Safety

WASHINGTON — Members of the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee criticized Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood and the Obama administration for refusing to consider an increase in the federal fuel tax.

Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said the United States is “working very hard to achieve a resolution” to a trade dispute that led to Mexico imposing tariffs on U.S. goods valued at more than $2 billion after President Obama signed a law ending a cross-border trucking plan.

Truck tonnage in February dropped 9.2% from year-ago levels, but inched up 1.7% from the low totals in January, American Trucking Associations reported last week.

A federal appeals court has thrown out the Port of Los Angeles’ ban on owner-operators and questioned the legality of concession requirements at the adjacent Long Beach port for drayage operators to file financial statements and give hiring preferences to experienced port drivers.

Spurred by trucking industry leaders, more states this year are banning contracts that shift liability for any incident that occurs on a shipper’s premises to freight carriers, joining more than a dozen other states that have acted to protect carriers from what they say are unfair contracts.

Rising oil prices and growing distillate demand pushed the U.S. national diesel average 7.3 cents higher to $2.09 last week, the first increase in more than two months, the Department of Energy reported.

The private sector has plenty to worry about at the moment. On a global scale, there are the conflicts in Iraq and Afghanistan and Iran’s nuclear issues.

Rail and intermodal traffic continued to decline along with the economy last week, the Association of American Railroads said Thursday.

China passed the United States last year to become the world’s second largest auto-producing nation behind Japan, according to a California research firm.