State profile · Pennsylvania

Pennsylvania oversize and overweight permits

Legal limits, escort triggers, permit fees, the superload line and the police escort position for Pennsylvania — every figure carrying the state document behind it.

14 source documents on fileoldest revision 1981-01-17last retrieved 2026-09-017 escort rules in effect1 source conflictsFree · no account needed

The short version: a Pennsylvania single-trip permit starts at $0 before bands, overweight and the transaction charge; an escort is first required at over 13' wide; and the load becomes a superload at over 201,000 lb. Everything below carries the Pennsylvania document it came from, that document's own revision date, and the date we read it.

Escort requirements

2. When Pennsylvania requires an escort

MeasurementFirst escort triggerFirst police escort trigger
Widthover 13'rev. 1993-08-13 · read 2026-09-01None published
Heightover 14'6"rev. 1993-08-13 · read 2026-09-01None published
Lengthover 90'rev. 1993-08-13 · read 2026-09-01None published
Rear overhangover 15'rev. 1993-08-13 · read 2026-09-01None published
Gross weightNone publishedNone published
Every escort rule on file, in full7 rules

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Permit fees

3. Pennsylvania single-trip permit fees

ChargeAmount
Single-trip base$0rev. 2025-07-01 · read 2026-09-01
Transaction / card$1rev. 2025-01-01 · read 2026-09-01
Route analysis reviewNot yet covered
Route with no bridgesNot yet covered

Dimension bands

BandFee
under 14 ft wide — PennDOT current schedule$46rev. 2025-07-01 · read 2026-09-01
over 14 ft wide — PennDOT current schedule$97rev. 2025-07-01 · read 2026-09-01
up to 14 ft wide — 75 Pa.C.S. §1942 statutory amount$35rev. 2014-07-01 · read 2026-09-01
over 14 ft wide — 75 Pa.C.S. §1942 statutory amount$71rev. 2014-07-01 · read 2026-09-01

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Overweight

4. How Pennsylvania prices overweight

PennDOT's current schedule prints the same structure beside every single-trip row: "+ .04 ton-mile for overweight".

PennDOT — Hauling Permit Fees, effective July 1 2025 (PDF) — rev. 2025-07-01 · read 2026-09-01

Superload

5. Pennsylvania's superload threshold

Above one of these, the state stops issuing over the counter and prices the move after an engineering review.

TriggerThreshold
Gross weightover 201,000 lbrev. 2015-10-30 · read 2026-09-01
Widthover 16'rev. 2015-10-30 · read 2026-09-01
HeightNone published
Lengthover 160'rev. 2015-10-30 · read 2026-09-01
Short axle spacingNot yet covered

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Route survey

6. Route survey and bridge review

The dimensions at which Pennsylvania triggers a physical route inspection or an engineering review, and what the agency charges to review it.

MeasurementInspection / review trigger
WidthNot yet covered
Heightover 14'6"rev. 2020-02-19 · read 2026-09-01
LengthNot yet covered
Police escorts

7. Police escorts

Charges exist and no schedule is published. PennDOT publishes no numeric State Police escort rate — "State escort fees vary based on escort personnel status (e.g., overtime) and will be invoiced separately".

This is a positive finding: we searched and there is nothing to quote. It is not the same as "no police escort is ever required here".

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Travel restrictions

8. When you can move it

Holiday, curfew and night-travel windows are not yet encoded for Pennsylvania.

Pennsylvania spring thaw restrictions →

Why those windows are absent rather than estimated

They are not guessed at here. What we do publish is the seasonal weight-restriction picture, with the date we last read each state's own bulletin — a curfew invented from a plausible pattern is worth less than an honest gap, because a reader cannot tell the two apart on the page.

Who issues it

9. Permit office

The agency behind each figure above is linked from that figure. We publish no per-state permit-office phone number.

Why there is no phone number here

We are not publishing per-state permit-office phone numbers yet, and the reason is worth stating: the two seed lists available for them are both demonstrably stale — the federal one gives two different states the same phone number — and a wrong number on a page like this costs somebody a morning. The agency behind each figure above is linked from that figure, which is the part we can stand behind today.

Source conflicts

10. Where the sources disagree

Two official documents, both in effect, giving different answers. Neither has been adopted.

Every conflict across all states →

Scope

11. What this does not include

Named rather than gestured at, because each of these can exceed the permit itself. Every item is listed; open one for why it is excluded.

Line haul, fuel and driver time

This is a permit fee, not a freight rate.

Civilian pilot car rates

We hold no rate data, and the two commercial sites that publish market rates disagree by nearly a factor of two on the same service.

Route-survey engineering

The agency's review fee is shown where the state publishes one; the engineer's own fee is a private cost with no schedule.

Bonds and escrow

Set per move by the agency, and in at least one state the escort is billed at actual cost against it.

Utility coordination and line lifts

Arranged with each utility, priced by each utility.

Second-issuer permits

A toll, bridge or city authority inside the same state issues its own permit, and a state total that omits it is missing a whole permit.

Need a pilot car for this lane? Browse the pilot car & escort directory.

Price a lane through Pennsylvania →

Provenance

12. Every source behind this page (14)

Every document behind Pennsylvania14 sources
Common questions

Questions

How much is an oversize permit in Pennsylvania?

The single-trip base is $0, before the dimension bands, the overweight component and the transaction charge. The base alone is rarely what is paid.

When does Pennsylvania require a pilot car?

The first width trigger is over 13'.

What is a superload in Pennsylvania?

Pennsylvania's published gross-weight superload line is over 201,000 lb. It is not 80,000 lb; that is the federal legal gross limit, not a superload threshold.

Do Pennsylvania's own documents contradict each other?

Yes, in 1 place(s) we hold both documents for. They are set out in full above, each with its pinpoint citation, and none of them has been adopted.