US Senate could allow big trucks in Maine and Vt.

PORTLAND, Maine

The U.S. Senate is considering a measure that would allow heavy trucks to use interstate highways in Maine and Vermont.

Republican Sen. Susan Collins of Maine and Democrat Sen. Patrick Leahy of Vermont say they helped place a provision in the 2012 transportation funding bill that would keep the trucks on the interstates permanently rather than forcing them to use secondary roads.

Currently, trucks weighing between 80,000 and 100,000 pounds are forbidden from using the interstates and they must use secondary roads that pass through towns in Maine and Vermont.

A one-year pilot project that allowed the heavier trucks to use the interstates ended in December 2009. During the pilot project the heavy trucks disappeared almost completely from the secondary roads.