University of Washington

PACTRANS FUNDED RESEARCH LEADS TO WORKSHOP WITH LOCAL TRANSPORTATION OFFICIALS PacTrans PI and University of Idaho Assistant Professor of Civil and Environmental Engineering, Ahmed Ibrahim, has recently completed a PacTrans funded research project exploring the safety impacts of Idaho Rural Highways under 129K trucks. "A significant number of local highway jurisdictions in Idaho lack the engineering expertise and financial resources to conduct detailed assessments when requests are received to increase weight allowances for local roadways beyond the current legal limit for gross load weight of 80,000 pounds," states Dr. Ibrahim. "The Idaho Transportation Department has the engineering staff and database resources available to evaluate road and bridge capacities on state and federal highways; however, local highway districts may not have such resources. This limits the local districts' ability to expeditiously consider increased load requests, which in turn limits freight organizations' ability to operate more efficiently on rural highways resulting in less competitive Idaho industries." The primary objective of this project was to further develop guidance outlining procedures that can be used by local highway jurisdictions to evaluate 129,000-pound route requests. Procedures vary depending on the characteristics of the roadway. In some instances, full engineering analysis is not required, but the guidance aides local agencies in determining the level and process of review or engineering study is needed to evaluate requests. In March of 2018, subsequent to the completion of this project, local transportation officials from Latah and Nez Perce counties and the Nez Perce Tribe, commissioned a workshop where Dr. Ibrahim had the opportunity to present his work, his findings, and the newly developed guidelines to help transportation officials assess the impact of the 129,000 lb trucks on the local highway network. 11 2017 – 2018 Annual Report

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