I know. Stupid question.

Go ahead, report me. I dare you.

32 year Teamster here and being told how to do my job by a bunch of suits who have never driven a truck is ridiculous, only the government and the industry, the drivers aren't represented. There is nothing wrong with trying to make the highways safer, I drive them every day, but drivers need some flexiblity to meet their ever tightening schedules.

I am one of the few drivers I know who believes the best way to safety is stop paying drivers by the mile and pay them a good hourly wage that equals what they make by the mile.

I agree with you 100%, get rid of the per-mile system. That reduces some of the incentives to cheat, dual logbooks (not so much with eLogs), and to drive tired. Also, make APUs mandatory for all non-local routes.

You get up in the morning and ask yourself a question: "What can I do to kill or harm Americans today?"

Because you're a member of the trump administration.

We have opposed the previous HOS service rules since they before they were put in place and have spoke out during the comment phase supporting these changes.

They care about safety on the road - theirs and the other drivers

But I don't think the trump administration people have warm and fuzzy feelings for truck drivers.

... about the safety of the truck drivers as the general public. Studies have shown that not getting enough time away from the wheel significantly increases the likelihood of accidents.

They also help reduce carrier abuses of driver labor. I understand that drivers may want to drive more, especially if their compensation is tied to how quickly they can deliver. And I certainly get that carriers want more hours from the drivers. But these rules are science based. There is no reason for any past government regulatory agency to have cut back on hours allowed for no reason or just to be assholes.

Taking a mandated break when required can cost you days, I had horrible snow and had to take a mandated break for 1 hour 20 minutes from my destination, since I missed my delivery window I had to wait 36 hours to get unloaded. I get paid by the mile so I sat there not getting paid all that time. Please tell me exactly how relaxing that rule would endanger public safety. Most people posting here don't even know how the rules were changed, it is all just knee jerk.

... exception. But you can’t regulate based on anecdotal examples unless they are numerous enough to outweigh the potential for abuse.

I don’t drive. But I’m pretty familiar with the rules as a lawyer who has handle trucking cases over the years. They’re not perfect. But overall they have reduced accidents. Your lost time - though it sucked - May not be worth the injury or death that could occur when another driver is on the road fatigued.

Just my perspective.

meth sales spike.

Something has to explain it

electronic logs put a dent in cheating and log falsification. So greater pressure to increase driver pay is on and the industry will do anything to avoid that. Solution according to the deregulators? Remove hourly limits. Wrong.

It isn't safe. It will lead to more accidents.

https://cdllife.com/2019/trucker-grills-clueless-presidential-hopeful-over-fmcsa-regulations-in-video/

Last week at the Iowa State Fair, CSPAN cameras were rolling as candidate John Delaney addressed a crowd and took questions from voters.

Truck driver Jeremy Walters begins the conversation (interrogation?) by asking Delaney is he’s familiar with trucking regulations. When Delaney says he is, Walters launches into a series of detailed questions on ELDs, driver pay, Hours of Service regulations, and whether FMCSA leadership should be required to hold a CDL.

Throughout the exchange, a visibly uncomfortable Delaney tries his best to respond to the questions but is forced to admit that he doesn’t have enough specific information to provide full answers.

I was a driver for years. I know what goes on.

The two log books gig is over, so the industry is in a dither. When you see a big rig drifting out its lane, it's because the driver has been cheating to get more miles because his pay is too low and he can only compensate by violating the regs and isn't getting enough rest.

One that won't knee jerk simply because Trump supports the idea, that person will recieve the backing of the Teamsters.

I believe it's possible that some reasonable changes could be made that work out for drivers and public safety. My main problem is that I think all the pressure is put on drivers to make their just in time loads without adequate regard for their situation or public safety. A lot of the resistance to current regs is from management (focused on keeping driver compensation low) and maybe independents getting low freight rates to run as long hours as they possibly can as the downward spiral in pay and freight rates goes on.

Thanks for starting this thread.

Miss your delivery time and being pushed back a day or even 12 hours can be a killer for someone getting paid by the mile. You either get minimum wage for detention if you are lucky or as in most cases the driver just doesn't get paid for that time.

I changed employers four times I think. The issue was always the same, refusing loads because I didn't have enough hours which was unacceptable from the dispatchers point of view, or being late due to some unforeseen weather occurrence or other delay and being told I had to deliver on time anyway when the hours were no longer there. I had one employer who literally didn't care at all whether the drivers complied with the hours of service at all. "That's your problem."

The drivers at the latter company were virtually all running illegally. It isn't as easy to do that now, but I know some may still be. I have one contact still in the industry and we discuss this matter.

He was losing his vision, his diabetes was hard to control, and he killed her by misjudging distance and changed lanes into her lane. She died, brutally, but he lived. She was in a sedan but he was in a truck. She didn't have a chance.

Increased driving time is anything but relaxing.

destroyed 2 families. so yay.

20 ton trucks barreling down the road at 70 miles an hour with a driver who has less mandatory down time.
You know a lot of long haul drivers are already tired with the current set of rules. Imagine how much less alert they will be if allowed to log more over the road hours in a given day.
This change will kill people. All for the sake of profit.

Patrick Phillips

The rest of us do.

truckers. Don't make sense.

We will all be so much better off when the roads are filled with truck drivers who've driven 20 hours straight and are perhaps buzzed on serious uppers.