Bucks lawmaker wants to block trucks from Yardley streets

A Pennsylvania lawmaker has started a petition drive to block trucks from taking a short cut through Bucks County towns he represents. 

Too much truck traffic is trying to avoid a weigh station as drivers enter Pennsylvania from New Jersey on I-95, said state Rep. Perry Warren, D-Bucks. The trucks roll right through Yardley and Lower Makefield instead.

“There’s a lot of traffic in town, the streets are narrow, the sidewalks are right up against the streets, and the buildings are virtually right up against the sidewalks,” he said. “There’s on-street parking on the already very narrow streets.”

Warren introduced a bill in Harrisburg to curtail the practice, but it was deemed illegal because the Pennsylvania Department of Transportation has determined the streets are safe for big trucks.

“What we’re asking, what we’re trying to do through the petition process, is to make PennDOT aware of it and ask them to take another another look at,” he said. “Particularly the impact on the communities and the safety.”