Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper has named Chuck Strahl the country’s new transport minister.

New Mexico is considering closng 13 of its 32 highway rest areas because of a budget shortfall.

One of the last toll-free bridges across the Delaware River would charge truck tolls of $4 an axle under a plan to seek private investors to rebuild and operate the Interstate 95 Bridge that connects Pennsylvania and New Jersey.

Twenty-five percent of the nation’s 603,000 bridges are structurally deficient in some way, but the federal government lacks the analytic and procedural tools to determine what impact federal bridge money would have in addressing the problem, a Government Accountability Office report said.

In a plea to the Pennsylvania State Legislature to hold a special session on transportation funding, Gov. Edward Rendell (D) recently told members of the Senate Transportation Committee that, collectively in their 13 districts, they have 1,970 structurally deficient bridges.

Florida and Louisiana are among six states this year to pass anti-indemnification laws that prohibit contractors from shifting insurance liabilities onto truckers.

As of this month, under a new Georgia law carriers in that state can no longer be forced to accept unwarranted insurance liability in order to get a special permit.

Truckers without E-ZPass will pay about 10% more than they do today to run the Pennsylvania Turnpike under a new rate schedule scheduled to take effect in January.

New Jersey has exempted truck drivers using with CBs and two-way radios from its prohibition against using handheld communication devices while driving.

Virginia Gov. Bob McDonnell (R) wants to take the state out of the retail liquor business by privatizing its system of state-owned stores in order to generate much-needed cash for transportation projects.