Letters to the Editor: Hours of Service, Hard Questions, Fuel Discounts

These letters appear in the Feb. 25 print edition of Transport Topics. Click here to subscribe today.

Hours of Service

After spending more than 32 years in this industry, nothing really surprises me anymore. However, with regards to all the political groups who seem to know more about our industry than we do, their members are probably the first to complain when the new stove, washer-dryer, etc., isn’t delivered on time.

The one area I feel we can’t get right with hours-of-service rules and regulations is the split sleeper-berth. Most drivers don’t have a problem with the 11-hour and 14-hour rules, and the 34-hour restart makes far more sense than the old rule. However, the simple fact that a driver can’t pull over and take a five-hour nap without it counting against the 14-hour rule has never made any sense to me.

When a driver feels sleepy and needs even a power nap, don’t penalize him or her for that. Change the sleeper-berth rule back to the way it was, and it will make a lot of drivers happy.

Jeff Jenkins
Director of Safety
Container Express Inc.
Solon, Ohio

I have to say that the 11th hour of driving is a killer, especially if you’re in a day-cab job and work for a company that wants that extra hour every day.

Walter Rabbe
Driver
Greentown, Pa.

In the real world, absolutes are unobtainable. A logbook treats days as if everything were absolute, whereas we drivers know that no two days are the same on the road.

Not being able to split the log is completely unfair. If a driver is going to stay in the truck 24/7 and be on the road for weeks at a time, that driver should be allowed to take a nap whenever that driver sees fit in order to reduce fatigue or just wait out rush hour and go through later on when rested and able to maximize his or her time.

The Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration needs to listen more to the drivers who have been out there for years. And it needs to get more training for new drivers — for example, running teamed with an experienced driver for the first three to six months.
Every time someone messes up, it gives the industry a black eye.

Robert Bearce
Driver
Belleville, Mich.

Hard Questions

As we look at our industry, we are facing some hard questions. Where are we headed? How can we stay in business? Who will help us? Transportation is a large part of our world as we know it, but look at where we are now, compared with where we have been.

I have been in this business since 1981 — 27 years — and I’ve never seen it like this. Companies are going out of business, drivers are losing their jobs and freight is being hauled dirt cheap, trying to pay for the high cost of fuel.

I’m sorry about this and wish I had some good news about our industry. And it’s not that I am ungrateful, because I am. I just think trucking needs a big boost that will bring pride back to the transportation industry.

Rick Adams
Driver Recruiter
Volume Transportation
Services Inc.
Lithonia, Ga.

Fuel Discounts

All trucking companies with a legal Department of Transportation number should be given an automatic variable discount at the pump, adjusted weekly — for example, $2.25 a gallon — and fuel surcharges eliminated.

The variable discount could be covered by overseas cutbacks, thereby spending the money on something that benefits all our citizens.

Fuel surcharges are not computed in the same way, and favor the shippers and large package-delivery carriers that can hide big percentage increases.

Using this idea, all carriers would receive the same discount.

James Thompson
President
General Delivery Inc.
Fairmont, W.Va.