This paper summarizes the California Department of Transportation's (Caltrans) successful demonstration of a virtual weigh station at Cordelia, California. Live Images of trucks, associated with their weight data were first in show at the 12th World Congress in San Francisco, California, UnitedStates of America (USA) in November 2005. Those images and data were the first from a prototype hardware and software demonstration completed just in time for the San Francisco event. Adding technology to existing weigh in motion (WIM) sites and upgrading them to become virtual weigh stations, providing both the weight data and the identity of the truck, shows promise in providing law enforcement with a new tool for enforcing truck weight regulations. - Caltrans started a public/private partnership to investigate use of emerging technologies to upgrade the WIM sites to become virtual weigh stations. This work is ongoing, and is still in the investigation and development phase. - Other states in the USA are also recognizing the need to use technology instead of manpower to address the problem. These states are investigating the technology to assist their law enforcement officers. California and other states recognize that there are significant institutional issues surrounding the use of these technologies, and work is inprogress to address them. At a minimum these include the right to privacyand homeland security issues in the USA. For the covering abstract see ITRD E134653.
Abstract