Weight rules create tension in Fairfield

FAIRFIELD — Former signs in the tiny town of Fairfield that imposed weight limitations for trucks remain the cause of ill feelings and prompted litigation that's holding strong into its second year.

Officials in this Utah County town, population 132, will go to court in April to try to resurrect the weight-limitation signs it posted on 1600 North in 2005 and find a way to pay for damages they say have been done to the road by farm trucks.

"The residents of my town do not do the damage in 10 years that one season of these trucks on the road can do," Fairfield Mayor Linn Gillies said.

A lawsuit against the town was filed in 4th District Court by a group of farmers in September 2005, not long after the weight limitation signs appeared on the road.

A judge later ordered the town to remove the signs until the case goes to trial, but the farmers want the limitation to be banished permanently.

The farmers' lawsuit also calls for the road to be fixed and for the town to pay their attorney's fees, if they win.

After the town was incorporated in December 2004, one of the Town Council's first decisions was to enact the weight-limitation ordinance. Now that the town is incorporated, Utah County government is no longer responsible for maintaining the town's roads, and 1600 North has fallen into disrepair.

Since the town has limited funds to make road repairs, the town originally set the weight limit at 3 tons

per axle to keep heavy vehicles from cracking the road.

But the farmers said the limit would keep their trucks from getting to their destinations and force them to go out of business.

Gillies says 1600 West, which borders Fairfield and Eagle Mountain, is an alternate route the trucks could take, but the road is not paved, and whether the road is a viable option is in question.

The group of farmers, made up of Scott McLachlan and the company he owns, Hogs R Us; and Zane Dansie, Keith Jonsson and Utah Valley Turf Farms, L.C., have businesses both in Fairfield and neighboring Eagle Mountain. They asked the court to place an injunction on the signs so they could drive on the road and not be ticketed.