Letters to the Editor: Speed Limiters, Driver Culture, Don't Involve Feds
These letters appear in the June 30 print edition of Transport Topics. Click here to subscribe today.
Speed Limiters
Hey, no problem — go ahead and limit the speed. That’s what you would expect from a socialist country. The truckers will simply move south — to a free country. (“Ontario Orders Speed Limiters on All Trucks Set at 65 mph,” 6/23; click here for previous Premium Content article.)
Governments limiting the current speed will not solve one problem. The use of auxiliary power units, conservative company policy and technology will be the best way to save fuel.
No government involvement in saving anything has ever helped anyone. You can bet costs will increase tenfold when a governmental body is involved. Let free enterprise work to solve the situation. Check your history, Canadians. You’ll see.
Greg Hart
Owner
Hart Consulting Service
Valparaiso, Ind.
I read an article in your fine paper about the Ontario Transport Ministry and Ontario Trucking Association President David Bradley and their arguments for speed limiters.
Had they been professional drivers or certified diesel mechanics before they became bureaucrats, these men would have known that all electronically controlled diesel engines already have built-in speed limiters in their electronic control modules.
This was a typical response from the uninformed pretending to be informed and is a major problem shared by the U.S. and Canadian governments — unfortunately.
David Ritter
Semper Fi Transport
Klamath Falls, Ore.
Real professional drivers do not require speed limiters. They realized long ago that operating a commercial motor vehicle at more than 62 mph not only affects the driver’s safety, but it affects fuel economy negatively as well. Real professional drivers will adhere to posted speed limits because they run compliant.
Having said that, and as I understand it, this new legislation is the result of a “fact-finding” mission to Europe a couple of years ago by some executive members of the Ontario Trucking Association.
Being the cynic that I am, it strikes me as extremely interesting that of all the differences between the European trucking community and its North American counterparts, the only recommendations OTA’s “industrial spies” could come up with was the speed limiter.
Among the other major differences they could have identified, were:
• Weekend and/or statutory holiday curfews for CMVs on roads in all of Western Europe.
• Maximum 48-hour on-duty cycle in seven days in all of Europe.
• Mandatory tachographs/electronic onboard recorders on all CMVs weighing more than 3.5 tonnes gross vehicle weight rating — and, interestingly, mandatory tachographs/EOBRs on all taxis and municipal vehicles, including ambulances and police cars.
We already have posted speed limits of 100 km/h (about 62 mph). Why not let the enforcement community do its job?
One of my concerns is that speed limiters do absolutely nothing to prevent a CMV from speeding through a school zone or other busy urban area. And, frankly, driving at 20% more than the posted speed in an urban area is a whole lot more dangerous than on the open highway.
On the other hand, who has not experienced the annoyance of finding a speed-governed truck attempting to overtake another such vehicle, both driving side-by-side for 10 or 15 miles on the cruise, thus blocking both lanes to all other faster traffic behind? This problem will multiply a hundredfold, once all trucks are equipped with speed limiters. Road-rage incidences will increase — possibly with dire consequences.
A recommendation for mandatory EOBRs would have done a great deal more to improve the general safety and compliance on the road, not only by the drivers but also some of the carrier executives. They might finally realize that just-in-time delivery deadlines don’t really work when a computer calculates the actual on-duty hours.
Besides, the trucking community would have been better served to voluntarily agree to EOBRs, because sooner or later, these will be mandated by the authorities under their own terms.
Also, if Ontario currently does not have sufficient officers to enforce posted speed limits, how do they expect to control carriers’ adherence to the new legislation? Will every officer be equipped with a laptop and the corresponding original-equipment-manufacturer software to download the programmed engine specs? Just wondering.
André Perret
The Road-Scholar
Fleet Safety/Compliance Specialist
Hamilton, Ontario
Canada
Speed limiters on trucks are a good thing. The question is, how will Ontario qualify the vehicle as being limited? I can say it’s limited, but what will be the burden of proof?
Roger Ites
Director of Safety
TransWood Inc.
Omaha, Neb.
Driver Culture
As a 2-million-mile safe driver myself and a safety manager for GTI Trucking, I have found that being a driver is a culture we must have and base on safety and respect, from the driver to the company and from the company to the driver.
As a trucking company, we must not act the part but do it, showing it to the drivers. They are the backbone of this nation and the true pavement pounders out there.
James Waugh
Regional Risk Manager
Gordon Trucking Inc.
Medford, Ore.
Don’t Involve Feds
I have been reading letters and listening to rants about fuel prices, and quite frankly, I am tired of it.
Trucking is one of the freest marketplaces in our economy, and when times get a little tough, many of us go crying to the government for salvation. What will our thoughts be when freight volume outpaces capacity shortly and the shippers go crying to the government to cap freight prices? I think people would be appalled at such control over our business, but that is precisely the mentality behind truckers’ whining about fuel prices now.
What is going on now is the market at work, and it is in the process of correcting itself. Friday the 13th’s Wall Street Journal had an article about how fuel pricing is changing the way businesses combat the fuel price by moving production back to North America.
People are changing how they drive; I drive 63 miles per hour tops and am now passing cars with regularity. Truckers are purchasing auxiliary power units and not idling their trucks as much. Shippers are being more efficient and more sensible.
For example, a customer I serve has stopped sending me on 200-mile additional deliveries with 5 pounds of freight because it is too expensive to spend $400 on freight for $20 worth of product simply because it is easier. On the whole, we are getting leaner and meaner.
The United States is going to be hurt the least by these fuel spikes because we have a freer marketplace than other world economies. We can adapt, and we have fewer government regulations in place that would prevent adaptation.
Crying now for more government regulation may save some companies and small businesses in the short term, but it hurts us all in the long run.
This market will weed out the weakest companies among us and leave those left standing in a better position. As freight picks up, prices will increase because of lack of capacity. This change will spur companies to expand and fill in the needed capacity, and these companies will be run, for the most part, by people who were efficient enough to survive these times.
Our industry will be stronger and provide better value to our customers and also to the nation as a whole. Please keep the government out of our industry.
Anthony Elliot
Tony Elliot Trucking
Lakeville, Minn.
