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New trailer orders fell 19.7% to 14,199 in May from a year earlier, ACT Research reported, but trailer manufacturers said backlogs remain strong and suggested that fleets soon will need to upgrade equipment.

While shorter stopping distances mandated last year by the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration prompted the introduction of new brake configurations in Class 8 tractors, a pending set of stopping standards for a subset of tractors is now prompting even more changes, according to truck equipment manufacturers.

Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood has announced $30 million for the replacement or repair of rural roads as part of the agency’s most recent “TIGER” grants.

Virginia transportation officials have recommended that their tolling plan for Interstate 95 include just one toll-collection location and that trucks pay $12 going each way.

President Obama has nominated Polly Trottenberg to serve as the Department of Transportation’s undersecretary for policy, the White House announced.

Congress was set last week to pass new transportation legislation authorizing highway spending through September 2014, after House and Senate negotiators agreed on a bill that included a mandate for electronic onboard recorders for trucks and a study of the 34-hour restart provision in driver hours-of-service regulations.

UPS said it has completed testing of its “plastic truck,” a composite-bodied vehicle that’s lighter and uses 40% less fuel than its current package cars, and will soon add 150 of the new vehicles to its delivery fleet.

Roughly one-third of the 3,446 truck drivers involved in fatal accidents in 2010 were cited in police accident reports for such contributing “driver-related factors” as speeding, fatigue and inattention, a senior federal transportation researcher said.

A year after U.S. officials agreed to allow Mexican trucks into the country, only four Mexican carriers are participating, far below the number the United States has said would be needed to judge the safety of Mexican trucks.

DETROIT — Detroit Diesel Corp. announced a series of enhancements to its 2013 Detroit heavy-duty truck engines that are designed to improve their fuel efficiency and reduce the cost of running and maintaining them.