West Coast Vs. Northeast

Ask around and most drivers will either tell you they hate running one or the other. I grew up in the northeast and I know #### well that most of the roads and a lot of customer docks/yards/truck stops were not designed for 53 foot trailers therefore I have zero interest in running there. I generally make it a point not to go further north or east of PA but if the load is right I'll make it happen. Depending on the company you may have trouble finding freight to get you out of some areas of the west coast but on the other hand those loads tend to be high mileage. Just came off of hometime in San Diego, ran a load to Stockton (500ish miles) followed by a run from Oakland to Nashville (2300 miles). Now I'm back to our usual 300-400 mile loads running more or less between PA/OH/IL/WI until they decide to send me either to TX or the southeast.

What I'm getting at(despite ranting a bit) is it all depends on the carrier, how their freight runs and how long you want to be out on the road. Since your profile says you live in FL I'd suggest sticking to the southeast and staying south of I40/East of I35 if you want to get home frequently but still get decent mileagel

 

I like driving out west because GENERALLY there is a lot more room out here, particularly in terms of highway space and consignee property. That said there are certainly tight backing spaces throughout America. I will say this. There are way way more places to shut down back east, even up north. Out west you'll got 100 miles without a rest area, much less a truck stop.

unloader

 

with the hos laws now you will need all the run time you can get as a company driver. lets say you are running from omaha to the west coast,which you can do in your 70 hours. you will not have a major traffic tie up until you get to salt lake,but not to bad if you take the bypass,vegas no big deal and smooth sailing until you get to la. true la has its own set of problems but a ton of freight comes out of there. have never run past chicago but i dont think you can get those type of miles out there. i live in the mid west so the west coast worked great for me,i dont how it would work if you lived out east. lots of luck

 

It's a trade off, as most things in trucking are. All depends on what you prefer. Let's say you look at your pay rate and you need 3K miles a week to make it good, pay your bills, pay for health insurance, contribute to retirement and save a little. Back east you can do that but it will probably be 5 or 6, 500-600 mile trips. Midwest and out west that might be 2 trips or even 1. Totally different driving conditions. Southeast seems to be a bit of a mix. You get to the 800 mile range and some of what folks like and dislike about both the east, Midwest and West. You can get the miles from most major carriers if you are a reliable driver. Most major carriers have pretty steady freight moving wherever you want to drive. Hometime gets to be the issue. Do they have the freight to keep you moving where YOU want to drive AND get you home when you want to be there? That gets to be the bigger question for reliable hands; just in my personal experience.

When I lived in GA and worked for a carrier that would run me a lot out west I made the miles but getting home was probably not gonna happen just when I wanted it to. Close but, you know - I was out west. They had to find something coming back or leap frog repowering loads. Live in SC and worked for carriers that didn't go out west and not too far into the Midwest and still made the miles but had the northeast and eastern mountain stuff to deal with and a lot more short runs to get to my target mileage. But getting home was pretty much all right on time.

You dead on there with the wind. I was pullin' a covered wagon and got a load of palletized whatever from some mine way north of Cheyenne and coming back on 25 it got so bad it was literally tearing my tarp out of the grommets with chord and busting every bungie s hook through the bungie. Brand new ones. Not dry rotted at all. I wound up taking an exit onto a ranch and pulling under the overpass over the rancher's dirt road to hide from the wind and break out my coil of rope and rope every grommet in the tarp and STILL darned near didn't get it. After a while I turned around and got back on I-25 and was poking along into the Pilot in Cheyenne - gonna just shut down totally and ride it out. Got there just in time to see the awning over the fuel island cut loose and leave and blow down the road like a piece of paper or something. Absolutely amazing wind and there were no tornados and not a cloud in the sky. Just REALLY big wind. Back east we get big wind too, but it proceeds and follows a storm. Not out there! Absolutely gorgeous day - except for the 70 MPH wind coming from; WHERE? No storms. Just WIND. Where was it coming from and why is a mystery to me but apparently that's fairly common there because the locals just took it right in stride. "Yeah. Little strong today" LITTLE STRONG? It just blew a truck over and took the awning off the fuel station! Yeah, wind is a WOW in WY. LOL.

 

I have always liked driving into new places myself. I love going some place that has challenges. The northeast has lots of backing problems that keep you on your toes. The docks there were not built for modern 280 in wheelbase sleepers and 53 foot trailers. It keeps you from getting stale. The problem with the Northeast is that there is very little made up there. Too many people in industries that do not require trucks. So you bring stuff in but have no loads coming out. You have to bounce or pull cheap freight coming out of there.

Of course if you like to work in California you could be killed in an earthquake at any moment.

 

Or caught in a tornado in Oklahoma, or in a hurricane in Florida, etc.

 

If you are company mileage pay driver you want miles, period. If you are percentage pay company driver or owner op you want high revenue loads. Running short haul intra-regional and medium haul inter-regional loads in the Northeast, Midwest, and Southeast pays better than other areas. I've been in the Northeast for most of the last two months. You learn to get up between 12 and 3am and go to bed early to avoid traffic. You learn routes and times to avoid traffic and minimize tolls. The tolls are in the rate if you are routing yourself correctly and getting the EZ Pass discounts. You learn where to get fuel the cheapest. The truck parking isn't good in any metro area anymore. Even out west the truckstops are just as bad as the East coast in most places. It's about the money. As long as I can continue clearing $2000 - $3000/week running the Northeast and Mid-Atlantic , then I will stay here doing that until it drys up. I bounce between the same handful of customers to help set a groove. I usually do a longer inter-regional run over the weekend(about 700 miles, Monday, I load a killer rate right back into the NE). Running coast to coast, I would only clear $1000/week and sit 3 days a week, run 4 days. I can sit at home this winter after I bust butt all summer tarping and untarping everyday. Keeps the gut away, too!

 

Northeast is harder to find parking, higher gas prices, traffic, its more tight to drive in. There's more money out running west and midwest.

 

I like driving where there is money to be made. I don't care where it is. It's all green. It's all good. Right now I'm on a run from Spokane, WA to Jersey City, NJ. I know the area well. But called to see if I can park there. I can. A little trip planning goes a long way no matter where you're headed.

 

We just had a tornado in Revere Ma,destroyed 65 buildings AND hurricane Sandy not long ago