New Driver Training back in the day, now vs then.

When I started my boss asked “you know how to drive?”
I said yep!
He handed me the keys to a year old cab over Pete and said be in Fresno Monday morning!
I was in Florida and it was Thursday afternoon!
At least he showed me how to operate the refer, didn’t have those in the military.

 

Four score and seven years ago. I went to the DMV and obtained a Chauffeur License for $8. I then rode off into the sunset.

 

Today meaning last year I did 2 hours of training and off I went.

 

Boss said I wish someone had a commercial.
I say I have one.
He says, you can drive a truck.
I say well yea, I had driven gas grain trucks. lol

When I turned 18 I went and got my chauffers license, no physical, do driving test, no drug test, nada.
Come to think about it, I have never had a driving test in a truck. lol

 

Have any idea how it compares to accidents on the whole? Maybe more vehicles just means more accidents?

 

The guy that owned the milk route asked my father if he was old enough to drive. Father lied and said yes. he had to ask the farmers not to fill the cans to the top because they were too heavy for him to move from the stoop to the deck of the flat bed. That was 65 yrs ago and he’s still going.

 

More idiots and more speed means more accidents

 

It’s a combination of factors. There are more trucks and passenger vehicles on the road than before, distracted driving from both parties, inexperienced drivers, and lack of proper training.

Back in 94 I was a sophomore in high school. I had been driving a cabover IH grain truck hauling out of the fields. I started riding with a local guy and learning more about how to drive. One night we got fuel in Rapid City and he said he was tired and if I wanted to get home that night then I had to drive. Then when I turned 18 I passed the written test and borrowed a truck for the driving test. Then I was hired by a local guy and started driving.

 

In '94 I went to a crappy, nearly fly-by-night school, which was $2000 cheaper than the local branch of NTTS. This was in the Frequent Poster's beloved Baltimore, MD, where his school taught "everything you needed to know and then some." I guess that school musta closed about 8 years after he got his license.

I worked a month for CRST, then quit and got a job driving food grade tanks for a little mom&pop outfit that took a chance on me. The old hands there taught me the job. I asked questions all the time, and listened to the answers.

I think part of the problem is that drivers no longer seem to have a place to congregate. I work for a medium-sized carrier now, about 30 drivers at our terminal, and I never see any of them. If I have any questions, I'm on my own.

I'd hate to be brand new at trucking, and be in this position.