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Payroll employment among for-hire trucking companies in October dropped 0.6 percent on a seasonally adjusted basis from September levels – slightly more than the decline the month before. Employment is down 9.3 percent from October 2008, according to preliminary figures released Friday, Nov. 6, by the U.S. Department of Labor’s Bureau of Labor Statistics. With the estimated 7,500 jobs lost in October, the trucking industry has lost more than 91,000 jobs since the end of 2008 – a decline of 6.8 percent. Job cuts since July 2008 – just before the current decline – total 141,400. The BLS numbers reflect...

NEW YORK (AP) -- YRC Worldwide said Friday it lost money in the third quarter, but the financially fragile trucking company is still working with lenders to stay out of bankruptcy. Despite a weak economy and competitors nipping at its heels, YRC CEO Bill Zollars said in a conference call with analysts that he's confident the company will be able to rightsize itself next year. But he expects the economy to remain weak through the first half of 2010. "I don't think there's anything that would make us think we can't be back there at some point," Zollars said. "The...

(As you read the article, remember it comes from the Dem mindset that GPS causes accidents, guns kill people, etc.) ALBANY, N.Y. — New York state wants to crack down on truckers who rely on satellite devices to direct them onto faster but prohibited routes and end up crashing into overpasses that are too low for their rigs. Gov. David Paterson on Wednesday proposed penalties including jail time and confiscation of trucks to come down on drivers who use GPS — global positioning systems — to take more hazardous routes and end up striking bridges. In New York, a truckers'...

ORONTO (Reuters) – A Canadian truck driver has been fined for smoking in his vehicle because it is considered his workplace, a police spokeswoman said on Friday. A police officer saw the 48-year-old trucker driving on a highway in southwestern Ontario with a cigarette in his mouth on Wednesday, and gave him a C$305 ($290) ticket. The Smoke-Free Ontario Act, adopted in 2006, prohibits smoking in an enclosed workplace or enclosed public area, and that extends to work vehicles, said Constable Shawna Coulter of the Ontario Provincial Police in Essex County.

A tractor-trailer loaded with canned beans was struck by a southbound Norfolk Southern freight train at the Coile Street railroad crossing off Snapps Ferry Road about 6:45 a.m. this morning. No injuries were reported as a result of the collision. GPD Officer Jeff Craft said at the scene this morning that Bobby Coffey, the driver of the Swift Transportation tractor-trailer, told police he had been attempting to enter the lot of the So-Pak-Co plant when he encountered a closed gate and came to a stop. The rear of the trailer was on the Norfolk Southern railroad tracks, police said. As...

<p>NASHVILLE, Tenn. (AP) - Peterbilt Corp. permanently closed its truck plant in Nashville.</p>

A German trucker suspected of driving under the influence of drugs crashed his vehicle near Borås in western Sweden on Tuesday. He subsequently admitted to masturbating at the time of the accident. The trucker, apparently unable to reach a satisfactory climax, then proceeded to continue to pleasure himself while in the midst of a police interrogation, according to the local Borås Tidning newspaper. "He was masturbating while the police interrogated him," police prosecutor Åsa Askenbäck told the newspaper. "He has admitted that he was not paying full attention at the time of the accident. He was playing with himself instead...

WASHINGTON -- U.S. business groups are growing increasingly frustrated with President Barack Obama's failure to resolve a cross-border trucking dispute with Mexico they say has threatened thousands of American jobs. "We've got companies that are really concerned," said Frank Vargo, vice president for international economic affairs at the National Association of Manufacturers. "Our calculation is that we've got 15,000 jobs at risk and the longer this goes on, the more likely it is that Mexican buyers are shifting suppliers," Vargo said. U.S. manufacturers hold out hope Obama's meeting early next week in Guadalajara with Mexican President Felipe Calderon and Canadian...

A plan containing guidelines on getting Mexican trucks back on U.S. highways has gone through bureaucratic review, the first step toward ending Mexican tariffs on $2.4 billion worth of U.S. goods. Implementing the plan would quell growing dissent among U.S. businesses that are hurt by Mexico's tariffs and that continue to besiege Washington with claims that doing nothing will result in job losses. The tariffs were imposed as retaliation for legislation enacted in March that took Mexican trucks off American highways, despite the North American Free Trade Agreement's program to let them into the United States.

Trucking Headlines U.S.-Mexico trucking plan may resumeBy Jill Dunn The United States may allow Mexican trucks to do business here as early as June, U.S. Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood reportedly said May 22. This spring, Congress ended the cross-border trucking program between the two countries. Mexico responded with 90 tariffs totaling $2.4 billion on U.S. products, casting a heavy burden on U.S. producers, LaHood said in a Bloomberg story. Candice Tolliver, the new communications director for the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration, did not immediately respond to questions. In recent weeks, the FMCSA began work with the U.S. Trade...

GENEVA (Reuters) – The prompt resolution of a 15-year old dispute over access to U.S. roads by Mexican trucks could be another casualty of the deadly swine flu outbreak, international trade experts said on Monday. Increased health checks to control the virus, which has killed 103 people in Mexico and infected at least 20 in the United States, could also slow the passage of goods across the busy but troubled U.S.-Mexico border, they said. The United States imported around $216 billion of goods from Mexico in 2008, making its southern neighbor its third-largest trading partner after Canada and China, according...

BRANFORD — At 8 p.m. on a Wednesday night — or just about anytime — there are 75 giant, exhaust-belching monsters parked at the TravelCenters of America truck stop off Interstate 95’s Exit 56. Many have their engines running and truckers inside sleeping or watching TV; cooking or talking on unlimited cell phone plans; playing video games or working on laptops to set up the next load. The Branford TA has been in the news because of the murder of an itinerant moving industry laborer found dead in a moving truck on April 17. But beyond that, it is “the...

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I stumbled on the political forum at the "Truck.net Roundtable Forum" and witnessed a lopsided representation of todays events and issues by a few liberals on the forum. To add a little balance, I created and had an account activated with the login id of "Ophir". I posted 3 or 4 articles that were critical of the present administration and was immediately banned from the forum. The administrator came up with ridiculous claims of "racism" and "using multiple logins". I have asked the admin to call me directly. No reply has come back. The forum can be found at http://roundtable.truck.net/viewforum.php?f=28...

<p>WOLF CREEK, Ore. (AP) - A truck driver blamed his breakfast burrito for a crash on Interstate 5 that scattered a load of building materials across all four lanes of the freeway near Wolf Creek in Southern Oregon.</p>

Washington, DC (AHN) - An FBI program that investigates unsolved killings along highways has linked long-haul truck drivers with hundreds of murders across the country, the Los Angeles Times reported over the weekend. The Highway Serial Killings Initiative (HSKI) has solved more than two dozen killings since it started five years ago, authorities said, according got the Times. At the center of HSKI's operation is a database holding information on more than 500 female murder victims, whose bodies were discarded at or near truck stops, motels and other places along well-traveled truck routes nationwide. The database also has information on...

The FBI suspects that serial killers working as long-haul truckers are responsible for the slayings of hundreds of prostitutes, hitchhikers and stranded motorists whose bodies have been dumped near highways over the last three decades. Federal authorities first made the connection about five years ago while helping police link a trucker to a string of unsolved killings along Interstate 40 in Oklahoma and several other states. After that, the FBI launched the Highway Serial Killings Initiative to track suspicious slayings and suspect truckers. A computer database maintained by the FBI has grown to include information on more than 500 female...

Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger on Wednesday sent a letter to the California congressional delegation urging it to restore the recently ended pilot program that allowed Mexican trucks to transport goods in the United States. "In this time of economic distress, when more than one in 10 Californians are out of work and the repercussions are felt throughout our great state, we must do all we can to boost trade with our international partners, not stifle it," Schwarzenegger wrote. "And yet I am afraid that the prohibition recently placed on Mexican truckers will do exactly that, with the result being markets functionally...

U.S. President Barack Obama's administration hopes to assemble a proposal to resolve a trucking dispute with Mexico before he visits the country in mid-April, an official said on Tuesday.

<p>A federal appeals court on Friday ordered a judge to reconsider her refusal to block portions of a clean-truck program at the nation's busiest port complex.</p> <p>In an opinion that dismayed environmentalists and labor leaders, the three-judge panel of the U.S. 9th Circuit Court of Appeals based in San Francisco ruled that U.S. District Judge Christina Snyder should grant all or part of the American Trucking Assn.'s request for an injunction halting the implementation of new rules that apply to truck drivers at the ports of Los Angeles and Long Beach.</p>

President Obama is facing his first trade war after Mexico slapped import tariffs on $2.4 billion in U.S. goods in retaliation for a ban on its trucks from American roads. Congress ignited the trade skirmish last week by killing a pilot program begun in 2007 that had allowed a few Mexican 18-wheelers to deliver goods across the border. "Right now, these trade agreements are contracts and if either side breaks that contract, there's repercussions," said Rep. Kevin Brady, R-Texas, the top Republican on the trade subcommittee of the House Ways and Means Committee. Economy Secretary Gerardo Ruiz Mateo imposed the...

One day after signing the $410 billion omnibus funding bill into law, along with provisions ending the Department of Transportation's Mexican truck demonstration project, the Obama administration has announced intentions to restart the program as soon as possible.

<p>The Obama administration will try to reinvent a program to allow Mexican trucks full access to U.S. highways.</p> <p>An 18-month-old pilot program that allowed a few Mexican trucks beyond a border buffer zone died when President Barack Obama signed a sweeping $410 billion government spending bill on Wednesday. The bill barred spending on the pilot program.</p>

Church Remembers Transport Professionals INNSBRUCK, Austria, MARCH 3, 2009 (Zenit.org).- Truckers face particular professional challenges, and thus have a special need for the Church, affirmed the secretary of the Pontifical Council for Migrants and Travelers. Archbishop Agostino Marchetto said this Monday in an address on the pastoral care of truckers in Europe, during a meeting organized by the European Association with tolled motorways, bridges and tunnels, being held these days in Innsbruck, Austria. The prelate recalled that the pastoral care of truckers was first addressed 50 years ago by Pope Pius XII, who described the group as "a very vast...

Buried in the $410 billion catch-all appropriations bill now before the U.S. Senate is a provision that would end a program that has allowed Mexican truck drivers to deliver goods to destinations inside the United States. A provision in the original North American Free Trade Agreement of 1994 was supposed to allow U.S. and Mexican trucking companies to deliver goods in each other’s country. But opposition from the Teamsters union and old-fashioned prejudice against Mexicans has derailed implementation of the provision. Under current restrictions, goods coming into the United States from Mexico by truck must be unloaded inside the “commercial...

The U.S. Department of Transportation will make no attempt to stop Sen. Byron Dorgan's effort to kill the Cross Border Demonstration Project, The Trucker learned Friday afternoon. Earlier this week, Dorgan, a Democrat from North Dakota, included language in the Fiscal Year 2009 Omnibus Appropriations bill that the senator said would finally bring to an end “the Mexican long-haul trucking program in the U.S. started by the Bush Administration.” The bill, not to be confused with the stimulus package, allocates federal funds for the remainder of the fiscal year. Sources have told The Trucker that LaHood has indicated he will...

DALLAS — Union officials were confident Tuesday that new legislation in Congress would halt Mexican trucks from making long-haul trips into the United States. A $410 billion spending bill House Democrats presented Monday includes language that would prevent Mexican-licensed trucks from traveling beyond commercial zones along the U.S.-Mexico border. The wording is aimed at ending a pilot program backed by the Bush administration that permitted up to 500 U.S.-certified trucks access deep into the U.S. "This is a really big win for us," said Leslie Miller, an International Brotherhood of Teamsters spokeswoman. "Historically, there has been very, very strong support"...

E-ZPass users and operators of large trucks will pay more for the use of the state's toll facilities under a series of changes proposed by the Maryland Transportation Authority to offset declines in revenue and increases in the cost of maintenance, Transportation Secretary John D. Porcari said today. Under the proposal given preliminary approval by the authority's board, users of the E-ZPass electronic toll collection system will be charged $1.50 a month for bill processing even if they don't use a toll facility during that month. New and replacement transponders -- the electronic devices placed in vehicles to record tolls...

<p>Two drivers were shot to death and a third injured on roads in northeast Dallas and Garland during rush hour Monday evening.</p> <p>Police were investigating four incidents Monday after the first fatal shooting was reported about 5:40 p.m. in Garland just north of LBJ Freeway. Police are working to establish whether the three shootings in Dallas are related to the Garland one.</p>

SACRAMENTO, Calif, Dec 12, 2008 /PRNewswire-USNewswire via COMTEX/ -- Will Dramatically Cut Largest Source of Deadly Diesel Pollution in State The California Air Resources Board today approved two diesel truck regulations that will dramatically cut the largest source of diesel pollution in the state and are the first of their kind in the United States, according to Environmental Defense Fund (EDF). The Air Resource Board estimates that the truck regulations are expected to save 9,400 lives between 2010 and 2025 and greatly reduce health care costs. "In passing these rules, California will continue to lead a nationwide movement to protect...

The black soot that big rig trucks belch from their chugging diesel engines may soon become a thing of the past. In one of the more far-reaching smog regulations that California has ever proposed, state air regulators are considering a first-in-the-nation plan that would require nearly every privately owned, heavy diesel truck in the state to install a filter that would reduce emissions of soot from their rigs by 85 percent. The new regulation would affect 1 million truckers, half of them registered out of state who regularly drive on California freeways. If approved by the California Air Resources Board...

MYFOXPhoenix.com/Arizona Dept. of Public Safety Arizona Department of Public Safety Detectives have confiscated about 2,118 pounds of marijuana from a truck that appeared identical to a United Parcel Service truck. A suspect fled the scene when an officer and narcotics canine attempted to stop the vehicle, according to MYFOXPhoenix.com. A search of the truck yielded nearly $1.2 million worth of marijuana bundles typically transported by

With the California Air Resources Board poised to adopt a new rule to cut diesel truck pollution next week, local trucking companies Wednesday highlighted the economic burden it would impose on local businesses and an industry already feeling the squeeze from high fuel costs and the recession. The rule would require truck owners to install pollution controls starting in 2010 and buy newer, cleaner trucks beginning in 2012. It is estimated to cost trucking companies $5 billion over the next decade. Truck owners say the costs are too high to absorb in the short amount of time they have to...

CONGRATULATIONS!!! We had a resounding victory in the House last night! Despite heavy threats from the White House and the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, HR6630 passed with 395 lawmakers voting for it and only 18 voting against. HR6630 will require the immediate termination of the DOT’s crossborder trucking pilot program with Mexico and revoke the DOT’s ability to grant Mexico-domiciled carriers authority to operate beyond commercial zones without Congressional approval. During the debate regarding HR6630 on the House floor last night prior to the vote, half of the lawmakers who spoke mentioned that they have been hearing from truckers back...

Having tolls removed from a major route in British Columbia, Canada, has taken some of the sting out of the cost of operating a trucking business in that province, but there’s still plenty of sting to go around. In late September, the government removed a $20 truck toll and $10 passenger vehicle toll from the Coquihalla Highway, which connects the city of Hope to Kamloops, B.C., in the Canadian West. Provincial officials said that truckers were pleased with the move, and they were. “Given the price of fuel, truckers are very happy with this,” Bridgitte Anderson, spokeswoman for British Columbia...

CITRA, Fla. -- A 13-year-old student was killed and eight others injured when a school bus crashed and caught fire, trapping the injured children in their seats. Officials said the bus carrying 21 students from North Marion Middle School and North Marion High School was struck by a big rig Tuesday afternoon on U.S. Highway 301 at 155th Street near Citra. As flames began to overwhelm the bus, four motorists stopped and began pulling the trapped students out of the flames. "They were heroes," Marion County School Superindent Jim Yancey said at the crash scene. "(The motorists) started pulling people...

WASHINGTON — Dismissing a White House veto threat, the House voted Tuesday to end a pilot program giving Mexican trucks access to U.S. highways. The Bush administration stressed that the United States is obligated, under the 1994 North American Free Trade Agreement, to open up American roads to Mexican truckers, and that terminating the year-old demonstration project would have repercussions for American trucks allowed into Mexico. Passage of the House bill, it said "would pose significant and immediate risks to U.S. interests." But the pilot project, which permits up to 500 trucks from 100 Mexican companies access to U.S. roads,...

A coalition of consumer, immigrant and civil rights groups warned Tuesday that a Port of Long Beach loan program to help thousands of mostly low-income truck drivers replace old, polluting rigs with newer, cleaner-burning vehicles could plunge the truckers into debt. Port officials counter that the loans are a bargain and that truckers would not be able to afford new rigs without them. But the coalition foresees a wave of "foreclosures on wheels."

Infuriated Democrats vowed Monday to kill a pilot program that gives Mexican trucks access to U.S. highways after the Bush administration - acting on the first day of Congress' summer recess - announced that it was extending the test project. Rep. James L. Oberstar, chairman of the Transportation and Infrastructure Committee, said the administration's maneuver was the latest attempt to flout the will of Congress on the matter, and said he will introduce legislation ending the program once and for all. "When Congress reconvenes in September, I intend to have the full House of Representatives approve our bill as quickly...

WASHINGTON – A controversial one-year program allowing Mexican trucks to travel deep into the United States will be extended for two more years, federal officials announced Monday. John H. Hill, administrator of the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration, said the extension would allow for the collection of more data to determine whether Mexican trucks can operate safely in the United States. Opponents quickly denounced the move, which some had been expecting despite their protests that the program poses a danger on U.S. highways. Rep. James Oberstar, D-Minn., chairman of the House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee, accused U.S. Transportation Secretary Mary...

WASHINGTON – Opponents of a pilot project that allows Mexican trucks to travel throughout the United States took another step toward ending the program yesterday, when a House committee approved a bill to bar its continuation next year. The bill could get a vote by the full House when lawmakers return from their summer break in September. “We believe it's time to end the program,” said Rep. Peter DeFazio, D-Ore., the chief sponsor of the bill. DeFazio blasted the Bush administration for ignoring a law passed by Congress last year to end the pilot program. He said lax safety standards...

BAGHDAD, July 24, 2008 – In another sign of progress in Iraq, 62 tribes and 68 sheiks have organized four private trucking companies to form the Iraqi Transportation Network. A driver for the Iraqi Transportation Network, an Iraqi-owned and operated logistics network, watches as containers are loaded onto his truck July 15, 2008, at Camp Liberty, Iraq. U.S. Army photo by Spc. Andrea Merritt  (Click photo for screen-resolution image);high-resolution image available. The sheiks approached the U.S. military with a proposition for the ITN to haul their cargo throughout Iraq, guaranteeing safe shipment and taking financial responsibility for any loss. They...

Already, some shippers, truckers and others who don't want to make changes are choosing other ports, according to Knatz, who said port traffic could drop 10 percent to 15 percent.

MICHIGAN (NEWSCHANNEL 3) - Truck drivers maneuver several tons of cargo down Michigan highways every minute. A new study shows that hundreds of thousands of them shouldn't even be behind the wheel. Right now about 600,000 commercial drivers suffer from conditions like diabetes and narcolepsy. They are conditions that qualify them for full disability benefits, because they can lead to serious issues like heart attacks, seizures and unconscious spells. Some truck drivers say the reason so many of their peers slip through the cracks is that they find doctors who overlook those medical conditions so they can stay on the...

TUSCALOOSA, Ala. — Manuel Castillo was driving a truck through Alabama hauling onions and left with a $500 ticket for something he didn't think he was doing: speaking English poorly. Castillo, who was stopped on his way back to California, said he knows federal law requires him to be able to converse in English with an officer but he thought his language skills were good enough to avoid a ticket. Still, Castillo said he plans to pay the maximum fine of $500 rather than return to Alabama to fight the ticket. "It just doesn't seem fair to be ticketed if...

Subject: Learning Over the Years How to Balance Family and Work in an Industry Not Even Their Own Company Executives Understand By Renee E. Taylor (ATAW/AR) To you, my husband is a truck number, just a large, blue or red metal object that mysteriously gets your freight from point A to point B. One of thousands of tiny dots that appear on your computer screen as you sit in your air conditioned office which you leave each night to return to your wife, children and pets. A large, blue or red metal object that dispatchers and planners seen as an...

Regulating Trucks by: Melinda Zosh, July 08, 2008 When Atlanta residents Stephen and Susan Owings ate breakfast, prayed and said good-bye to their two college-age sons after Thanksgiving, they had no idea that only one of their sons would return for Christmas. Nearly six years ago, on Dec. 1, 2002, 22-year-old Washington and Lee student Cullum Owings, a business major, died when a 70,000-pound tractor-railer driving 72 m.p.h., the equivalent of a car driving more than 300 m.p.h., slammed into his door. “My rear-view mirror has turned into a time machine,” said Stephen Owings. “Every now and then when I...

The most recent outbreak of salmonella poisoning of produce caused much alarm across the country and cost American tomato growers millions in lost revenue. As of this writing, over 900 salmonella cases have been diagnosed in 40 states. While American farmers struggled as the CDC did their best to pin the tainted tomatoes on them, their crops rotted on docks and in warehouses as consumers refused to buy potentially contaminated goods. For those of us in Arkansas, it was a relief when our famous Bradley County pink tomatoes were cleared; harvesting had not begun when the outbreak occurred.

Truckers in Albany protested at the New York Capitol amidst concerns their industry would be hit hard by skyrocketing fuel prices and climate change legislation. About 100 truckers attended the demonstration, where they paraded big rigs past the Capitol building and blasted their horns. They’re specifically directing their anger at Democrat-controlled State Assembly for refusing a vote on a proposed gas tax holiday bill to suspend New York’s fuel tax through Labor Day. The truckers even invited Democratic Senate Majority Leader Joseph Bruno for a ride on one of their big rigs to lobby him.

AUSTIN — Truckers who smuggle drugs or people into the United States are now risking not only prison time but the loss of their commercial drivers' licenses as Texas uses a long-standing law in a new border-crime crackdown. “Up until today, when those lawbreakers had their trucks apprehended, they were convicted in federal court, they typically paid a small fine or served a brief sentence, then it was back to business as usual. Well, starting today, that all changes, ” Gov. Rick Perry said Thursday at the Texas Capitol with U.S. Border Patrol sector chiefs. “If you are a commercial...