Trucking groups, including OOIDA, have consistently pushed back against proposed increases in truck weight limits.
Safety is at the forefront of that opposition, while the Association has also outlined the potential financial fallout.
“Increasing size and weight is all cost and no benefit for truckers,” OOIDA wrote to transportation leaders in the House and Senate in August 2025. “Heavier trucks would also accelerate damage on our already-crumbling infrastructure, creating additional costs for truckers and the government.”
In a May 5 letter sent to the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee, Senate Commerce, Science and Transportation Committee and House Committee on Transportation and Infrastructure, the law enforcement board of the Coalition Against Bigger Trucks made a case for maintaining current truck size and weight limits.
“We urge Congress to maintain current truck size and weight limits to protect public safety and to save lives, including supporting the officers who risk their lives every day responding to road incidents,” the law enforcement board of the Coalition Against Bigger Trucks wrote in the letter to lawmakers.
The board, featuring more than 100 years of law enforcement experience, said numerous studies have shown that a bigger truck is a more dangerous truck.
Data from the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration indicating a 36.6% increase in fatalities from crashes involving a large truck between 2014 and 2024 was also cited in the letter.
“Members of Congress need to listen to law enforcement on the dangers of heavier trucks,” Steven Casstevens, retired police chief and member of CABT’s law enforcement board, said. “Unlike those pushing for heavier trucks, law enforcement has no financial stake in the outcome of this debate. We have sworn an oath to serve and protect, and that is where our opposition comes from.”
Last year, the Coalition Against Bigger Trucks released a study stating that increasing the maximum truck weight to 91,000 pounds could put as many as 80,000 bridges at risk.
According to the American Society of Civil Engineers’ 2025 Report Card, American roads received a D+, and bridges were a C.
The letter concluded by saying that arguments in support of heavier trucks miss a key point – physics.
There is not one argument that can be made that is worth a person’s life, the coalition said. LL
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