Court Issues 90-Day Stay of Hours’ Decision
A federal appeals court has delayed implementation of its ruling striking down parts of the federal hours of service rule for 90 days — less than half of what had been requested by American Trucking Associations and the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration.
“The clerk is directed to withhold issuance of the mandate in these consolidated cases for 90 days, until Dec. 27,” according to the issued by Judges Karen Henderson and Merrick Garland, writing Friday for the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia.
Last month, ATA requested an eight-month delay in the issuance of the court’s mandate — which will put into effect the ruling that struck down provisions of the hours’ rule allowing an 11th hour of driving per day and letting drivers reset their weekly driving limits by taking 34-consecutive hours off duty.
FMCSA filed its own brief in support of ATA’s request, but asked for a one-year stay of the ruling.
Both the agency and the association said immediately stripping out the provisions would be costly and confusion among industry and enforcement officials.
ATA said in a statement it was “pleased that the [court] granted in part its motion for a stay of the mandate to eliminate the 11-hour daily driving limit and 34-hour restart provisions” of the HOS rules.
The trucking industry and its customers could not instantaneously shift to an hours-of-service regime with a different daily driving limit and without the 34-hour restart, ATA said — rather, such a conversion would require months of preparation. (Click here for previous coverage.)
Public Citizen, which had successfully challenged the rule, had said the stay should not be granted.
The decision to let the rules “stand for just 90 more days supports the recommendations of safety groups determined to protect drivers and passengers alike on the nation’s highways,” the group said in a statement Monday.
In the same order, the court rejected a request from the Owner-Operator Independent Driver Association to rehear the entire case.
