BETHLEHEM TWP., Pa. — As the autumn wind blustered Thursday morning and the Route 33 traffic howled, Pennsylvania Secretary of Transportation Mike Carroll looked across the back lot of the William Penn Highway park-and-ride.
While the main lot was packed with passenger vehicles, the back lot was a ghost town. It would have been empty if not for a news conference with transportation VIPs, some local journalists and construction equipment serving as a backdrop.
"This here is our star pupil," Carroll said.
Earlier in the week, Gov. Josh Shapiro's administration announced it was creating more than 1,200 new truck parking spots across the commonwealth. Most of the spots are along highway shoulders, weigh stations or interchange ramps, but the park-and-ride will be able to serve at least 30 tractor-trailers with potential to add permanent amenities down the line, he said.
In addition to the William Penn Highway spots, PennDOT previously disclosed 18 new parking spots in the Lehigh Valley as part of the project, including:
- Five on the Interstate 78/Route 863 interchange in Weisenberg Township;
- Five on the Interstate 78/Route 412 interchange in Bethlehem;
- Eight on the Interstate 78/Route 611 interchange in Williams Township.
Pennsylvania and the Lehigh Valley in particular have experienced a logistics boom as developers have rushed in to construct warehouses and depots. Becky Bradley, executive director of the Lehigh Valley Planning Commission, said 100 million customers are within driving distance inside a single driver's shift from the Lehigh Valley.
But as big rigs have become an increasingly common sight on local roads, government and the private sector haven't created the truck parking spots needed to accommodate them, Carroll said.
Unused capacity
That's led truckers to take federally mandated breaks on the shoulders of local roads or idle their engines on the shoulders of highways as they wait for their appointed time to drop off cargo at a warehouse. The new spots are intended to put a dent in the truck parking deficit.
"As a commercial driver's license holder myself, I know how important this commonsense approach is to our economy and our workforce," Carroll said.
PennDOT built the park-and-ride back lot in the 2010s. At the time, the main lot was consistently near capacity, and planners anticipated more spots would be needed as more people moved to the area and looked to commute to New York City and local destinations, said Christopher Kufro, executive director of PennDOT District 5, which includes Lehigh and Northampton counties.
"Right in this vicinity, there currently — until this project — were about 100 truck parking spots. This project alone increases that number by a third."Becky Bradley, Lehigh Valley Planning Commission
But the extra commuters never materialized; demand wound up dropping after many employees shifted to remote work following the coronavirus pandemic, he said. Up to 1,000 spaces in the back lot go unused every day, he said.
Bradley said the Lehigh Valley Transportation Study singled out the lot as an ideal spot for truck potential parking back in 2020. Route 22, which she said serves at least 15,000 trucks a day, is less than two miles north. Interstate 78, which she said carries at least 20,000 trucks a day, is less than three miles south. The increasingly busy Route 33, which carries 8,300 trucks a day according to a November road survey, is a stone's throw away.
"Right in this vicinity, there currently — until this project — were about 100 truck parking spots. This project alone increases that number by a third," she said.
A needed resource
A 2024 report by the Eastern Pennsylvania Freight Alliance found there was a severe shortage of parking spots in much of northeastern and central Pennsylvania.
Despite the significant warehouse growth in the region, there are only four major truck parking areas in the Lehigh Valley — the Allentown Service Plaza off the Northeast Extension, the Onvo Travel Plaza in Weisenberg Township, the Easton area rest stop on Interstate 78, and the Trexler Truck Stop in Upper Macungie Township.
The new spots will give truckers a safe spot to sleep, take breaks or park while waiting for their drop-off window, Carroll said. The park-and-ride will feature port-a-potties as well, he said. Bradley added that creating the parking spots will allow drivers to legally shut off their trucks, which should improve the region's poor air quality.
But Carroll acknowledged the change will likely come with tradeoffs.
Garbage collection is a common problem at existing truck parking spots, and it may become an issue here, too, Carroll said. PennDOT crews and township police will need to stay on top of cleaning and litter enforcement, he said. And while the new spots will encourage drivers to stick to appropriate locations, it won't address the surge in truck traffic and warehouse proliferation that many locals oppose.
"The [challenge] for the Shapiro administration and PennDOT and a lot of our local partners is striking that fair balance between quality of life and economic development and opportunity. I think a project like this strikes that balance," he said.
