The Mississippi Department of Transportation (MDOT) will hold two press conferences today to demonstrate and discuss the implementation of the Smart Roadside System equipment recommended by Federal Highways to sort commercial vehicles to help enforcement officers focus on carriers with low safety ratings and out of date credentials and get them off the highways. 

    The first press conference will be held in the Tupelo area at 10:30 a.m. at the westbound weigh scales on U.S. Highway 78 near Fulton. The second will be held at 2:30 p.m. at the scales on the southbound side of I-55 near Nesbit.

     MDOT partnered with The Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration (FMCSA) to address the problem of unregistered, overweight, out-of-service commercial vehicles that are continuing to operate.  They awarded the MDOT Office of Enforcement a $3.5 million Commercial Vehicle Information Systems and Networks (CVISN) grant. The ultimate goal is to make highways safer by using more efficient ways to inspect trucks.

     Since Jan. 1, 2010, MDOT Enforcement Officers have inspected 63,432 of the 80,015 commercial vehicles inspected in Mississippi during that time.  With truck traffic increasing and resources decreasing, MDOT is utilizing “smart roadside” technology to inspect and weigh vehicles while they are traveling at regular speeds.

     Mississippi, using a three prong approach to cover the entire state and tie into a central data base for sharing information, is the first state in the United States to implement this system.

     Orange Grove, the fixed weigh station on I-10 at the Mississippi/Alabama line now has the latest technology in smart roadside mobile applications. Virtual weigh stations are installed on secondary roads used to by-pass the fixed scales and a mobile SRIS van (one of two in the nation) with infrared capability is deployed for use in remote areas or on highways without scales.

     Weigh-in-motion (WIM) sensors, license plate and DOT number readers, and overhead and infra-red cameras send information and images to data bases using wireless connections to obtain information on a truck that triggers the process at one of the installations. Using this information, the officers determine whether the vehicle is allowed to pass by or is instructed to stop for further inspection and credential verification.

     This process reduces the number of vehicles stopped randomly for routine inspections allowing the enforcement officers to focus on risky carriers while allowing legal carriers with good safety records to keep moving. Every minute a commercial vehicle is stopped costs the company $1.