SageBrush said:
And mine too.
When truckers are paying their currently externalized costs, transportation will seek solutions. It might be less use of trucks, but my guess is more axles and more wheels. It will only happen when costs are not swept under the carpet.
More axles and wheels can help with axle weight, but then you get into gross weight limits on bridges and overpasses, which would still require you to limit the max. gross, thus reducing the payload and raising the cost of shipping (not to mention increasing the cost of trailers, further boosting the shipping cost). Assuming that politicians can ever be convinced to raise weight-based fees to make trucks pay their full share, I suspect that won't occur until we see a large % of autonomous long-haul trucks in the fleet. That way, the companies can offset the higher road fees by eliminating the cost of drivers, and the weight/space dedicated to them.