Government

Members of the Commerce Committee in the Senate will look at how the 2015 highway law is affecting safety on highways and rails, and boosting freight connectivity.

Here's the week ahead for trucking on Capitol Hill, the last week before Congress takes its summer recess. 

The Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration on July 11 outlined plans for a two-year demonstration program that would allow certain nonpreventable crashes to be removed from motor carriers’ public and private safety scores.

Tax-writing policymakers in Congress should ensure that any reform package they consider incorporates a permanent fix for the Highway Trust Fund, the Transportation Construction Coalition said July 7.

Within several weeks, we could see the final form of Phase 2 of greenhouse-gas limits for heavy- and medium-duty trucks. That should not be confused with the rollout of the second half of Phase 1 GHG regulations on Jan. 1 — although the timing seems almost guaranteed to generate confusion.

The logistics industry in the United States is rapidly evolving. Thirty or 40 years ago, we worked within our own borders to manufacture and produce many of our own goods. In the 1980s and 1990s, this quickly shifted to China and India, because production costs and labor were much cheaper overseas. Even with the costs of transportation, the United States could manufacture goods much easier in China than in our own homeland.