The trucking industry has been making special deliveries in Washington, spending millions of dollars on lobbyists and in congressional campaign contributions in a new push to eliminate federal safety rules that limit the size of trucks.

A $55.3 billion transportation funding bill making its way through Congress does just that. It would allow the maximum length of each trailer in a tandem rig to rise from 28 feet to 33 feet, or a combined length of 66 feet rather than 56 feet — not counting the length of the cab and the spaces between the cab and the lead trailer and between the lead and second trailers. In all, some rigs would exceed 90 feet. The longer trucks could carry 18 percent more freight by volume but still would be bound by the federal 80,000-pound weight limit.

The industry claims that the longer trucks will be no less safe than current rigs, but Advocates for Highway and Auto Safety cite data showing that the crash rate for tandem trailers already is 15 percent higher than for single units. Making the rigs longer inevitably would make them more difficult to control and stop, especially amid adverse weather and road conditions. And there can be no safety advantage to making the huge, slow-moving rigs even more difficult to pass.

Apparently, the trucking industry and its dependents in Congress believe that the answer to the nation’s badly stressed highway and bridges is to put bigger trucks on them.

In a further bow to the industry, the bill would kill an effort to increase minimum liability insurance requirements on trucks, which has remained at $750,000 for 30 years, and lifts some restrictions on driving hours for operators — further diminishing safety and compensation for people injured in truck crashes.

U.S. Rep. Lou Barletta, the 11th District Republican from Hazleton, was instrumental in delaying a previous industry effort to trade safety for lower costs. He rightly argued that the bigger trucks pose special hazards when they leave the interstate highways and enter towns with roads incapable of handling them. He should renew that effort, and Congress should join him in elevating safety above profits.

— Pottsville Republican & Evening Herald