An Evaluation of Montana's State Truck Activities Reporting System (Addendum)

To refine and improve the way that data from Montana’s State Truck Activities Reporting System (STARS) is processed to make it a more effective tool for planning weight enforcement activities by the Montana Department of Transportation (MDT).

Since its deployment and activation five years ago, STARS has provided valuable information to MDT on commercial vehicle activity on the state’s highways. Using this system, data on vehicle weight and configuration is continuously being collected around the state using sensors embedded in the roads. This data is processed to assist MDT with a variety of functions such as vehicle weight enforcement, road design, and transportation planning. This addendum to the STARS evaluation will address issues that MDT has determined will make STARS even more effective in its weight enforcement role. These issues include: 1) refining the data collection methods to identify permitted overweight vehicles; 2) determining how infrastructure damage attributed to overweight vehicles can be quantified to account for changes in traffic volume; 3) investigating how level of enforcement effort can be factored into the STARS database; and 4) exploring how STARS-based data on overweight vehicle activity can become a part of the federal weight enforcement plan and certification process.