Local driving jobs: Route job vs. Construction/other

No they won't. Contractor will beg, plead, and cajole a driver to get the 70000 lb mixer just a foot closer to the footing trench and when the truck falls in it is "driver's fault, he is a professional and should have known better".

 

You are #### right.

One foot is a bridge too far, Ive had wreckers and rotators come get me after I cheerfully plunked my mixer where the contractor wants it.

I quit trying to encourage the contractor not to make me put that thing there becuase it will get royally stuck, then eff his job totally because no one can come to pour the rest of the day fixing to storm and sink me deeper on the hill side.

Don't say I told you so boss, she got good and stuck just like I said it will.

One job in particular, I thought I was fixing to get into a fistfight with two very very angry people who completely and totally lost their self control in incadescant anger on that job... I don't know how that would have worked out any differently than it did. I spoke softer to them the louder they got. It's touch and go sometimes.

STory of my life, when I tell you she will break this or get stuck or a third problem no one ever listens to me. Fine. Eff you boss, here you are CRUNCH broken just like I told you. WAT!!!??? -insert lost temper and profanity back at me.- save it.

 

Interesting thread. I've considered ready mix before but from the sounds of it, it doesn't sound all that great.

As for the OP, the best option would be doing a LTL linehaul gig. They tell ya what trailers to hook and where you are going. You run the route and nobody harrases you. Dispatch gives you generous amount of time to get to your destination. For us it was 4 hours on a route that usually lasted around 3 hours. You have virtually no interaction with anyone. Granted, most of it is overnight but you are home almost everyday. On days you are not, they put you on a hotel.

 

From my previous comment. I wrote up this thread four years ago. Typical day of a line driver

 

Nah it's fine. I wrote it before you guys did that major server overhaul a few years back. I don't know why I chose that font size. I think I wrote it up on MS Word and pasted it on here.

 

Route jobs are the best. Once you get the routes
Down and know the people it's a piece of cake.
Forget that random local delivery stuff.

 

Trying to find the "right" local job can be a tough one for some, that's kind of what I'm finding out for myself. Where I live there's plenty of local driving jobs available: food/bev, LTL, reefer, private fleets, intermodal, construction, fuel, and so on.

After 18 months of being a regional "OTR" driver, I had to seek local work due to the girlfriend wanting me back home. Even though, my regional job allowed me to be home weekly, I only saw my GF for a total of 12 hours a week. Her days off were sat & sun, and my days off were mon & tues. So when I started my search into the local fields, I first that I'd like to purse fuel hauling. Talked to a driver before, good money and he liked it. Well in my area, a lot of hiring for fuel drivers, but the downside for me...all night work and you work on a 5on/2off - 5on/3off schedule, meaning you see a sat & sun weekend about every 6 weeks.

For me, girlfriend wanted me home nightly, and weekends off (she was okay with the occasional Saturday work), so this really limited me to what type of local work I could seek. There's just a lot of things to consider when seeking local work - Work/home life balance, relationships, money, age. At times, I honestly felt overwhelmed, thinking "would this type of work be a good fit for me".