By Wendy Leavitt, director of editorial development
Since November of 2007, when the State of Rhode Island imposed weight restrictions and later axle limits on the aging Pawtucket Bridge, which carries I-95, state troopers have issued almost $7 million in bridge-related citations and fines to truck drivers and to the companies for whom they work. Drivers are ticketed $85 for failure to comply with posted bridge detour signs. Fines of $3,000 are also levied against the fleets that own those trucks for violating the 2008 law which imposed the current two-axle limit.
Things are not going to get better soon, either. Bridge replacement is not expected to be fully complete until June of 2013, although all traffic is expected to be crossing over new bridge structures by May of 2012.
“Over the past couple of years, we have found deficiencies in the structure of the bridge,” Frank Corrao, deputy chief engineer for the Rhode Island Department of Transportation, told Fleet Owner. That explains why the state now restricts bridge use to vehicles weighing less than 18,000 pounds and/or having more than two axles.
What it does not explain is why truckers persist in making that, now very expensive, transit over the bridge. Corrao, like many fleet owners paying fines and the attorneys representing them, said he is not sure why drivers keep crossing.
“About 170,000 vehicles per day crossed the bridge before,” Corrao noted. “Normally, ten to eighteen percent of those would be trucks. [Now that the bridge restrictions are in place] there are a few detours truckers can take instead, like I-295 coming from the south. We have a detour sign posted ten to fifteen miles before the exit to 295 and there is also a big overhead, interactive warning sign as you get closer to the bridge. Even if a trucker comes from the City of Providence, we tell them to get off Route 95 and take the detour. Truckers do not have to go over the bridge.”
Attorney Patrick Quinlin, who has handled some 200 cases involving trucks on the Pawtucket Bridge, is less positive about the effectiveness of the warning signs. “The signage is confusing,” he told Fleet Owner, “and the bridge just looks like another overpass, not an actual bridge, even though the river flows some 90 feet below it.”
MultiService, which has been working with Quinlin on behalf of its customers, says that it is not the restrictions that are a concern, it is the signage. “Time and again we have heard complaints regarding inappropriate signage and communication of these restrictions,” noted a MultiService spokesperson. “If there are serious safety concerns associated with large vehicles traveling this bridge…it seems as though signage should be improved.”
According to Quinlin, the language of the signs is unclear, although he notes that the DOT has made improvements to the southbound signage, which “have made it a little better.” The sign reads: “Truck Detour, Pawtucket Bridge. Weight limit 18 tons. Axle limit 2 per unit. Use I-295 North—Exit 11, $3,000 fine.”
Read More at FleetOwner.com