Business and Community Leaders Urge Congress to Oppose Commercial Rest Areas

NATSO and a diverse coalition that includes restaurants, fuel retailers, city governments, trucking firms and blind entrepreneurs urged lawmakers to oppose efforts to commercialize Interstate rest areas as Congress considers infrastructure legislation. The groups, which represent hundreds of thousands of mostly small businesses that operate near the Interstate Highway System, urged lawmakers to reject proposals to carve out any exceptions to the longstanding ban that prohibits state departments of transportation from competing against the private sector by selling food, fuel or other commercial services, including electric vehicle charging, at Interstate rest areas.