Restricted route(s) questions

be very wary of getting directions from a shipper unless they are the automated kind......the moron that you get on the phone either a) has no clue about the roads in the town they live on or b) will send you down a road that is either weight or height restricted. they don't know any better or just don't think in terms of trucks....they get there in their car that way, that's all they know. the automated type directions are usually okay as far as inbound routings....i'll almost always just use a combination of the gps, the atlas, and google earth to plot my possible best route in if i haven't been there before and i get the dreaded 'no directions for the customer of this stop' message on the qualcomm.......my last trip this week was like that......first driver in for our company to a new consignee and it was in a suburb of DC......the gps, as usual, wanted to send me on a convulted route making a big circle around and to the front door of the cons......a closer inspection of the roads on google got me a 4 lane route with no restrictions right to the dock entrance and 8 miles shorter than the gps gave me....there is no one size fits all answer you have to use several sources and arrive at the best conclusion.....at least with our company, the directions are submitted by drivers as they go in for the first time and usually the best way in.....

as far as the intersection and no turn sign in philly......near as i can figure and making an educated guess, using common sense (you'll see the true hilarity of that statement once you get out here)......all 4 directions at the light the stop lines were right at the light, no setback for turn clearance. narrow 2 lanes and typical Pa in town intersection with nothing but brick buildings and sidewalks and light poles right on the corners......just no clearance for a truck to make the turn unless traffic holds back to your left or there is no traffic at all.....even with the tandems slid all the way up.....many places like that in RI and Mass too.....one of the things they don't teach you in school is that the best thing to do alot of times before you leave the highway for an in town delivery in alot of these towns up north is to slide those wheels up at the last spot you can stop before you get off the highway.....saved me more than a few times....

i haven't gotten any tickets or dealt with any local cops over any of these types of places yet...but i've only been out here 17 months....i'm sure my day will come when i have to have that conversation as much as we run the northeast

 

is that the intersection that has a humungus concrete post on the corner ?? I used to drive for Epes and was at a mill up there like that.

 

don't remember a post but it's just off a bridge off 76 on the west side......the other paper place in philly is down at the port....it's not too bad but requires a u-turn to get back to the entrance.

 

One set of company directions tells drivers to "Ignore the 10 ton limit sign!"

The main route to another shipper has a 10 ton limit bridge. Well the sign is still there. But the shipper told me the bridge was replaced with an adequate limit bridge five years ago. And no one has ever removed the signs...

Mikeeee

 

The directions to Manger Meat Market in Baltimore not only say to go on the no trucks over 5 tons road, it also the wrong way on a one way street.

Thing is, cops have helped me stop traffic to back into the thing going the wrong way on that one way, so at least the local cops understand that there is no other way, and businesses need thier freight. I mean it might be practical to make a length restriction so like you need a box truck, but a 5 ton gcvw is totally unrealistic for a road a meat market is on.

 

Hehehe yeah those cones you knock over during school and training don't have irate owners with insurance companies that come calling if you dent them or crush them lol

Luckily my school had a bunch of intolerant old timers for instructors who actually found some small tight spots to take us on to give us a taste before we actually got a job. They setup our backing exercises tight and small too and that helped. The quality and type of training I got really showed itself when road testing with my company.

You're absolutely right though lol there's school, and then there's the school you'll get in the real world. You'll learn more the first week on your trainers truck than you do the whole time going to school to get the license.

 

Until the shipper tells you the way they go to work.... in their 4 wheeler

 

I had directions to the bud distributor in yazoo city ms....took me turn for turn right to the place. Then, right after the directions finished, it said " do NOT go this way. You WILL receive a ticket".....um.... then why the*%#$%<^¥> do you tell me to go that way?!

 

Another place we pull from, company directions state, "Entry route ok if empty, but exiting loaded-expect to find LEO ambush! Must take different route exiting."

Mikeeee