Heavy Haul Trucking in Texas

What changes for a load going into Houston, Dallas-Fort Worth or San Antonio?

Each big metro has a highway loop or county rule that TxDMV prints on the permit, and which rule applies depends on the load's size. These are the district restrictions for each metro in TxDMV's permit restriction files, checked October 2026.

A Cat D10 dozer shows how the Houston cap works. Blade off, it is 12 ft 4 in wide and reaches about 16 ft 3 in once it sits on a 2 ft deck, so no highway inside IH 610 is open to it; if the delivery is inside the loop, the route is settled before the price. Conroe, north of the city, and Friendswood, to the south, hold loads that pass 14 ft in width or height, or 110 ft in length, off the road from 6 to 9 AM and 3 to 7 PM, Monday through Friday, and the City of Montgomery requires law enforcement escorts for loads that size. Dozer shipping sizes from the Cat D3 up are on our bulldozer transport page.

West of Fort Worth, I-20 runs to Midland and Odessa in the Permian Basin, and on that run the statewide clock matters more than any city rule. Permitted loads move in daytime, which Texas counts as half an hour before sunrise until half an hour after sunset; night travel is allowed only for loads that are overweight but not oversize, or for Interstate loads no wider than 10 ft and no longer than 100 ft with legal overhang. A Cat D8 hauled 9 ft 2 in wide, blade removed, can keep going after dark on I-20; a 10 ft 5 in wide Cat 320 excavator has to stop half an hour after sunset. Texas has no statewide weekend ban, so long runs continue through Saturday and Sunday unless a local curfew applies, such as the City of Bandera's ban on permitted moves on weekends.

What does heavy haul trucking cost in Texas?

Most of the price is the haul itself, which carriers price by the mile; Texas state fees are a small, fixed part. Take a Cat 320 excavator, which ships at 49,800 lb and 10 ft 5 in wide. Add a tractor and RGN at 35,000 to 45,000 lb and the gross comes to roughly 85,000 to 95,000 lb, inside the 80,001 to 120,000 lb band, so TxDMV charges the $60 single-trip fee plus a $150 highway maintenance fee: $210 in state fees, with no escort below 14 ft wide.

The Texas extras come with size: escorts over 14 ft wide, Houston District law enforcement escorts over 20 ft wide, TxDOT-approved signal crews (paid by the mover) for Houston loads 17 ft 6 in and taller, and a carrier route inspection over 20 ft wide or 125 ft long. Dated per-mile benchmarks are in our heavy equipment transport cost guide, and the oversize load checker shows whether a given load needs a Texas permit or escort.