Board reviews plan to delegate neighborhood truck restrictions to administrative process

Town staff proposed revising Chapter 23 of the Mooresville code to make it easier and faster to regulate truck traffic on residential streets by moving approvals from an ordinance-by-street approach to an administrative process.

Public Services Director Kevin Blayton told the board the change would allow the town to accept neighborhood requests, run a traffic-engineering study, develop an engineering recommendation and have the town manager approve or deny posting a truck prohibition without requiring a separate ordinance for each street.

Board members asked how the town would enforce new restrictions when truck drivers rely on GPS routing and when incidents are transient. Staff described a toolbox that includes early signage and a focused enforcement presence to “set the tone,” short-term use of Flock-style cameras to identify repeat trucking companies for outreach, and officer-accessible maps showing restricted streets for targeted patrols. A public-safety official on the panel said a few days of police presence combined with new signage has often reduced repeat misuse.

Commissioners emphasized they did not want to create an expectation of immediate and continuous enforcement once signage went up; staff acknowledged enforcement would be challenging early in any rollout and said annual review of any interlocal or maintenance agreements would be used to ensure local needs remained prioritized.

No ordinance was adopted at the pre-agenda session; staff will bring the code amendment language and enforcement plan back to the board for further review.