Truck speed limit reduced in Indiana

Chesterton, Indiana announced a speed reduction for trucks on Ind.49.

Weeks after the announcement of plans to reduce truck speed limits, Chesterton officials, in collaboration with the Indiana Department of Transportation, installed signs reducing truck speed limits from 50 mph to 40 mph.

The permitted speed applies to Ind. 49 between I-94 interchange and Indiana Toll Road. This speed must be observed by drivers of vehicles weighing over 13 tons.

Chesterton Police Chief Tim Richardson explained the reasoning for lowering the speed limit for trucks only: “The sheer dynamics of Ind. 49 in Chesterton and the way you’re coming over hills and around curves, lowering the speed limit to 40 is not meant to punish the truckers, because they’re very important and vital to our society today. But by the sheer dynamics, it gives them more stopping distance at traffic lights and we hope that greatly improves safety. We didn’t want to punish motorists, Chesterton residents and people passing through, by making them do 40. The dynamic really affects the truckers because of their weight and their stopping distances.”

“If the speed for trucks is 50, they’re doing 58, and that’s way too fast to to stop in time when they’re coming over the overpass or around those curves,” Richardson added. “If it says 40, we hope they stay between 40 and 46 or 47 and then they’ll have the right stopping distance.”

Workers from the Indiana Department of Transportation have completed three turnaround tunnels midway between East Porter Ave. and the Indiana Toll Road, which would allow local police to conduct patrols to “monitor traffic lights, vehicle speeds and truck lanes.” The police are now able to “perform U-turns in a timely manner, identifying violations in oncoming traffic lanes.”