Articles Posted in Trucking industry

If you specialize in truck wreck litigation so you can do research at truck stops, you might be a redneck lawyer.

On a long car trip a couple of days ago, I stopped for caffeine at a truck stop that is part of one of the big national truck stop chains. Walking around the store area, I reconfirmed something I wrote recently about how hard it is for long-haul truck drivers to follow a healthy diet and exercise routine.

About 98% of the food and beverage items in that truck stop were high in fat, salt and calories. Adjoining the truck stop was a fast food outlet with virtually no items that you would eat if you were trying to maintain healthy weight. There were some in-cab cooking appliances that a driver could use to prepare food he brought from home, but nothing that would constitute a healthy meal. However, it is unusual to find a supermarket where fresh produce could be purchased with parking spaces for big rigs.

While truck stops often have showers and video games, I don’t think I’ve ever seen one with any exercise facilities. If a trucker wants to run on his off duty hours, consider that most truck stops are located on busy highways by freeway exits, hardly conducive environments for safe running.

A trucker who was a former professional hockey player once told me what an ordeal it is for him to find decent food and a place to exercise. For anyone less motivated than a former pro athlete, the strong tendency is to become increasingly obese and unhealthy while driving over the road. At the truck stop I visited this week, that was grossly obvious as about 90% of the truck drivers I saw were very significantly overweight. They looked like prime candidates for obstructive sleep apnea.

It would be refreshing to see one of the truck stop chains start marketing to truckers on the basis of healthy food options and availability of gym facilities along with showers.
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For years we have been hearing about a severe shortage of qualified over the road truck drivers, contributing to widespread safety concerns.

Now the severe economic recession has cut into shipping volume, led to an ongoing consolidation of the trucking industry, and a glut of qualified drivers, as reported by Rick Rommell of the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel.

This is just the latest “bad news / good news” story in the interesting times in which we live.
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Taking a break from trucking accident litigation on the day after Christmas, I’m sitting at home in Atlanta, in a house where it seems everyone else is either sleeping or out bargain hunting, reading the news.

A few quick notes on the news as it relates to the trucking industry safety and economics, which in turn ultimately affects safety:

* Three members of a Duluth, Georgia, family were killed on Christmas Eve when they were rearended by a tractor trailer on the Pennsylvania Turnpike en route to New York. Benito Rivera, Christina Rivera-Morales and their four year old child were killed. Their two year old survived. One report says this happened in freezing rain, the sort of adverse weather that requires that truckers operate with “extreme caution.” According to another report, the family vehicle had lost control and come to rest across the traffic lane in the dark. Let’s remember that family in our prayers, as well as the overstressed and underpaid trucker who probably hit them while trying to get home for Christmas with his family, and hold our own loved ones tight.

* YRC Worldwide parent company of Yellow Freight, cancelled a $150 million tender offer and is negotiating for easier terms on its credit lines as its shares dropped 18% and Moody’s cut its credit rating. The carrier’s freight tonnage was down substantially — 11%, 12% 21% depending on how the counting is done — from last year YRC was also negotiating a sale-leaseback of a portion of its facilities.

* Navistar International,manufacturer of trucks, buses, and diesel engines, is restating its net income upward due to an accounting error. While reported earning were up, the stock went down. The company benefited from higher military revenue and demand for more fuel efficient trucks, offsetting some of the decline in general trucking demand.

* The Wall Street Journal in a lead editorial blasted prospective DOT Secretary Ray LaHood as “Obama’s Secretary of Earmarks,” criticizing him for having “facilitatated the incontinent spending that helped Republicans lose their majority….” That is followed by an editorial titled “…And Bridges to Everywhere,” lampooning some spending projects proposed by local governments. Let’s hope that the new infrastructure spending will be more like Ike’s building of the interstate highway system in my youth, investing in our children’s future.

* California has passed the nation’s strictest rules on diesel fuel emissions. While my son may breathe marginally cleaner air near L.A., the increased cost for truckers to comply comes at a very difficult time.

* In another California story, the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration announced on Christmas Eve a ruling that the hours of service rules for interstate truckers do not preempt California laws and regulations requiring employers to provide employees with meal and rest breaks.

* The U.S. isn’t the only country where the economic slowdown is affecting trucking. In India, about 158,000 commercial trucks went back to the lenders in December alone.
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Seldom does my trucking litigation practice as an attorney in Atlanta overlap with my semi-regular reading of Investors Business Daily. However, the issue for Monday, 12/22/08, includes an insightful article by J. Bonasia titled “Trucking Firms Shift Gears.”

Some key points:

* “A central part of the industry’s cost structure involves a focus on safety, which is the main differentiator among trucking firms.”

* “All trucking firms pay roughly the same amount for fuel, trucks, drivers and equipment, . . . .So the real difference is the quality of people who deliver the service and their safety record. That can prevent a company from being bitten by losses due to accidents.”

* Advantages of GPS tracking system for efficient fleet management and auxillary power units for energy conservation.

* Consolidation of the trucking industry in the current economic contraction as smaller and less well managed companies fail.

So it’s not just plaintiffs’ lawyers (that nasty breed constantly berated by IBD) and wingnut safety crusaders who recognize that safety is crucial to profitability. Business analysts too recognize that safety management is critical to profitability in the trucking industry.
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Bankruptcy (or mere shutdown) of 2,700 trucking companies in 2008 have put more than 127,000 trucks out of commission, cutting U.S. trucking capacity by 6.5 %, according to Donald Broughton, an analyst with the Avondale Partners research firm, as quoted by Mateusz Perkowski of Capital Press.

In previous economic downturns, trucks were simply mothballed and then returned to sevice when the economy improved. However, due to the weak dollar throughout much of 2008, there was a huge overseas demand for U.S. trucks. Many of the used trucks this year have been exported to Russia and Eastern Europe, resulting in more lost trucking capacity than in previous recessions.

The current contraction in trucking capacity may result in shipping demand quickly exceeding capacity when the economy recovers, so that trucking companies will be able to charge higher rates. Then, as they expand capacity to meet rising demand, they will be ordering new equipment with the next generation of fleet management and safety technology.

That should result in safer operations, fewer accidents and injuries in relation to the volume of traffic. But as we have been told so many times lately, it will get worse before it gets better.
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As an attorney in Atlanta, Georgia, handling litigation resulting from accidents involving motor carriers (truck, bus, tractor trailer, big rigs, etc.), I have observed with interest the controversies about the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration in recent years. Looking ahead, it will be interesting to see who is picked to run the DOT and FMCSA in the next administration.

With many challenges regarding infrastructure, funding and technology, as well as safety rules and enforcement, personnel will be policy.

A report from Associated Press lists three likely candidates for Secretary of Transportation: Jane Garvey, former head of the Federal Aviation Administration. Mortimer Downey, former deputy transportation secretary. Steve Heminger, executive director, San Francisco Bay area transportation commission. Garvey and Downey are both on the Obama DOT transition team.

Garvey graduated from Mount St. Mary’s College and earned an M.A. at Mount Holyoke. She was the first female FAA administrator. .Here is a copy of her testimony to Congress as FAA Administrator after September 11th. Out of office, she has been executive vice president of the transportation practice at the Washington lobbying firm APCO Worldwide. She has also served the boards of Mitre, the Flight Safety Foundation, and Canadian aircraft manufacturer Bombardier She currently serves as the chairwoman of the Capital-to-Capital Coalition, which advocates for nonstop commercial air service between Beijing and Washington Dulles International Airport and head of U.S. public-private partnerships at JPMorgan

Downey also has had a long career in public transportation administration. His educational background includes graduation with honors from Yale University in 1958, a master’s degree in public administration from New York University in 1966, and the Harvard Business School Advanced Management Program in 1988. He worked in administration for the Port Authority of New York, as a congressional transportation analyst, Assistant Secretary for Budget and Programs at the Department of Transportation in the Carter Administration, executive director and chief financial officer at the Metropolitan Transportation Authority (MTA) in New York. In the Clinton Administration, he was Deputy Secretary of USDOT and was the Department’s Chief Operating Officer. Out of office, he has been with Parsons Brinckerhoff, an international engineering and transportation consulting firm.

Heminger is the executive director of Metropolitan Transportation Commission (MTC) in the San Francisco Bay area and has served on the National Surface Transportation Policy and Revenue Study Commission. He received his M.A. from the University of Chicago and a B.A. from Georgetown University.

The transition team also has considered Rep. James L. Oberstar, D-Minn., chairman of the House Transportation Committee, and Rep. Peter A. DeFazio, D-Ore., chairman of its highways and transit subcommittee.

I haven’t yet seen speculation in the press about who might be the new FMCSA chief, but stay tuned.
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