Police Planning Inspection Checkpoints

Watch out if you're trucking down Route 50 in Heidelberg. Police are ramping up truck inspections on the roadway as .

Eleven officers from four area departments stopped a couple dozen semi-trucks and other trucks pulling long trailers so they could inspect them Thursday. Halfway through the inspection, officers had pulled two trucks off the road and wrote six citations.

Heidelberg police Chief Vernon Barkley said they will increase the number of inspections for the rest of the year in an effort to keep construction contractors safe. He said some landscaping contractors are not aware that adding a trailer to the back of a truck requires the motorist to have a commercial drivers license.

“It’s for the safety of everybody,” Barkley said. “We’re double-checking that everything is in compliance because it becomes an ongoing safety hazard for the contractors working out here.”

Barkley said he recently spotted a landscaper who did not properly tie-down a leaf blower, causing the machine to fly out of the back and onto a patch of grass beside the road. He said an incident like that could be catastrophic if it happened in a work zone.

After a busy start to the day at 7 a.m., the number of trucks rumbling through town quickly decreased. Barkley said the first wave of truckers usually contact others on the radio to avoid the area.

“It doesn’t take long for word to get out that there’s a truck inspection on Route 50 or anywhere in Pennsylvania,” he said.

Officers funneled traffic down to one lane near the intersection with Collier Avenue. Certified inspectors from police departments in Heidelberg, Castle Shannon, Mt. Lebanon and Jefferson Hills helped with the checkpoint.