Opinion: Recommended Hours
B>By Bill Graves
I>President and Chief Executive Officer
merican Trucking Associations
Almost three years ago to the day, ATA began a fight against a proposed hours-of-service rule that would have cost trucking companies approximately $3,400 per over-the-road truck in lost productivity and additional expenses. The proposal also would have adversely impacted highway safety by forcing more trucks onto our already crowded roads.Three years ago, ATA stated the trucking industry’s strong support of hours reform “based on sound science that improves highway safety and meets the growing needs of the U.S. economy.”
For three years, ATA remained true to that statement, opposing a poorly conceived proposal that failed to meet these requirements while advancing its own proposal that championed them. After three long years, we are now at the point where we can unequivocally say that we accomplished what we originally set out to do: work with the government to improve highway safety through practical hours-of-service reform that incorporates sound science and provides sufficient flexibility for the industry to perform its job.
With last week’s release of the new HOS rules, the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration concluded this part of the change process that began in 1997. From the beginning, ATA members and staff worked to develop a comprehensive set of HOS recommendations for FMCSA’s use in reforming rules that are more than 60 years old. After a turbulent process, the government chose to issue its own proposal in 2000. It was met with swift and severe criticism from every industry stakeholder group. ATA quickly developed a congressional strategy to keep this proposal from devastating the trucking industry and harming our national economy. In October of 2000, after an unprecedented campaign led by ATA, Congress did just that.
Under the new rules, the amount of off-duty rest time for drivers has been increased by 25%. The rules also reduce the amount of on-duty time each shift while promoting the body’s natural 24-hour circadian clock. At the end of the day, the rules are easy to understand, easy to comply with and easy to enforce. These three guiding principles have been the underpinning of ATA’s position on this important safety issue. It’s important that we not forget that at its heart, hours-of-service reform is a safety measure that will help improve conditions on our nation’s highways.
At the same time that FMCSA was releasing the new rules, the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration released preliminary Fatality Analysis Reporting System numbers for 2002. While the total number of highway-related fatalities rose in the past year, fatalities from crashes involving large trucks dropped from 5,082 in 2001 to 4,902 in 2002, a 3.5% decline. This marks the first time since 1995 that the number of fatalities from truck-involved crashes has fallen below 5,000. In fact, trucking was the only group to show a decline in the number of fatalities due to crashes. With the implementation of new hours-of-service rules, we believe that this number will continue to decrease and more lives will be saved.
But we wouldn’t have reached this point today without the hard work of so many people from so many different organizations and companies. Former ATA Chairman David McCorkle, chairman of McCorkle Truck Line, and the members of ATA’s HOS committee played a tremendous role in this process, as did Gerald Detter, president and CEO of Con-Way Transportation Services, and Don Schneider, chairman of Schneider National Inc., who served as co-chairs of the Trucking Executives Leadership Council in 2000. We also owe a great deal of our success to our state trucking association executives who played a major role in ATA’s grassroots efforts. We owe a debt of gratitude to the members of the U.S. Congress for listening to the industry’s concerns in 2000 and assisting us in moving this change process forward.
This issue is an excellent illustration of how ATA followed the process through from start to finish, ensuring that the American trucking industry could continue to do its job of moving our nation’s economy. We still have a significant task ahead of us, however. We need to train America’s truck drivers in these new rules to ensure compliance and continued improvements in truck safety. But that’s great news, because it means that after a lengthy change process, we can continue to do what we do best — move America’s freight safely and efficiently.
American Trucking Associations, Alexandria, Va., owns Transport Topics Publishing Group, which publishes this newspaper.
This story appeared in the April 28 edition of Transport Topics. Subscribe today.
