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April
27 , 2004
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Headline
News
Educate Your Students on Good Business Relations
Looking to educate
your students on the basics of good business relations for shippers,
receivers, carriers, and drivers? TCA can help! TCA and the National
Industrial Transportation League created and jointly adopted a guide
to good business practices to govern the relationships between shippers
and receivers in September 2000. A laminated condensed version of this
guide is available to you for distribution to your students and could
be used as a resource in a discussion about loading and unloading and
the shipper/receiver relationship. Click
here to see what the condensed Guide to Good Business Relations
looks like. If you would like to order a supply for your school contact
Marlene Dakita by phone at 703-838-1950 or e-mail at mdakita@truckload.org.
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Highway Bill Extension Anticipated, House and Senate Must Reconcile Different Versions
Congress returned to work
on April 20 with only ten days remaining before the expiration of current
federal highway and transit programs, and it now appears likely that
another extension of the current highway bill is imminent. Earlier this
year on February 29, President Bush had formally signed legislation
extending authorization of the Transportation Equity Act for the 21st
Century (TEA-21) for the additional two months through April 30, as
an earlier five-month extension of TEA-21 was set to expire. These extensions
were necessary to extend highway maintenance, highway safety, motor
carrier safety, transit and other programs as Congress continues to
work on the finalization of a new highway bill.
On April 1, the House passed
its $275 billion bill (H.R. 3550) and the $318 billion Senate bill (S.
1072) was passed in February. Neither legislative body has appointed
conferees at this time, although it is assumed that Senator James Inhofe
(R-OK), chairman of the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee,
will be the conference chairman. In addition to lining up conferees,
the House and Senate also must enact the aforementioned third extension
of TEA-21.
Click
here for a copy of the latest summary chart of the major provisions
of both the House and Senate versions of the highway bills.
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CVSA's Annual Roadcheck
Roadcheck 2004, the 17th
annual 72-hour vehicle/driver inspection program, will take place on
June 8-10, 2004 throughout the United States, Canada, and Mexico. The
Commercial Vehicle Safety Alliance (CVSA) sponsors this event, which
involves more than 9,000 truck and bus inspectors checking commercial
motor vehicles (CMVs) at inspection sites and in roving patrols along
the highways. The CVSA, formed in 1982, includes all 50 states, the
District of Columbia and U.S. Territories, all Canadian Provinces and
Territories and Mexico’s federal government.
More than 2.5 million roadside
safety inspections, including the annual Roadchecks are conducted each
year by CVSA-trained and certified inspectors. During last year’s
event inspectors reported that they conducted more than 55,000 inspections,
which represented the fourth consecutive year that there was an increase
in this number. Of these inspections, 43,583 were Level I, the most
comprehensive vehicle/driver inspection conducted by CVSA. Last year,
the inspectors placed 24,171 CVSA decals on vehicles found to be free
of critical safety defects (43.3%).
Roadcheck 2003 also saw a
slight increase in vehicles being placed out-of-service (OOS) for mechanical
problems– up to 22.7% from 22% the prior year. In addition, there
was a decrease in the OOS rate for drivers – down to 5% from 5.7%
in 2002.
For more information
on this year’s Roadcheck visit CVSA’s website at www.cvsa.org.
Top
Significant Change to Smog Rules Could Affect Trucking
In the most significant change
to the Federal smog rules in over 25 years, the Environmental Protection
Agency (EPA), on April 14 announced the “rolling out” of
tougher new air pollution standards. The EPA found that 474 counties
nationwide have failed to meet its tougher ozone standards, and counties
that are in violation are required to outline a plan to meet requirements
by set deadlines, which vary to allow extended time to the severest
of counties. At the same time it issued designations on attainment and
nonattainment, EPA issued a new rule classifying areas by the severity
of their ozone conditions and establishing the deadline state and local
governments must meet to reduce ozone levels. Once designations and
classifications take effect on June 15, 2004, states and communities
must prepare a plan to reduce ground level ozone.
The 8-hour ozone standard,
0.08 parts per million (ppm), averaged over eight hours replaces the
1-hour standard that has been in place since 1979. The 8-hour standard
was issued in 1997 after a significant body of research showed that
longer-term exposure to lower levels of ozone can also affect human
health. Implementation of the new standard was held up by a lengthy
legal battle. Deadlines for meeting the 8-hour ozone standard range
from 2007 to 2021, depending upon the severity of an area’s ozone
problem. Accordingly, on the 14th, EPA announced a suite of inter-related
actions known as the Clean Air Rules of 2004 which include national
tools to help states and communities meet the standard for ground level
ozone. The Clean Air Rules of 2004 encompass the following major rules:
the Interstate Clean Air Rule; the Mercury Clean Air Rule; the Nonroad
Clean Air Rule; Ozone Rules and Fine Particulate Rules.
As for the impact
these new rules will have on the trucking industry, ATA’s Environmental
Council, Glen Kedzie said that as a result of these actions the result
is that states will be more likely to adopt costly fuel blends. “The
ATA’s major concern is that states now have more incentive to
adopt specialty fuel blends to reduce nitrogen oxides (NOx)…There
is no viable NOx-reduction technology to retrofit older engines, therefore
the [ATA] predicts the impact on the freight industry will be limited
to pump prices.” More information about the Clean Air Rules of
2004 is available at http://www.epa.gov/cleanair2004.
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NATMI
Offers Discounted Program
NATMI is offering
its Certified Driver Trainer (CDT) program and 2-day
"Essential Instructional Skills for Professional Driver Trainers"
course at Frederick Community College in Frederick, MD on June 16-17.
Staff from schools with PTDI certified courses can attend the instructional
skills seminar only or attend the full certification program at a special
discounted rate. Contact NATMI for details at 720-887-0835 or click
here.
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