Monday is the last day of voter registration in Pennsylvania, and already more people are registered to vote than during any other election in state history, according to elections officials.

		Voter registration information • For information on registering to vote in Pennsylvania, visit the VotesPA Web site.

"We have more than 8.5 million people registered to vote so far, and that number will only grow when the counties complete processing all their registration forms," said Rebecca Halton, a Department of State spokeswoman.

Before now, the largest total was in 2004, when 8.3 million Pennsylvanians were registered. With 8,548,580 registered as of last Monday, state elections officials say voter registration this year is on pace to far exceed 2004's.

"We continue to see an increase, especially in new voters, who tend to rush to register as the deadline nears," Ms. Halton said. Last week, the state processed 36,000 new registrations -- the most so far in the space of a week, she said.

In Allegheny County, elections director Mark Wolosik said he has not yet seen as much of a push this year as four years ago.

"It seems like there was more of an effort in 2004, especially from a number of third-party groups like ACORN," he said. So far, Allegheny County's total registration stands at 937,346 -- some 16,338 more than the 921,008 who registered in 2004.

Mr. Wolosik said he expects that number to grow as the presidential campaigns of Sens. John McCain and Barack Obama make their final registration pushes throughout the weekend.

"There are people who have been walking out of our office with boxes of registration forms, which they are taking out for registration drives," he said. "And we usually get more registration forms in the mail after the deadline."

Only forms with a postmark of Oct. 6 or earlier will be processed.

The McCain campaign will unleash the "Straight Talk RV," traveling in Delaware and Bucks counties on registration drives. The campaign said it is targeting coalitions in southeastern Pennsylvania.

In addition, College Republican units on campuses across the state will conduct aggressive registration drives until Monday, campaign officials said.

"Our campaign is actively engaged in a strong grass-roots program aimed at registering new voters who are supporting the McCain-Palin ticket," said Peter Feldman, spokesman for the campaign.

The Obama-Biden campaign has planned voter registration events in almost every part of the state this weekend, said spokeswoman Allison Price.

"With 78 field offices across the state, our plan is so localized that we are looking to register record numbers this weekend," she said. In addition to phone banks and door-to-door canvassing, the campaign has arranged a number of events to draw the kind of registration numbers "that will extend the Obama footprint in Pennsylvania," she said.

Mr. Obama will be in Philadelphia this weekend, as will singer Bruce Springsteen, as part of the drive. In Pittsburgh, one of the key events will be "Barack the 'Burgh" at Carnegie Mellon University on Saturday night.