8 hours a day?

Well now hello to anyone that finds this and reads it. Thank You. Now to the point of this post.
I am a truck driver. I realize that and about $3.00 might get me a cup of coffee, but it is what I am. Those that drive know that there is a controversy over the hours that drivers are allowed to drive, and it is getting pretty ugly. Now a group of groups including the Teamsters Union, has filed suit demanding that truck drivers only be allowed to drive 8 hours a day, and work only a total of 12 hours a day. This suit also calls for limiting hours worked in an 8 day period to 40 hours. As a truck driver I think this is pretty much insane. Right now I am allowed to drive 11 hours a day, and only 70 hours in 8 days. The daily driving hours must be completed in 14 hours from the start of my day. This means that if I stop during the day for a break, or to inspect my truck, or get fuel, or anything it counts against my 14 hour work clock. Even if I stop and take a nap it counts against my 14 hour clock. Normally I just do not stop. These rules were described by the venerable Senator from New Jersey,
Frank Lautenburg as unsafe. Mr. Lautenburg is absolutely correct, forcing drivers to drive even when they feel that they should take a break is horrible. The new rules whatever they turn out to be will be worse, and of course there will now be electronic on board monitors to insure that drivers park the truck after driving for 8 hours.
The down side is that there will be more accidents, lots more, and less drivers lots less. At an average speed of 57 miles per hour a driver will be able to get about 450 to 460 miles a day down the road with these rules. That means that lettuce and other produce from California will require about 6 days to get from California to say Washington D.C. Currently the same trip is done in 5 days. What does one extra day mean? Lets see the lettuce which is perishable will only be able to be on the shelf 2 days instead of 3 or 4. But that is OK because Mr. Lautenburg feels that the food you buy is already too cheap, and too plentiful. Besides produce grows at the back of the Whole Foods store, it isn't shipped all the way across the country.

After reading the article on the suit I did a little math. Currently under the 70 hours in 8 days rule in order to keep moving and make a living most drivers only drive about 8 hours a day, with the occasional longer day to get the product to the receiver on time, but by in large 8.75 hours a day (this is figuring on .25 hrs a day for fueling and .50 hours a day for a post trip inspection) is the only way that a driver can make a living. You see at 8.75 hours a day a driver never runs out of hours. So lets change the rules to 8 hours a day driving go ahead. That means in order to keep rolling the average driver will drive about 5 hours a day so that he can keep going. It also means that the current driver shortage will increase because people have to make a living and at 250 miles a day times the industry standard of about $.35 a mile most folks could make more money flipping burgers for minimum wage. So the Teamsters will get to hall all the freight, but there won't be much of that either because of time sensitivity most freight will end up on the rail. I for one will find something else to do for a living if these proposed hours go into effect. It is already hard to find a safe secure place to park after my hours are up. I spend almost two hours every trip planning on where to park and how far to drive each day, and parking is at a premium right now. Take away the night time hours, and force trucks to park after 8 hours of driving and the wrecker companies will get rich.
All of this does not address the fact that good old "Joe sixpack the factory worker" can work 80 hours a week, then load his family into the car and drive 16 hours to get to a vacation spot and while tired and seeing the taillights of a tractor trailer ahead he decides to follow the truck. He doesn't realize that the truck is pulled off the road because his 8 hours are up, and good old Joe drives right into the back of the truck and kills himself and his family. The truck driver was complying with the law, and was at the end of the rest area, but that doesn't change the fact that Joe and his family are dead. Lets make it so trucks can only drive from 9:00 A.M. to 5:00 P.M. and make it so that if they are parked they are in an area that cars can't drive into them. But lets not make Joe and his ilk drive safer, lets just blame the nasty old truck.
If the above sounds insane, how about this question, If all the trucks have to be parked 16 hours a day, where are they going to park? If Drivers are only allowed to be on duty 12 hours a day and we do not make shippers and receivers load and unload trailers in a timely manner how is the freight going to move?

Trucking has gotten a lot safer, and a lot more dangerous at the same time. The trucks are safer, and more comfortable to drive than they were when the HOS were first implemented, we now have air ride, auto shift, air conditioning, power steering, seats that have lumbar support, and satellite radio. Drivers are not as fatigued at the end of the day because of these comforts, and the same statistics on crashes that the group sites in their court filing show that 90% of the fatal truck accidents are caused by the cars involved (inattentive driving, ignorance of the rules of the road, fatigue of the car driver, defects in the car) are just some of the reasons sighted in truck car accidents. But all that aside, all it takes is one slick trial lawyer to tell a jury "The driver of the truck involved in this horrible accident did not have to be there. If he had followed the rules 7 days earlier and not driven 45 minutes too long after his 14 hours were up that truck would not have been there, and my client might have driven off the road and wrecked his car while he was drunk, and after he had worked 90 hours in a factory and driven 17 hours simply to get his family to their vacation. But no this evil truck driver driven by the almighty dollar didn't follow the rules and murdered my client and his family!"
That is an exaggeration, but you get the drift.
So in short I sure do hope the grocery stores figure out how to grow food in the back room because the way things are going there won't be anyone interested in driving trucks to get them from the farm to the market.

Dave Talley