Dallas–Fort Worth oversize load permits: who issues them, the curfew and the limits inside Loop 12 and I-820

A Dallas–Fort Worth oversize load can need state, county and possibly city permits. The Texas Department of Motor Vehicles (TxDMV) permits the state highways. Dallas County and Tarrant County permit their own roads, and Fort Worth’s code describes a street permit. The Texas Department of Transportation (TxDOT) caps or closes named highways and bars permits on highways inside two loops, one with listed exceptions. Permigo, a Houston permit service, files the TxDMV permit. Permigo has filed more than 100 Texas permits for Dallas–Fort Worth loads so far in 2026.

The short version

TxDMV’s permit covers the state highways, but TxDOT allows no permits on the highways inside Loop 12 in Dallas, and only ten listed routes inside Fort Worth’s I-20 and I-820 loop. In Tarrant County, oversize loads can’t move from 7 to 9 a.m. or 4 to 6 p.m. on weekdays. TxDMV’s sheets print no Dallas curfew. County roads take the county’s own permit. Order the TxDMV permit from Permigo for $20, plus Texas’s fee at cost. Sources read November 1, 2026.

Texas’s size limits, escorts and travel hours are on the Texas page.

Who issues which permit for a Dallas or Fort Worth move

It comes down to whose road the load is on. On state highways, the TxDMV permit is the one you need: Texas law bars cities and counties from requiring their own permit, bond or fee there, unless the Transportation Code allows it (§621.304). Off them, a city may regulate oversize moves on its roads (§621.303), and a county may permit them on county roads outside city limits (§623.018). The TxDMV permit says as much in its general conditions: “This permit does not authorize travel on non-state maintained roadways (i.e., city streets and county roads).”

The TxDMV permit: what Permigo files

TxDMV’s single-trip permit covers a load that can’t be taken apart and is over Texas’s legal size or weight, up to 254,300 pounds. It’s good for one movement, from a named origin to a named destination, during the times printed on it. Over 20 feet wide, 18 feet 11 inches high or 125 feet long, TxDMV wants a route inspection on file first.

Permigo files it for a flat $20, with Texas’s own fee passed on at cost; that fee is in the cost guide. Most single-trip permits come back the same day while Permigo is open; superloads take longer.

Order your TxDMV permit from Permigo or get a quote first

Do you need a City of Dallas or City of Fort Worth oversize permit?

In Dallas, Permigo couldn’t find one. Chapter 28 of the Dallas City Code, the city’s traffic code, shows none for an oversize load; the one move permit it names is for structures. It does keep truck tractors and trailers on its listed truck routes on city streets (§28-71), apart from reaching a terminal or a pickup or delivery off them (§28-72(a)). Even so, a TxDMV permit doesn’t cover a city street, so ask the city’s Transportation & Public Works first.

Fort Worth’s code describes city permits for overweight or oversize loads on city streets, in §22-117(e) and §§7-262 to 7-266. It also says §22-117 and §7-261 don’t apply to a vehicle under a state permit. It doesn’t say plainly whether a state-permitted load needs a city permit too, and a TxDMV permit doesn’t authorize city streets. So ask the city before a street leg.

TxDMV’s list of jurisdictions with their own rules has no entry for Dallas, Fort Worth, Arlington, Irving, Plano, Garland, Grand Prairie or Mesquite, and TxDMV says the list isn’t complete.

Do Dallas County and Tarrant County require their own oversize permits?

Yes, if the route uses a county road outside city limits. State law lets a county permit a load that can’t be taken apart for up to 90 days, on county roads but not on state highways or on roads inside a city (§623.018).

Dallas County Public Works handles the Dallas County permit. Its request form is headed “For the Unincorporated Area of Dallas County” and says the permit “is not valid within a municipality”. The permit is good only for the date on it, and the County Engineer’s Office approves the route.

Tarrant County calls its version a Move Building Permit and requires it “when moving large, heavy equipment, homes, or other structures” on county roads, with a $1,000 bond and a route map. It warns that some routes won’t take overweight or oversize loads, and the county makes the final call. Signs, high wires, mailboxes, traffic control and any damage fall to the applicant.

Denton, Collin and Ellis counties fall under the same state law; ask each one about its own roads. Permigo files the TxDMV permit; city and county permits are yours.

Loop 12 and the I-820 loop: where permits stop

TxDOT’s Dallas District allows no permits on the highways inside Loop 12. Its Fort Worth District allows none inside the loop formed by I-20 and I-820, apart from ten listed routes. Both are on the district restriction sheets TxDMV publishes, and each sheet holds more than 100 restrictions.

The Dallas District’s sheet, updated October 27, 2026, has carried this line since May 7, 1998: “No permits on all highways inside LP12.” It’s marked permanent and lists no exceptions. The same sheet also sets limits on roads inside the loop, such as 13 feet 6 inches high on I-30 at St Francis Ave, and doesn’t say how the two fit together.

The Fort Worth District’s sheet, updated October 13, 2026, has this one, dated May 8, 2019: “No permits on all highways inside of the loop formed by IH20 and IH820 with the following exceptions”. The ten routes that follow run on pieces of I-35W, SH 183, US 377, BU 287 and SH 199, plus two off I-820 with crossovers at Dale Ln and Village Creek Rd. The sheet’s other restrictions still apply on those roads. One, dated April 22, 2024, closes SH 183 in Fort Worth between N Nichols St and Decatur Ave.

That’s two loops and more than 100 restrictions on each sheet. Order your TxDMV permit from Permigo and it works out the route and tells you what TxDMV will issue.

Order your DFW permit from Permigo or get a quote first

Is there a Dallas or Fort Worth curfew for oversize loads?

In Fort Worth and across Tarrant County, yes. In Dallas, TxDMV’s sheets print none (read November 1, 2026).

Fort Worth and Tarrant County: 7 to 9 a.m. and 4 to 6 p.m.

On TxDMV permits, a load over 8 feet 6 inches wide, 14 feet high or legal length may not move on Tarrant County highways from 7 to 9 a.m. or 4 to 6 p.m., Monday through Friday. Mobile cranes are exempt. TxDOT’s Fort Worth District ordered it on October 17, 1997, and TxDMV’s Time Permit Curfews sheet, effective September 30, 2025, lists it too. A permit Permigo filed on September 22, 2025, from Gainesville to Corpus Christi, reads: “Tarrant County Curfew: All loads over 8'6" wide, 14'0" high, and/or over legal length: No movement 7-9am or 4-6pm; Monday through Friday.”

Dallas and Dallas County: none on TxDMV’s sheets

TxDMV’s curfew sheet has no Dallas row, and the Dallas District’s sheet doesn’t use the word. The curfew sheet covers time permits: 30, 60 and 90-day permits for length or width, quarterly hubometer permits and a list of annual permits. A single-trip permit prints its own curfews, under “Route Conditions”, for the roads on its route. In Permigo’s experience, the single-trip permits it files for Dallas-side routes carry no Dallas curfew.

Those are state permits, so that answer covers state highways only. On city streets, Dallas’s code bars semitrailers and trailers from leaving a truck route between 10 p.m. and 6 a.m. onto a street next to single-family or duplex homes (§28-72(b)).

If you’ve read that “Key corridors like I-35E and LBJ Freeway ban oversized loads during peak periods”, that line is on a heavy-haul company’s page about Dallas. It gives 6 to 9 a.m. and 3 to 6 p.m. in one section and 6:30 to 9 a.m. and 4 to 6:30 p.m. in another, with no source. Another hauling site says much the same. TxDMV’s sheets print no curfew for I-35E or the LBJ Freeway (I-635).

Statewide, permitted loads move in daylight only, unless they’re only overweight or they’re interstate loads up to 10 feet wide and 100 feet long with legal overhangs (43 TAC §219.11). TxDOT can also allow night movement after a route and traffic study. Loads over 14 feet wide, 16 feet high or 110 feet long can’t move on six holidays unless TxDMV grants an exception: Memorial Day, Independence Day, Labor Day, Thanksgiving Day, Christmas Day and New Year’s Day.

Order your TxDMV permit from Permigo or get a quote first

Other Dallas and Fort Worth District limits

Past the loops, TxDOT caps named stretches and ramps. Here are the ones on the main DFW routes, with the date each was ordered (TxDOT writes the interstates as IH 635, IH 35E and so on). TxDMV puts the job of checking the latest restrictions on the permit holder.

TxDMV’s jurisdiction list adds two more calls: Royse City police on SH 66 for loads over 14 feet wide, and Oncor 48 hours ahead in Cleburne for loads over 17 feet high.

Can oversize loads use NTTA toll roads or the TEXpress lanes?

In Permigo’s experience, TxDMV doesn’t route permits onto North Texas Tollway Authority (NTTA) roads, and a carrier who needs one of those roads clears it with NTTA directly. NTTA publishes no oversize policy Permigo could find (checked November 1, 2026).

TxDOT’s Dallas District also allows no permits on the tolled main lanes of three state highways: SH 121 from Business 121 in Lewisville to Hardin Blvd in McKinney, SH 190 from SH 78 to I-35E, and SH 161 from I-20 to I-35E. On SH 121 and SH 190, loads take the frontage roads where they exist, and can use the main lanes only where those break: on SH 121 between I-35E and FM 544, and on SH 190 west of SH 78 and west of US 75. NTTA calls its roads in that area the Sam Rayburn Tollway and the President George Bush Turnpike.

Neither district sheet mentions the TEXpress lanes, and TxDOT’s page on them says nothing about oversize loads, so Permigo can’t give you a rule for them.

Example: one move across DFW

An invented load: a steel tank 14 feet wide, from a fabrication yard on a Fort Worth city street to a job site on a county road in unincorporated Dallas County.

• Permigo files the TxDMV permit for the state highways in between and works out a route that respects both loops.
• The tank can’t move on Tarrant County highways from 7 to 9 a.m. or 4 to 6 p.m. on a weekday.
• The carrier asks the City of Fort Worth about the street out of the yard.
• The carrier gets Dallas County’s permit for the county road to the site.

Texas’s own escort rules for that width are on the Texas page. Heading south too? Houston oversize permits has that city’s offices and limits.

Order the permit for your DFW load or get a quote first

Who to call

Next: Texas permit and escort rules →