Two national truckload carriers have signed letters of intent to participate in the port of Los Angeles’ Clean Trucks Plan, the Los Angeles Times reported Friday.
The two, Swift Transportation Co. and Knight Transportation, both based in Phoenix, plan to begin drayage operations at L.A. in October, the port said in a statement late Thursday.
While the number of trucks they will operate in the market is still to be determined, port officials expect that, collectively, their pool of trucks will exceed 2,000.
The trucks will meet 2007 federal diesel emissions standards using a mix of clean diesel and liquefied natural gas-fueled trucks, the port’s statement said.
American Trucking Associations filed suit in federal court late last month to block part of the Clean Truck program plans of the Port of Los Angeles and its neighboring Port of Long Beach, saying that their separate plans adopted earlier this year — one of which bans independent drayage operators — go beyond cleaning the ports’ air. (Click here for previous coverage.)
Meanwhile, the ports of Los Angeles and Long Beach said Thursday they filed opposition in the U.S. District Court in Los Angeles in response to ATA’s suit.
The “claimed financial injuries are more than outweighed by the public health and security interests of those who work at the ports and who live near the ports,” the statement said.
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