Weight restrictions have gone up on area roads as winter turns to spring. This annual posting poses problems for businesses that require heavy vehicles to haul goods and services. Governments put the restrictions on this time of year to save roads made soft by thawing.
One group hit with the restrictions are loggers. Great Lakes Timber Professionals Director Henry Schienebeck says they know the spring thaw is coming each year, the only question is when...
"A lot of the guys stockpile wood. Production is usually pretty good in the winter with tghe exception of this winter with the really deep snow in some areas. That did hamper production quite a bit. A lot of times we'll cut wood and stockpile it on a Class "A" road for delivery during the spring thaw period...."
Schienebeck says the state could also help out by changing how roads are funded. He noted in his blog that town government has 62,000 miles of roads comprising just over 53 percent of the transportation system. He says town governments receive only 5 percent of the funding pot. ...
"Local units of government struggle. They don't get a lot of money per mile for those roads. It's getting difficult for them to keep up with maintenance. So as far as our organization goes, we're hand-in-hand with the towns and the counties so we have access to that first mile..."
He says many loggers and wood consumers have invested thousands of dollars for gravel and grading on roads for which road aids have been paid. Despite these actions, the use of weight limits and “Class B” restrictions have increased dramatically as local governments try to increase the life of roads already several years beyond their projected life expectancy.
