When it comes to America’s hour of service requirements for truckers, the commercial trucking industry is asking for the federal government to do its part in maintaining an already strong system. The commercial trucking industry is experiencing rapid growth but trucking officials are asking the government to do its part in helping one of the country’s fastest growing industries continue to grow.
In a brief filed July 24 with the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit, American Trucking Associations said federal rules further restricting drivers’ ability to work and drive would add tremendous cost to the economy and undue burden on drivers while providing minimal possible safety benefits.
“From the outset of FMCSA’s review of the hours-of-service rule, ATA has contended that the rules that have been in place since 2004 have been working and have been a major contributing factor in the reduction in truck-involved crashes and fatalities,” ATA President and CEO Bill Graves said in a press release. “FMCSA systematically, and without regard for science or logic, distorted the available data in order to fit it to a predetermined and arbitrary outcome. The brief filed today lays out this case convincingly and we believe the court will come to see the merits of our case and vacate these potentially ruinous changes.”
The American Trucking Association called the FMCSA’s proposed changes “arbitrary and capricious as well as unwarranted.”
“The agency claims that restart restrictions and the off-duty break requirement are justified by the cost-benefit analysis in FMCSA’s Regulatory Impact Analysis,” the ATA said in its brief. “That ‘analysis,’ however, is a sham. FMCSA stacked the deck in favor of its preferred outcome by basing its cost-benefit calculations on a host of transparently unjustifiable assumptions. FMCSA therefore cannot justify the 2011 final rule on the ground that it has net benefits.”
The ATA’s brief was filed at a time when the commercial trucking industry is experiencing rapid growth and many commercial truck carriers are desperate to find more professionally trained drivers that can help move the industry forward. The national economy is growing slowly but the commercial truck industry has been experiencing its own economic growth that is outpacing most American industries.
Trucking officials like those at the American Trucking Association say now is the wrong time to restrict the hours a commercial truck driver can be on the road, especially considering the industry is experiencing record high safety records and the trucking industry plays an important role in helping the overall economy move forward.
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