Archive for August, 2012

The Environmental Protection Agency will allow Navistar International to pay penalties on engines that do not meet clean air standards. The rule, which has not yet been published, sets a maximum penalty of about $3,800 per engine, the agency said last night.

Navistar Financial Corp. signed agreements to renew and increase its largest dealer inventory funding facility to $750 million, effective immediately.

Averitt Express, Cookeville, Tenn., has dropped the minimum age for drivers and kicked off a student driver training program.

Federal, state and local officials broke ground on the $3.2 million-first construction phase of the Louisville-Southern Indiana Ohio River Bridges project, which will dramatically improve the Kennedy Interchange in downtown Louisville, Ky.

The Bridges Project involves construction of new bridges across the Ohio River between downtown Louisville and Jeffersonville, Ind.

From local watermelon deliveries with a Model T in 1927 to the storage and cross-country transportation of hazmat materials via Volvo tractors in 2012, New Jersey-based Hermann Services has been in the logistics business for the long haul.

Who’d-a-thunk that mile-per-gallon numbers would be important to macho owners of pickup trucks? You can thank spiking prices of gasoline, even before Hurricane Isaac finishes making a wake in Louisiana.

Acclaimed Movers & Storage of Simi Valley, Calif., runs its moving trucks on biodiesel fuel as part of its efforts to leave a smaller mark on the environment.

“That’s what we’re looking for now – transportation.”

Gulf Oil has deployed 34 trucks that run on liquefied natural gas and says it soon will be supplying and distributing LNG to customers in the transportation sector and other interested bulk users.

IDG’s Computerworld magazine has named Maverick Transportation a Best of Business Intelligence (BI) Editor’s Choice Awards honoree.

Trade using surface transportation between the United States and its North American Free Trade Agreement partners, Canada and Mexico, was 6.6% higher in June 2012 than in June 2011, totaling $82.6 billion

Vocational Energy announced the grand opening of its first public access compressed natural gas fueling station, constructed for Smith Dairy Products Co. about 20 miles west of Canton, Ohio.

The board of directors and ambassadors of Trucker Buddy International announced the organization’s Ambassador of the Year award has been named posthumously for Darrell Hicks, the longtime Trucker Buddy board member, advisor and ambassador known as Uncle Darrel.

The California Air Resources Board and the California Pollution Control Financing Authority, part of the State Treasurer’s Office, hit the $100 million mark in financial assistance to small-business truckers so they can buy cleaner-burning vehicles.

C.R. England, Salt Lake City, announced 13 corporate executive promotions.

Richard Wilson

The Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration (FMCSA) will be incorporating major changes to the Compliance, Safety, Accountability (CSA) program, effective December, 2012.

Among the changes planned for full launch in December are:

• The Vehicle Maintenance BASIC will include cargo and load securement violations
• The methodology will be updated to align with current intermodal regulations
• The Cargo Securement BASIC will become a HM (HazMat) Compliance BASIC
• Clarify the definition of HazMat carriers to ensure any carrier hauling a placardable amount of HazMat will be subject to the HM Compliance BASIC’s intervention thresholds
• Update the definition of passenger carrier to better identify those operations
• Align relevant inspections with Commercial Vehicle Safety Alliance inspections levels (for example, driver only inspections will not be included under the Vehicle Maintenance BASIC)
• Modify the SMS display to include more specific terminology in place of “inconclusive” and “insufficient” with information reflecting the number of inspections and unranked compliance

There are four additional changes, all of which address some of the concerns raised by OOIDA:

• Currently, federal regulations allow for a 5 mph speedometer variance, however CSA included speeding 1-5 mph as a violation weighted and scored by the program. This violation will be removed from CSA.  Also, the severity weight for unspecified speeding will be lowered to a “1″ rating.
• The methodology currently treats similar logbook violations and  electronic on-board recorder violations differently. In December, those violations will be scored consistently.
• The Fatigued Driving BASIC will be renamed “HOS Compliance BASIC” (hours of service) to reflect that the category measures everything from on-duty violations to paperwork violations.

Paperwork violations, commonly called form and manner violations, account for 35% of all violations under the soon-to-be HOS Compliance BASIC. OOIDA has been very vocal with their opposition to the inclusion of form and manner violations in the enforcement program.

FMCSA officials did not remove any of the form and manner violations from the methodology that I had addressed.

* The following is the speech Richard Wilson presented at the recent MCSAC meeting this past Monday, August 27th, 2012:

“Nothing is currently on the SMS site that shows positive or non-violation inspections; If shippers look at the SMS, all they see is negative inspections with violations.  I think that the DATA should only be allowed to be seen by DOT, State, and MCSAP certified officers and the companies. It shows a prejudice to and against small carriers in being competitive in shipping.”

“Corrective action plans need to be addressed expeditiously and fairly. If an intervention is instituted, and only small or marginal violations are found, the carrier should only have to offer a corrective action plan based on found violations during the specific intervention, not require the carrier to provide all documents for a complete Compliance Review. You have to supply more documents causing delays when requesting an upgrade in rating.”

“Relating to accident reporting, and data provided, accident information is not public information, then why can anyone go on the Carrier overview site, click on “Accidents” and see all accidents with no discerning value of fault?  You say you cannot determine fault, but you can cite a carrier if they do not post accident tests for a recordable accident if they are charged, if they are not charged, then why should it be on the data information?  A non-fault accident looks as bad a a fault accident, and carriers weight as causing an intervention.”

“And last, removal of erroneous data and accountability of road side officers and DOT inspectors. If you prove a carrier had false data reported and prove through a court, or with evidence that it should be removed, then remove it from the SMS. Do not rely on the offending or inspecting officer to automatically, with hard evidence, expect them to remove it. Hold officers accountable for false reporting with disciplinary actions the same as drivers, set up a uniform standard of violations, not some states do this and some do.  Also, accept the courts decision in ruling guilty or not guilty”.

“A Maryland officer said a local judge had no right to turn over an inspection because he had no experience, well why should that same judge be able to find the company or driver guilty and issue a civil penalty?  If he is experienced enough to find some one guilty, then he should be capable to find some one not guilty!”

© 2012, Allen Smith. All rights reserved.

Technorati Tags: compliance, CSA, CSA compliance basics, CSA program, EOBR, FMCSA, MCSAC meeting, regulations, Richard Wilson, Safety, Trans Products Trans Services, trucking

The new highway law sets an ambitious agenda for the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration over the next couple of years.

Most of the requirements in MAP-21 came from the agency’s strategic plan, said administrator Anne Ferro as she introduced a presentation Monday on the agency’s plans to implement the law.

Eaton is working on a way to reduce the size of batteries used in hybrid vehicles ranging from passenger cars to commercial vehicles, without compromising battery life or vehicle performance in hybrid vehicles.

In what may be an unprecedented event, all the month-over-month comparisons – volume, price, miles, and age – for all weight groups of used trucks improved in July.

Massachusetts Gov. Deval Patrick recently signed the state’s Right to Repair legislation. The Right to Repair Coalition says it is the first-of-its-kind in the country, and will serve as a model for other states. However, the new law exempts vehicles over 10,000 pounds.

Ron Huibers, president of Sales & Marketing North America within Volvo Trucks Americas, is leaving to take over as president of Volvo Penta Americas, which makes marine engines.

The American Trucking Associations is among dozens of organizations and municipalities urging the U.S. Department of Transportation to reject an application by Virginia to toll I-95, a critical freight corridor.

The Electrification Coalition and FleetAnswers have teamed up to provide online resources on plug-in electric vehicle deployment.

Truckload freight brokerage firm Total Quality Logistics is saying thank you to truck drivers with its new Drivers Dreams program.

MHC Kenworth has opened a new parts and service facility in Augusta, Ga., off of Interstate 20.

Utility Trailer Manufacturing Company named Larry Roland as the new director of marketing.

The trucking industry and other interest groups are getting more say in how the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration shapes its signature CSA safety enforcement program.

At the first meeting of a new CSA advisory panel yesterday, the agency spelled out the help it needs, calling for ideas and suggestions on how to solve such long-standing issues as public access to data, improvements in the data correction system and whether or not carriers should get credit for safety technology.

Diesel prices continued to climb this week, according to the U.S. Department of Energy.

The Truckload Carriers Association announced the participants in the follow-up to its successful Weight Loss Showdown.

Trimble, Sunnyvale, Calif., has agreed to buy privately held TMW Systems, Beachwood, Ohio, for $335 million cash. TMW will be part of Trimble’s Transportation & Logistics unit, which also includes PeopleNet and other providers.


The National Retail Federation urged labor and management to return to the table in negotiations for a new East Coast and Gulf Coast longshoremen’s contract, saying retailers heading into the crucial holiday season will be forced to divert cargo elsewhere in a matter of days.

Accuride Corp. named Scott D. Hazlett senior vice president and general manager, Accuride Wheels and Gunite.

South Carolina’s Kenworth dealer is expanding to the Charleston area. Worldwide Equipment will open a third full-service dealership in South Carolina next month.

The Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration Friday announced several changes to its Compliance, Safety, Accountability enforcement program, including going ahead with a new HazMat BASIC that has prompted a lot of criticism from the industry.

Eaton’s UltraShift Plus automated heavy-duty transmissions have been certified for use with the Westport HD 15-liter high pressure direct injection liquefied natural gas engine

Federal and state government expenditures on transportation were almost $243 billion in 2009, according to the U.S. Department of Transportation’s Bureau of Transportation Statistics.

Dale “The Truckin’ Bozo” Sommers, a longtime trucking radio personality, died Friday morning in a Florida hospice. He was 68.

Solid waste operator Republic Services Inc. announced an agreement to recover landfill gas from its North Shelby Landfill in Millington, Tenn., for multiple uses — including as a vehicle fuel for its growing natural gas-powered fleet.

Navistar International Corp. and Chinese truck maker Anhui Jianghuai Automobile Co. Ltd. announced that the two companies have received formal approval from the Chinese government to move forward with their commercial engine joint venture.

July is seasonally the weakest order month for the trailer industry, and the 14,500 new orders booked for the month confirmed that pattern.