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President Bush’s proposed Transportation Department budget for next year would increase DOT’s spending slightly but cut highway spending more than $2 billion from last year, and it proposes to borrow funds from mass transit to cover a shortfall in the Highway Trust Fund.

If there is a silver lining in the current freight recession, it might be that the challenging economic environment is forcing carriers to focus more closely on business fundamentals to keep the bottom line healthy.

ORLANDO, Fla. — Uncertainty about the life cycle of key emission control components and higher maintenance costs have emerged as the top concerns fleets have with 2007 heavy-duty diesel engines, maintenance and equipment heads at several major carriers said here.

About 2,500 members of United Auto Workers walked off their jobs at the only Volvo-Mack over-the-road assembly plant in North America, shutting down production Feb. 1, after the union and Volvo Trucks North America failed to agree on a new contract.

Freight forwarder UTI Worldwide plans to cut its workforce by 7%, eliminate divisions in the Americas and Africa and restructure management in an effort to its boost its profitability, the company said Friday.

Wholesale inventories rose 1.1% in December, though sales fell 0.7%, the Commerce Department said Friday.

Three of the primary measures of large truck safety fell to record lows in 2006, American Trucking Associations said Friday.

Vitran Corp. said Friday its fourth-quarter profit was $1.7 million, or 12 cents a share, down from $5 million, or 37 cents, a year earlier.

Truckload carrier P.A.M. Transportation Services said it lost $840,000, or 8 cents a share, in the fourth quarter, compared with net income of $4.3 million, or 41 cents, a year earlier.