Prepping for Electronic Logging

Even without truck and engine makers exhibiting at this year’s Mid-America Trucking Show, the event offered a good opportunity to take the pulse of drivers.

They were the clear focus of this year’s MATS, which took place March 31-April 2 at the Kentucky Exposition Center in Louisville. There were 1,100 exhibitors, with many featuring products and services to help recruit, retain and support drivers.

Also important were the seminars and listening sessions, allowing drivers the chance to interact directly with federal officials. While not as explosive as in previous years, many questions directed at the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration concerned the electronic logging device mandate, scheduled to start in December 2017. The sessions showed a need for more education and outreach by all stakeholders.

One driver asked if electronic logs will be required for pre-2000 model year trucks. Once the officials confirmed an ELD would not be required for those trucks, he and many others in the audience gave a sigh of relief.

For them, it appears, the mandate is that much more incentive to keep their older trucks running as long as possible — whether in the initial form or through glider kits. While that is an extremely small percentage of the entire U.S. truck fleet, the undercurrent of resistance toward ELDs was not limited to that seminar.

At a nearby research conference, executives with small and midsize fleets shared some of the opportunities and challenges they have faced transitioning to electronic logs (see story, p. 1). Drivers have left carriers to avoid ELDs, and some small fleets have said the mandate will cause them to shutter their doors.

It’s clear there are some drivers, especially among the industry’s many older ones, who are determined to never use an electronic log. Yet there is also a sense that once there is proper training and guidance, many change their opinions and then never want to go back to logging hours on paper.

We encourage governmental and industry proponents of electronic logs to work together to find additional ways to bridge that gap prior to the December 2017 adoption.

We also encourage any further challenges to the rule be resolved quickly, so the preparation can continue unabated. Any suggestions that drivers should avoid considering buying an electronic hours log is likely doing a great disservice to both the trucker — and potentially — to overall highway safety.