Government

The Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration filed a memorandum with a court in Washington Friday strongly supporting American Trucking Associations’ request that the court’s vacating of provisions of truck driver hours-of-service rules be stayed pending reconsideration by the agency.

PierPass Inc., which operates the off-peak program at Southern California ports, said the container terminals at the Ports of Los Angeles and Long Beach will require trucks to be equipped with TruckTags in order to gain access to the terminals, starting Dec. 1.

The average price of regular gasoline dropped about 2 cents in the past two weeks, according to the latest Lundberg Survey of filling stations, released Sunday.

Hybrid drivetrains, combining diesel and electric power and developed by Eaton Corp., will be available in 2008 on medium-duty truck chassis made by Freightliner Corp., International Truck and Engine Corp. and Paccar’s DAF, Kenworth Truck Co. and Peterbilt Motors Co., according to several announcements by the manufacturers involved.

The current truck-driver hours-of-service rules — allowing 11 hours of driving and restarting a week after 34 hours of rest — are likely to remain in place for at least several more weeks.

Five counties in southwestern Indiana will switch from Central to Eastern time beginning Nov. 4, the U.S. Department of Transportation said.

Manufacturing levels increased in the Philadelphia area this month, the Federal Reserve Bank of Philadelphia said Thursday.

The index of leading economic indicators fell in August, the New York-based Conference Board said Thursday.

Truckload carrier Schneider National said a sleep apnea screening and treatment program managed by an outside vendor has improved safety and driver productivity while lowering health-care costs.