New Driver Rules * USA - Trucking Recovery Faces Roadblock From

The sector could stall out from forced cuts to drivers' on-road time

(Video from YouTube, by aaronnflanders -30 Jan 2011: Hit a little snow storm on the way to RI. It was 18+ inches by the time I got back to CT)

Lancaster,PA,USA -Investor Place, by Susan J. Aluise -Feb. 18, 2011: -- Just as the trucking industry labors to drive away from a deep recession and defray runaway diesel fuel prices, there’s another potential roadblock to recovery: the possibility of new federal rules on how and when drivers work and sleep... While the extra margin of safety proposed is a noble goal, there are significant costs in time and money that likely will eat into the margins of trucking companies as they ease back onto the road to profitability... The Department of Transportation’s “Hours of Service” rules were put in place decades ago to curb accidents caused by driver fatigue. By limiting the number of daily driving hours, requiring minimum daily rest periods and keeping drivers on a 21-24-hour schedule, the rules aim to reduce cumulative fatigue by maintaining the natural sleep/wake cycle, or “circadian rhythm”... The Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration (FMCSA) wants to cut a driver’s maximum daily driving time to 10 hours from 11 hours and reduce the on-duty “workday” to 13 hours from 14 hours. Regulators also want to eliminate the so-called “34-hour restart,” which allows drivers to work more weekly hours if they take 34 consecutive hours off. Comments on the plan — and there are more than 7,600 so far — are due to FMCSA by March 4...   If FMCSA passes the rule as is, additional costs and delayed shipments could put the brakes on the fragile recovery and inhibit the rebound in share prices...