Trucks crashing into Thruway bridges are a 'plague.' Who pays for repairs, traffic misery?

The sun had been up for about 20 minutes when Ivan Varava drove his black Peterbilt tractor-trailer south on the New York State Thruway into South Nyack on Aug. 31, 2023. He was a long way from his home in Hollywood, Florida, as Labor Day weekend approached.

The 39-year-old trucker’s trip had begun days earlier and 1,404 miles west, in Salina, Kansas, where he had lashed a massive steel tower to his flatbed trailer. Varava, the Peterbilt and the tower were bound for Bridgeport, Connecticut, getting closer by the minute at 6:44 a.m.

Even if I-95 didn’t cooperate — and when did it ever cooperate? — there was still a decent chance he’d arrive in Bridgeport by 8:30. In South Nyack, Varava could see the Hudson River shimmering a third of a mile away as he approached the twin-span Gov. Mario M. Cuomo Bridge. The road was clear and dry. If things went his way, he could be in Bridgeport in just over an hour.

But things did not go Ivan Varava’s way. They went spectacularly not his way.

And because of that, things went spectacularly not the way of thousands of drivers behind him.

Varava’s load was too tall. The tower slammed into the South Broadway overpass. He managed to force his way through, but two of the overpass’ 100-foot girders were damaged. He pulled his rig off to the right shoulder, where New York State Police Trooper Javier Caceres soon issued him three tickets. Varava was taken to Nyack Hospital for observation.

But the damage was already done, to the South Broadway overpass and to traffic flow.

Five lanes would choke down to two, backing up the Thruway past Airmont Road in Suffern and creating more than 11 miles of bumper-to-bumper traffic on the last unofficial Thursday of the summer, all of it moving at a crawl, if at all. It would be 12 hours before all lanes were reopened.

Ivan Varava's truck, after the damage was done.

Thruway damage done had to be undone

In the days that followed, engineers monitoring the crippled overpass noticed the damaged girders were splitting. Eight days after the crash, the entire southbound Thruway was shut for 16 hours in South Nyack for emergency repairs to cut away the damaged steel and narrow the South Broadway road deck. Thruway traffic was diverted to the Bear Mountain, Newburgh-Beacon or George Washington bridges.

As anyone who has driven the passenger-car-only parkways in Westchester or Rockland can attest, trucks hitting bridges are a way of suburban life, particularly on Westchester's Hutchinson River Parkway, a perennial victim of oversized trucks. But on the New York State Thruway?

Yes. On the Thruway.

Gov. Kathy Hochul noted the rise in the number of bridges being struck by commercial truck operators, box truck renters and moving-company truckers who don't know or don't care how tall their vehicles are. State law sets the maximum vehicle height at 13 feet, 6 inches.

From 2021 through 2022, there were 808 reported bridge hits across New York state, Hochul said. In 2023, there were 101 reported bridge hits on the Thruway alone, a 60% rise from the 63 in 2022.

Through the first week of October, there were 41 bridge hits on the Thruway in 2024.

Thruway Executive Director Frank Hoare casts the problem in biblical terms, calling bridge hits "a plague that's hitting every transportation authority and entity in the country."

Hoare said the post-pandemic boom in commercial traffic (all that online shopping) has spiked demand for drivers, and companies are hiring truckers who haven't logged the miles and who cut corners. Driver inexperience and failure to follow safety checks is to blame, he said.

"That's not an excuse. They still have commercial drivers licenses, CDLs, which means they are held to high standards," Hoare said. "They're expected to know what the driving standards are and what the requirements are. They're not doing what they're supposed to do before they take off."

Adding insult to injury — when bridges are hit and taken out of commission, and traffic backs up for miles (including trucks whose drivers follow the law) — truckers face traffic fines that amount to a slap on the wrist.

Our investigation looks at truckers, the court, bridge heights and demands for restitution

If it's a plague, the South Broadway bridge could be its poster child. In the past 25 months, five over-height tractor-trailers have slammed into the overpass. On: Sept. 16, 2022; Nov. 2, 2022; April 7, 2023; Aug. 31, 2023; and July 31, 2024.

A Journal News/lohud investigation has tracked what happened to the truckers in each of the crashes, as their cases went through Orangetown Town Court. The total fines paid thus far — $1,051, with one still to be determined — wouldn't fill the gas tanks of two dozen of the thousands of frustrated drivers who endured the soul-sucking traffic jams the crashes caused. One trucker lost his driving privileges, but not because he crashed into the overpass; he was a no-show in court.

We also examined bridge heights along the entire Thruway. Our analysis found that before the August 2023 crash, there was no Thruway overpass that had travel lanes with lower clearances than the South Broadway bridge. If there can be a silver lining to the bridge hits, it is two-fold: that no one has yet been killed or seriously injured, and that cutting away the damaged girders actually increased the clearance by up to 6 inches. (And still it was hit again.)

We wondered who paid when bridges are damaged and looked at the Thruway’s efforts to seek restitution. These are handled on a case-by-case basis, and can take years to resolve. The Thruway has submitted bills for damage in three of the five recent strikes in South Nyack. There was no damage done in the strike on Sept. 16, 2022, and the Thruway is still processing a potential damage claim for the most recent crash, on July 31, 2024. The bill for the Varava crash? A whopping $2.1 million.

The Thruway also seeks reimbursement when the actions of others affect toll receipts, the authority’s principal revenue stream. We revisited the case of “The Tappan Zee Dangler,” whose 2011 protest — lowering himself over the side of the original Tappan Zee Bridge to assail his treatment by Rockland County employers — snarled traffic and had the Thruway demanding, and eventually winning, restitution.

The Thruway plans to replace the South Broadway bridge, but its timeline suggests it lacks the urgency that locals feel about solving the problem in South Nyack.

Older than the original TZ Bridge, South Broadway bridge took a back seat while others were replaced

The South Broadway bridge in South Nyack was built in 1953, two years before the original Tappan Zee Bridge opened.

When the Tappan Zee was dismantled and replaced by a gleaming $4.5 billion bridge, northbound drivers were still welcomed to the Rockland shore by the South Broadway bridge’s rusting green girders.

The Thruway replaced three other Rockland overpasses in 2020 and 2021 — two of them just as old as the one at South Broadway, with higher clearances — at a cost of $30.8 million.

The College Road bridge (at milepost 26.37) re-opened Nov. 24, 2021. Built in 1953, its original clearance was 14 feet, 3 inches. The Scotland Hill Road bridge (at milepost 23.62) re-opened Nov. 1, 2021. Built in 1953, its original clearance was 14 feet, 3 inches. The Hungry Hollow Road bridge (at milepost 24.62) re-opened Nov. 27, 2020. Built in 1955, its original clearance was 14 feet, 2 inches.

The rebuilt bridges have clearances of 16 feet, 6 inches.

How the South Broadway bridge got taller

The New York State Thruway stretches 570 miles, from the New York City line in Yonkers to Buffalo, with hundreds of bridges along the way. They’re called “bridges” whether they go over or under the Thruway.

The Thruway is continually inspecting, maintaining and replacing its bridges, the average age of which is 56 years. Its Minimum Vertical Clearance database lists every bridge on the Thruway — along with the Garden State Parkway extension to the New Jersey line, New York’s section of the New England Thruway, and Route 90 as it extends from Albany to the Connecticut line.

The spreadsheet lists 817 bridges — 683 on the New York State Thruway alone — with the clearance height for each travel lane, a notation of the most recent measurement, and when it was taken.

According to a Journal News/lohud analysis of the database, as of May 2024 there was no Thruway overpass that had travel lanes with a lower clearance than the South Broadway bridge in South Nyack. (One mile north, the Thruway’s northbound shoulder under the Mountainview Avenue Bridge was measured at 13.60 feet.)

The South Broadway bridge listed clearances that ranged from 14 feet in the far-left travel lane, to 14.3 feet at the far right shoulder.

Then came Ivan Varava and his Peterbilt.

When pressed for new measurements that reflected clearances after the emergency repairs of last September, the Thruway came up with measurements taken on July 11, 2024. Clearances at the South Broadway bridge have changed. The bridge got taller.

• In the left lane, to 14.5 feet from 14 feet;

• In the second lane from the left, to 14.58 feet from 14.17 feet;

• In the third and fourth lanes from the left, to 14.42 feet from 14.17 feet;

• In the rightmost lane, to 14.42 from 14.29 feet;

• At the right shoulder, to 14.5 feet from 14.33 feet.

And yet, it still wasn't tall enough to avoid another bridge strike, on July 31, 2024.

Thruway plans to replace two Nyack bridges

More than 85 Thruway bridges are slated to be replaced within the next decade, at a cost of roughly $800 million in 2024 dollars.

That includes replacing the South Broadway bridge and the Mountainview Avenue bridge in Central Nyack by the end of 2028, combining two major projects within a 1.6-mile corridor from milepost 16.4 to milepost 18. Both of the new spans would have clearances of 16 feet, 6 inches.

When asked if he is comfortable with the 2028 timeline, Thruway boss Frank Hoare minced no words.

"I feel perfectly comfortable because the decisions are based on safety and the condition of the bridge," he said. "The bridges are constantly monitored for safety by our maintenance personnel. And every two years, we are required under federal guidelines to attest to the safety of that bridge."

If things change, Hoare said, the Thruway will do what it did in the days after the Varava crash; it will adjust.

"I can assure the residents of Rockland or of any county traveling on that stretch of Thruway, that the road, the roadway itself and the bridges that span it are absolutely safe," Hoare said.

‘Groundhog Day’ in South Nyack

While 2028 is not soon, it can't come soon enough for Rocklanders, for whom bridge backups resemble the movie “Groundhog Day,” the story of events repeating themselves with no hope of a different outcome.

Each South Broadway bridge strike brings the same questions: Why does this keep happening? Did recent paving raise the roadbed? Has the bridge begun to sag from all the wear and tear? And: Why can’t something be done?

The Thruway has a go-to answer that places the blame squarely where it belongs. This is not a low bridge issue, they say, but an over-height truck issue. If truckers would seek the proper permits, the permitting system would tell them where to drive, and that driving a truck that is nearly a foot over the legal limit is a recipe for disaster.

Facebook user Dori Horowitz jokingly posted a photo of an oversized plywood duck near an overpass, its wing extended over the roadway, the other holding a sign that reads: “You must be this tall to fit under the bridge.”

The Thruway agrees. If truckers drove trucks that were the legal height of 13 feet 6 inches, there would be no problem. No duck required.

Thruway boss Hoare said: "The lowest of our bridges is 14 feet, 2 inches. And most of them are 14 feet 6 inches. So at the very minimum, we're giving them 8 inches of leeway. It's mind-boggling to me how they can miss 8 inches. Eight inches is significant."

The question of the 2022 repaving in South Nyack — if the roadbed rose and lowered the clearance — was countered by measurements taken in 2023 and again this July. The bridge's clearance is actually higher than it has ever been.

New York has checkpoints to catch tall trucks

The Thruway is testing ways of cracking down on over-height trucks.

For three days in September, trucks were diverted into the tandem lot on the northbound Thruway near Sloatsburg. A motion-detector was rigged up as a de facto height sensor. State troopers at the checkpoint wrote 561 violations, 17 of which were for oversized vehicles.

Then the state troopers and Thruway team did something unusual: The over-height trucks were turned around and sent back to New Jersey's Route 17, the drivers told to find a route where they wouldn't hit a bridge.

"Which is what they were supposed to do but didn't, either because they didn't know or they decided to take the risk," Hoare said. "What we did was what they should have done from the get-go, from when they started their trip."

Hoare said another checkpoint was set up between Utica and Syracuse this month, with more to come. He said he hopes truckers, who communicate all the time about road conditions, will spread the word about the checkpoints, that the Thruway is cracking down.

To Eric Noble, regional manager for instruction at 160 Driving Academy, which partners with SUNY Rockland to help new truckers earn their commercial drivers licenses, bridge strikes can be described in two words: Driver error.

“Drivers should always be aware of their vehicle height and the bridges on their route,” Noble said. “Pre-planning a route is extremely important, and they should be aware of the vehicle height before departing.”

The Thruway also has a public-service campaign aimed at truckers. "Check Your Height, Know It's Right" reminds truckers: "GPS doesn't know your height. You should."

The Thruway has a public service campaign aimed at over-height trucks.

Seasoned truckers with schedules to keep must endure the same bridge-hit backups as regular motorists.

Chet Gordon, a former Journal News photographer, has been a driver for Prime Inc., the largest refrigerated trucking company in the U.S., for eight years.

“Every time I turn the key, I'm working. Every time I start the truck. It's a commercial vehicle, it's for commerce, it's for moving freight. I'm a professional driver. You're supposed to know better,” Gordon said.

2 years, 1 overpass, 5 crashes

The Thruway has its own New York State Police barracks, at Troop T in Tarrytown, where troopers respond to accidents, spills, and disabled vehicles up and down the lower Thruway.

There is no Thruway court. Depending on where an incident occurs, a case on or around the bridge could end up in Greenburgh, Tarrytown or Orangetown courtrooms. The South Nyack bridge strikes all ended up in Orangetown Town Court, which has to parse two sets of traffic laws with different fines and penalties: There are Vehicle and Traffic Laws and New York State Thruway regulations.

The courts don’t deal with the impact of the crashes, the inconvenience and delay they cause for commuters, tourists or fellow truckers with schedules to keep. They deal only with the traffic infractions. And judges have great discretion in assessing fines.

Ivan Varava wasn’t the first trucker to crash his big rig into the South Broadway overpass in recent years. Nor was he the last. Here’s a look at the cases, and how they ended up, according to documents provided by the New York State Police and Orangetown Town Court.

Sept. 16, 2022 at 6:13 p.m. | Esmatullah Sarwarzai

According to New York State Police, at 6:13 p.m. on Sept. 16, 2022, Esmatullah Jan Sarwarzai, of New Haven, Connecticut, was southbound in the middle lane when the shipping container he was hauling struck the South Broadway overpass and fell on top of a vehicle in the middle lane.

Sarwarzai was ticketed for driving an over-height vehicle (over the legal limit of 13 feet, 6 inches). The supporting deposition, filed by State Trooper Jaroslaw Kopcza, said Sarwarzai’s rig measured 14 feet, 3 inches. The case went to Orangetown Town Court, where he pleaded guilty to a “stop/park violation,” meaning he admitted to illegally stopping on a highway. He paid a $125 fine on Sept. 25, 2023, more than a year after the accident.

The driver and passenger in the second vehicle — Joseph and Angela Bologna of Tappan — were treated at the hospital for minor injuries and released. The Bolognas wouldn't comment about the case, and how close they came to being injured. Sarwarzai did not return calls seeking comment.

Nov. 2, 2022 at 7 a.m. | Luis Plaza Soto

At 7 a.m., on Nov. 2, 2022, Luis Plaza Soto of Waterbury, Connecticut, was driving his red 2017 Freightliner southbound when he struck the South Broadway overpass. Soto was ticketed for driving a vehicle taller than 13.5 feet. State Trooper Jaroslaw Kopcza, in his supporting deposition, said Plaza Soto’s truck measured 14 feet, 4.5 inches. Plaza Soto pleaded guilty in Orangetown Court to the over-height-vehicle violation and paid the $168 fine on Jan. 26, 2023. Efforts to locate him were unsuccessful.

April 7, 2023 at 9:21 p.m. | Mehbob Singh

On April 7, 2023, Mehbob Singh of South Richmond Hill in Queens crashed into the South Broadway overpass at 9:21 p.m., and kept going. The deposition by Trooper David Miranda cited Singh for depositing refuse on the highway, noting Singh “struck Broadway overpass and left the scene with roof of trailer in the lane.” Singh never showed up to face the charge and, on April 22, 2024, his license was suspended for failure to appear. Efforts to locate Singh also were unsuccessful.

Aug. 31, 2023 at 6:25 a.m. | Ivan Varava

Varava’s too-tall cargo crippled the overpass, knotting the Thruway for a dozen hours after his crash. He faced three violations: for over-height vehicle, for “unsafe vehicle for use upon the Thruway,” and for “interfering with the free, orderly and safe flow of traffic on the Thruway.” On Aug. 27, 2024 — four days before the one-year anniversary of the incident — he pleaded guilty in an arrangement approved by Orangetown Town Attorney Robert Magrino. The interfering-with-traffic-flow ticket was dismissed and Varava pleaded guilty to the unsafe vehicle and over-height-vehicle tickets. He paid a $758 fine on Sept. 19, 2024.

July 31, 2024 at 7:26 a.m. | Reynold Angeles Marte

At 7:26 a.m. on July 31, 2024, 11 months after Varava’s crash buckled the South Nyack overpass, what was left of the now-taller bridge was struck yet again.

Reynold Angeles Marte of Jersey City, New Jersey, was hauling a rock crusher that struck the overpass. The rock crusher and trailer overturned and debris from the trailer struck and damaged the rear of a vehicle in an adjacent lane. No injuries were reported by Angeles Marte or the driver of the adjacent vehicle. He was ticketed for driving an over-height vehicle, and for not having a Thruway hauling permit.

There is no accompanying supporting deposition showing the height of Angeles Marte's truck, but the Thruway's measurements, taken 20 days before the crash, suggest it had to be taller than 14 feet, 5 inches to make contact with the overpass. That means it was nearly a foot over the legal limit.

Calls to Angeles Marte’s attorney, Dino Mountroukas, of Hartsdale, were not returned.

Special hauling permits

The Thruway accommodates millions of vehicles each year and issues special hauling permits for oversized vehicles and loads, those larger than the legal size and weight set in the state’s Vehicle and Traffic Law. In 2023, there were 62,746 oversized permits issued. According to the Thruway’s Special Hauling Permit Program guidelines, criteria include vehicles that are heavier, wider or longer than permitted, or whose loads overhang their trailers.

As for height, the Thruway has more rules, and puts limits on where and how over-height vehicles can travel. The Thruway itself is not immune to size restrictions. When the Cuomo bridge was under construction, the project’s massive blue girders were too large to transport by Thruway. They were shipped down the Hudson, instead.

When the Thruway comes calling, seeking payment

The Thruway is setting up checkpoints and doing public-service campaigns. But the Thruway also has lawyers. While the actual bridge-strike violations are dealt with in local traffic courts, the Thruway Authority submits bills to drivers and companies whose drivers damage Thruway property.

The law is on the Thruway’s side. Vehicle Traffic Law 385 reads: “Any damage to highways, bridges or highway structures resulting from the use of a vehicle exceeding thirteen feet in height where such excess height is the proximate cause of the accident shall be compensated for by the owner and operator of such vehicle.”

There is no ironclad Thruway policy on when to seek restitution for damage. If, for example, a tractor-trailer is cut off by another motorist and the driver swerves to avoid contact and jack-knifes, that might not rise to a level of damage where the Thruway would seek restitution.

Jennifer Givner, the Thruway’s director of media relations, said in a statement: “The Thruway Authority is committed to vigorously pursuing claims from motorists who damage Thruway property and equipment and inconvenience our customers.”

“Vigorously pursuing claims” typically starts with a letter to the vehicle’s registered owner, reminding them of their responsibility.

The Thruway Authority’s Claims Unit processes more than a thousand property and equipment damage claims a year, most of which are processed in house, with the gathering of police reports, invoices and damage estimates, invoicing insurance companies to make claims or billing the owner of an uninsured vehicle. If the claims unit hits a roadblock, the matter is referred to the attorney general’s office.

The toll for one bridge strike: A whopping $2.1 million

It works. Through September, the Thruway this year has recovered $7,100,000 for damages to its property. That’s already more than was collected last year.

In 2023, it collected $6,428,000. In 2022, it pulled in $6,024,000.

If money is recovered from Varava and his employer, it could take years to arrive. The figures cited above represent the final fruits of years of back-and-forth with lawyers and insurance companies and litigation to cover all sorts of damage, from guiderails and light towers to bridge hits and equipment.

The Thruway is pursuing restitution from Varava and the insurers for San Trans Inc of Bartlett, Illinois, for whom he was driving. The total damages sought: $2.1 million.

"That is based on our actual real cost, we don't make it up," Hoare said. "That included the cost of removing the damaged girders and the inspections that had to take place. The (bridge) was inspected multiple times a day for the next week. Those girders, the damage to them was increasing, they were splitting, and now we have a real safety issue to the road above and something coming down on the Thruway.

"So it's the inspections cost, it's the removal of the damaged materials and going in to do the repairs as well as our lost revenue. We calculated our lost revenue at about $422,000. So we included that in our $2.1 million claim," Hoare said.

The problem, he said, is that the insurance policy's limit is $1 million, meaning that Thruway lawyers will have a choice to make: Accept less than half the amount due or have the attorney general's office sue the trucking company and, possibly, Varava himself.

"No decision has been made yet," Hoare said, "but we will likely be in that position of 'Do we take the million and call it a day and move on?'"

If the Thruway does "move on," it will do so $1.1 million short. Hoare said taxpayers aren't on the hook for that cost, as the Thruway is not in the New York state budget and operates largely on toll revenue alone.

"That's why bridge hits are such a serious problem for us," he said. "What it means is we've got to look to our checking account and come up with the money to do the repairs and do the work, because safety is our primary concern and we've got to make sure that the road is safe and we've got to do the work."

The "checking account" Hoare speaks of is the money in the Thruway's $2.4 billion capital budget for the next five years. Something in that project will have to be pushed back to find the $1.1 million needed to cover the rest of the Varava costs, if the Thruway doesn't press its claim to be made whole.

Sometimes, the Thruway goes after toll revenue lost to something other than an avoidable bridge strike or accident.

Consider the case of Michael Davitt, known as “The Tappan Zee Dangler,” whose protest snarled traffic on the Tappan Zee Bridge on Nov. 7, 2011, and was tied up in criminal court for two years and in a civil suit until 2017 and beyond. The Thruway took him to court and secured nearly $40,000 in restitution for tolls lost.

Varava's boss calls $2.1 million demand 'ridiculous'

Meanwhile, Alexander Kuzyk, president of San Trans — the Bartlett, Illinois, trucking company with 45 trucks, including one that is still driven by Ivan Varava — called the Thruway’s $2.1 million demand “ridiculous.”

“Most of this money they said, is actually to cover the toll loss, not the actual damage of the bridge,” Kuzyk said. “That bridge was struck four times before my accident happened which I think is also ridiculous.”

Kuzyk disputes the facts presented by state police and the Thruway.

“First of all, this load wasn't really even tall. You can't really say this thing was tall,” Kuzyk said. “He made it all the way from Kansas to New York somehow, so this load was not 14 foot tall, anything like that. He said this load was 13-six, 13-seven at the most, which is a completely legal load for any flatbed. Whatever the police say, that's not true. This thing was not that tall.”

The episode has Kuzyk thinking twice when dispatching trucks to New York.

“We try and avoid New York as much as we can, especially any oversize shipment,” he said. “We don't really haul anything to New York or through New York anymore. We go through New York with legal loads, but we don't do any oversize shipment.”

Varava’s crash cost Kuzyk money out of pocket.

“We had his medical bills cause he got injured, we had towing, we had re-delivery fees. We lost like probably 45 to 50 (thousands of dollars) of our own money, plus the insurance cost,” he said. “We didn't get paid for hauling that thing. We didn't get paid for the delivery because the towing company had to deliver on their own truck.”

Varava, Kuzyk said, “was psychologically injured more than physically. He had some back pain, but not for a long time. He took a break for two months from driving before returning to work.”

Kuzyk is clearly not happy about the situation.

“I'm just hoping they're going to fix the bridge and not for my money or the insurance money,” he said. “They charge thousands of dollars every day or even millions of dollars every day for tolls. I think they should have a fund to repair this bridge. This bridge is from the last century.”

Lawyers and insurance companies

Ivan Varava hired attorney Thomas Mafrici from the Mafrici Law Office in Cicero, near Syracuse. His website is “nyticketfixer.com.”

“I handle a lot of bridge-strike cases and other cases involving damage to highway property,” Mafrici said. “Often my client will have moving violations and the prosecutor won’t reduce them until I show proof that the damage has been paid for or that the insurance company acknowledges that it is a covered claim.

“Sometimes it is really hard to get that insurance letter,” Mafrici said. “They don’t want to respond. They don’t want to acknowledge liability. Sometimes the driver gets fired and then I can’t get any information from the insurance company. It’s time consuming.”

Mafrici said in his experience, whenever there is a bridge strike, New York state’s Department of Transportation — which has jurisdiction over all motor carriers operating in the state — will assess a non-negotiable $10,000 civil penalty against the trucking company, independent of the action the Thruway might or might not take.

"If you disagree with it then you have to go to a hearing in Albany," he said. "I don't know for sure if that happened (in the Varava case), but I would be very surprised if it wasn't."

He added state troopers are told to write tickets whenever Thruway property is damaged, which gives “additional incentive to assist in settling claims.”

Joe Morrissey, the state DOT spokesman, confirmed that his department "is empowered to assess up to $10,000 to motor carriers ... for impacting overhead structures. If disputed, such fines may only be assessed after a department hearing.”

Seeking remedies, in courts and the Legislature

Hoare, the Thruway's executive director, said he's exploring all options to battle the "plague" of bridge hits, going after truckers and trucking companies to recoup some of the Thruway's losses.

"It's not total. We're not made whole. There's an issue with insurance limits," he said. "We're going to be talking to the Legislature about insurance limits. We're going to be talking to them about the fines that are paid, because right now the fines are not very high."

The pain right now is on the driving public, who must endure the frustration and delays every time an 18-wheeler hits an overpass. And Hoare agrees with the "Groundhog Day" analogy. "That's how I feel when I get a text notification that we have another hit on our system," he said.

"We've got to do more, I think, to go after not only the individual driver but the company that they work for. One of things we should be looking at is suspending their licenses for a period of time, to put some teeth in the penalty, to make them think twice."