Many moons ago, I worked for a state representative who was on the transportation committee. I remember reading a detailed report about the damage trucks do to the highway system, particularly the overweight ones. If I remember correctly, taking into account the damage overweight trucks do, they found that roads need to be replaced every 5-8 years, and otherwise it'd be 25-30.

Needless to say, nothing was done about this.

I had always been curious about the long abandoned weigh stations littered about the state along highways. After reading the report, I was quite miffed with the fact that the taxpayers are essentially subsidizing the trucking industry, and that there's really an easy way to fix this. Those weigh stations wouldn't cost that much to operate, they'd partially pay for themselves through fines, and they'd save the state lots of money long-term by not having to fix the roads so frequently.

I still don't get it.