Truck-related accidents have decreased under the current DOT Hours of Service rules, asserted the American Trucking Associations (ATA) in a web site statement, reaffirming its support for the current regulations governing the number of hours a trucker may work. The trucking association wants the rules to remain as written, reported Logistics Management online.
The five-year-old regulations are under review again by the Federal Motor Carriers Safety Administration (FMCSA) complying with terms of a lawsuit settlement brought by the group Public Citizen. Under the terms, FMCSA agreed to examine and possibly revise the regulations. After reviewing, FMCSA has up to nine months to submit a notice of proposed rulemaking and as long as 21 months to make a final HOS ruling.
“Safety in the trucking industry has greatly improved while operating under the current hours-of-service rules,” said Bill Graves, ATA’s president. The association cited a 19 percent decrease in deadly truck-involved crashes since the new HOS became active, and a 13 percent drop in injury accidents since 2004. During this same period of reduced accidents, truck-driven mileage increased in excess of 2 billion miles, and registration of big trucks jumped hundreds of thousands in number, claimed ATA.
Two rules the Public Citizen group had issue with were the 11-hour driving rule and the 34-hour reset rule.
Source: Logistics Management: Trucking industry digs in for new HOS battle.
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