Letters to the Editor: Trucks and Cars, Training, Medical Issues
b>Trucks and Cars
Everybody seems to think trucks are causing all the accidents. Most trucks have governors. We also have lane restrictions and lower speed limits and we still have accidents — go figure.
All you people out there who drive to work, can you do me a favor? Next time you get in your car, get on the interstate around your city and set your cruise control on 55 mph.
There are 4 million trucks on the road. You don’t notice the trucks that travel safely down the highway, but you notice the one that does something wrong.
Most truck drivers out on the highway today spend most of their time trying to stay out of everybody’s way.
Dave Schraub
i>Driver
ndianapolis
Driver Training
I send this in support of making our nation’s highways safer, but it seems as though no one is really addressing the real issues in the trucking industry today.
I actually laughed out loud, back in 2003, when I read what passed as a “Minimum Standard of Training for an Entry-Level Driver.” I was glad to hear the issue is being revisited.
I was a truck driver for 21 years, but currently I’m a commercial driver license examiner in Louisiana. I’ve been teaching CDL training since 2001.
he efforts to change the hours-of-service rule seem unrealistic to me in that the rules being enforced had worked for many years. In my opinion, the best change would be in how the regulation is enforced.
If you were to talk with almost any old-time trucker, you would most likely hear what I’m telling you in this letter. The company’s dispatchers and safety departments would have safety meetings and tell you how they wanted you to “run legal,” but as soon as the safety meeting was over, the driver would hear, “This load can’t be late, so do what you have to do and get it there on time.”
The unspoken words, “or else,” were all too clear. If more of the enforcement was placed on the companies and dispatchers, they would be more willing to work with the drivers to make sure they were getting the rest they needed.
I feel we have spent an awful lot of time and money trying to change and re-change regulations, when all we had to do was make the trucking companies more responsible.
The much bigger need in driver safety is quality training from the very start.
In the past, when a person became a driver, chances were they had already spent quite a bit of time as a driver’s helper. This is not so today, and because there are no real training standards, a person can go through a crash course in as few as 14 days and walk out with a commercial driver license. In those programs, the trainee may not get more than eight to 10 hours of actual hands-on driving time.
No wonder there are so many accidents. We would not think of letting someone get a pilot’s license with such short training, but we are willing to put someone at the wheel of an 18-wheeler weighing 80,000 pounds. It just doesn’t add up.
If real training standards sounds like a true safety issue to your organization, I’m interested in what could be done to make it happen.
Hubert Reeves
i>CDL Skills Examiner/Instructor
ouisiana Technical College
est Monroe, La.
Doctors and Truckers
I just read the article about all the doctors who have been appointed to the medical review board. I think this is a great idea that is long overdue. (Click here for previous story.)
It sounds as though they are qualified in their respective fields. But I have two questions.
First, what in their backgrounds gives them an understanding of the truck driver’s job? Second, are there any plans to appoint anyone from the trucking industry?
In more than 40 years in this industry, I have seen way too many medical releases and signed physical forms from what I am sure were very good and well-intentioned doctors who just did not understand what the job of a truck driver entails.
There should be some nonmedical person on this board — or they should at least have an advisory panel of trucking professionals.
Loyd Wallace
i>Owner
A Consulting Services
owell, Ark.
These letters appear in the April 10 print edition of Transport Topics. Subscribe today.