New Online System Makes Obtaining A PA Highway Occupancy Permit Much Easier

By Tony Romeo

HARRISBURG, PA (CBS) – The Corbett administration is touting a new online system that is dramatically cutting the time needed to get Highway Occupancy Permits from PennDOT.

Until last October, it required piles of paperwork for businesses and homeowners to get one of the fifteen thousand Highway Occupancy Permits issued each year for projects that needed to build driveways, ramps or other amenities that access state roadways.

PennDOT Secretary Barry Schoch says that paperwork often translated into a long wait.

"A lot of the problem was, we would get submissions that were not including all the required information. So it would come in, go to somebody's review desk and in a couple of weeks they would look at it and say, 'we don't even have everything'. Let's send it back, resubmit it, and then we'll review it. And of course, that took three of four weeks, you didn't have a permit and you were no closer to getting a permit."

Now, Schoch says the entirely electronic Highway Occupancy Permit system has reduced a process that once took 30 to 45 days to an average of about ten days.