Political Quotes

“I rise today with my good friends and neighbors from New England--Senators Susan Collins and Olympia Snowe from Maine--to introduce a bill that would allow Vermont and Maine to set the appropriate truck-weight standards on the interstates in their states. For too long, Vermont and Maine have been at a competitive disadvantage while our next-door neighbors in New York, New Hampshire, Massachusetts, and Quebec have enjoyed the economic benefits that come with higher highway truck weight limits. Due to these restrictions, the heaviest truck traffic in Vermont and Maine must travel over smaller and narrower roadways, creating significant safety concerns for pedestrians and motorists and putting pressure on our already overburdened secondary roads and bridges. That is why Senator Collins and I included language in the 2010 transportation funding bill to implement pilot programs that allowed heavier trucks on interstates in Vermont and Maine for one year and studied the impacts of this policy change on highway safety, bridge and road durability, commerce, truck volumes, and energy use in Vermont. During the past year I have heard from a number of Vermont truckers, business owners, and state and local officials who support extending the pilot program because of the economic and safety benefits they saw when the trucks were on the Interstates. Most importantly, many Vermonters reported a significant reduction of heavy truck traffic in our downtowns and villages.”