Letters to the Editor: LTL Reweighing; DOE’s Fuel Surveys; TWIC: Why Bother?; Limit Cars, Not Rigs; Goodbye, California
These Letters to the Editor appear in the Nov. 3 print edition of Transport Topics. Click here to subscribe today.
LTL Reweighing
The letter writer who commented on less-than-truckload reweighing in the Oct. 13 issue of Transport Topics (p. 9) has led a sheltered experience in the trucking industry. I have been in this industry for 31 years, and reweighing and inspections (the opening of containers and cartons to make sure the freight is classified correctly) have been going on since I started.
There was an Interstate Commerce Commission back then and every once in a while it bared its teeth. There was a case — I believe it was one of the automotive giants refusing to pay detention on trailers — in which the carrier, after being dismissed, took it to the ICC and the auto giant was made to pay the bills.
Back then, there were ICC regulations against any kind of incentive to reweigh or inspect in order to keep people from cheating for financial gain. That didn’t stop the carriers from insisting that their supervisors do so much weighing and inspecting a month. We were not compensated for what we did, of course, but we were required to spend days off in the terminal until we reached our quota. It seemed funny to me that my yearly quota always added up to my base salary.
This practice was started because some shippers didn’t have scales or the ability to obtain the proper classification, and others simply cheated. On a call with a salesman I had to attend to because I was the one cutting the corrections, the traffic manager looked me straight in the eye and said, “I take 10% off on the weight of every shipment and if you keep cutting corrections, I will take my business to another carrier.”
Replicating the shipment is like asking the cheating party to take a month to figure out what went wrong and correct all cartons to weigh what the bills of lading read. I’m not saying his shipper cheated, but trying to replicate is asking for trouble.
I’m not saying all carrier employees are angels. Just look at the situation in this country today: If people can cheat to put an extra buck in their pocket, they will. As long as they have no penalty for doing it, they don’t bother to worry about how it affects anyone else. Sound familiar?
Bob George
Dispatcher
Columbus, Ohio
DOE’s Fuel Surveys
The Department of Energy fuel pricing that is used throughout the industry to determine fuel surcharges is taken from a very small sampling of filling stations nationwide — only 350 (10-27, p. 26).
The DOE’s published diesel rate for my region — Central Atlantic — is always higher than the prices I see around the area. With all the electronic data-collecting tools at their disposal, why can’t the DOE sample a larger number of stations for a more accurate number?
Ralph Folkes
Vice President
Corporate Transportation
L’Oreal
Clark, N.J.
TWIC: Why Bother?
I am not sure I will participate in the TWIC program. I am due to renew my commercial driver license in a couple of months, and I may not renew my hazardous materials endorsement.
My state runs a background check on me every time I renew my license. I see no need to pay $94 for a hazmat check and then another $132 for the Transportation Worker Identification Credential. Frankly, programs such as these serve no useful purpose but to hold the driver and industry hostage to a new tax. It takes only minutes for any government agency to run a criminal background check on an individual.
We may just avoid going to any of the ports. The money isn’t that great on those loads, and I am tired of more taxes being thrust onto this industry.
If programs such as these actually served a useful purpose, it would be different. Ports check only a fraction of the containers that enter there, yet they want natural-born American citizens with decades of experience to pay at least two extra taxes to do our jobs. It is a waste of my time and money.
If someone wanted to do serious damage to our ports, there are much easier ways to do it without going to the trouble of obtaining a CDL, hazmat endorsement or TWIC. They will do nothing to prevent terrorism but will cost workers millions of additional tax dollars imposed in the name of national security. Enough is enough.
Michael Goodman
President
Goodman Transport
Chattanooga, Tenn.
Limit Cars, Not Rigs
This letter is regarding truck speed limiters.
I am an independent agent for Landstar Ranger, and we mandate that safety must come first. What I have a hard time with is coming down on the backs of professional truckers in the United States and Canada and doing nothing about automobile drivers.
Why must everyone jump on the truckers’ backs when they are the professionals out there? Our drivers have a minimum of six to eight weeks of school training and learn every day about operating these large vehicles.
Truck drivers are faced daily with the monumental concerns of keeping our country running: delivering the freight on their trailers, carrying the weight of the fuel price problem and coping with delivery times, brokers and rate issues (usually making very little on the loads), log books, hours of service and sleep needs — not to mention what happens in their personal lives — and trying always to be safe out there. Then note how many accidents are caused by the stupidity or simple lack of education of some car drivers.
Here are some suggestions for teaching automobile and sport utility vehicle drivers how to operate safely around big trucks:
• Automobile manufacturers could install speed limiters on the cars they sell, setting them for a maximum of maybe 85 mph. They would save on fuel costs, make the highways safer and cut down on accidents, which would lower insurance costs. There is no reason for cars that will do 90 mph and 100-mph-plus to be on the highway. At least nine out of 10 people who own these cars are not trained to drive at speeds like that, especially in high-stress situations around big trucks. I speak as a former over-the-road driver on this point, and I can’t tell you how many times I have had a “four-wheeler” cut me off just to make an exit ramp or a turn at the next intersection.
• State and provincial departments of motor vehicles could agree to start programs in which renewing a regular driver’s license would require a course training drivers to drive safely around big trucks and understand what can happen to them if they challenge a tractor-trailer, even unknowingly. These courses could include a chance to experience what happens when a big truck loses control, although only on a closed track like Michigan’s professional skid pad. They would learn that speeding even 10 mph over the posted limits saves only one or two minutes — and that it takes an 80,000-pound truck more than 500 feet to stop.
• Because insurance companies view those drivers ages 16 to 25 as the highest risks, those individuals should start with a mandatory one-year training program with a weeklong refresher course every two or three years.
• Give more extensive retraining to people who already have bad driving histories.
People need to stop putting all the burdens on the backs of the truck drivers and start taking some of the blame for their own actions.
Dan Mitchell
Owner
CR Danstar Transportation
Somerset, Wis.
Goodbye, California
My husband, Michael, and I are team truck drivers who go to California to deliver freight, but it’s getting to the point that when we get a run to California, we refuse it. Do none of you in California — where there is now a strict limit on idling truck engines, even for truck-cab temperature control — realize that some truck drivers do not go home every night? We sleep in our trucks.
I am on the road six to eight weeks before I even see my home again. I don’t get to have fun on weekends with my family. I miss a lot of home-time seeing my granddaughter and my kids.
You in California — keep on putting your stupid laws into effect, and there will come a time when no truck will be willing to bring freight into your state. At home or at work, try cutting off the air conditioner or heater and try to be comfortable. But, no, you won’t do that because you need to be more comfortable than we are. Try sleeping in a small box with the windows rolled down and the temperature 80 degrees — and see if you feel safe sleeping at a truck stop in that box with the windows open.
Robbin and Michael Gardner
Over-the-Road Driving Team
Owner-Operators
Bridgeville, Del.
