State and federal leaders are moving forward with a plan to build a second four-lane road along Interstate 81 in Virginia that would be used solely by trucks, The Washington Post reported.

Virginia transportation officials said they gave preliminary approval last month to the plan, which would widen I-81 to eight lanes with separate lanes for cars and trucks.

Under the plan – submitted by a consortium of private builders known as STAR Solutions – the expansion would be paid for, in part, with toll money collected from both cars and trucks.

Transportation Commissioner Philip Shucet announced earlier in March that he planned to negotiate with STAR Solutions over its competitor, Flour Virginia, to expand I-81. STAR’s plan had earlier included a provision to toll only trucks, but federal officials reportedly said such a restriction would lower the project’s chance of getting federal funds.

A statement from the Virginia Department of Transportation said negotiations between the state and STAR would take six to nine months.

The Post reported that under the current plan, I-81 would be expanded to eight total lanes – four headed in each direction. Two lanes in each direction would be used by cars, two by trucks, with the two types of vehicles separated by concrete barriers.

The advisory panel that recommended the STAR plan said it considered several factors in its decision, including whether each plan contained a “proper tolling structure to minimize truck traffic diversions to other state roadways.”

As Virginia looks at truck-only toll lanes, on the federal level, House and Senate legislators are apparently taking a serious look at them as well.

The current round of federal highway legislation may include some funding for truck-only toll roads that would separate doubles, triples and big rigs from 4-wheelers by concrete barriers.

That "truck-only" plan was developed by the Los Angeles-based Reason Foundation, a think tank. In a recent report, the group suggested moving trucks into their own lanes, separated by concrete barriers. Reason reasons that because the trucks would be safely separated from cars, trucking companies would be allowed to use higher-capacity double and triple combination vehicles.