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In putting this issue together, we didn’t know whether to oooh and ahhh like children watching a Harry Potter movie or reach for antacids like baby boomers with heartburn. Engineers are weaving computer capability into vehicles in a way that seems like wizardry coming soon, while this year’s freight market continues to offer disappointment with no signs of yielding.

To readers of Transport Topics, the plight of the industry’s truck drivers is well-known. It requires a unique commitment to be away from home and travel over congested highways while complying with more and more regulatory demands.

No quiet end to summer this year. Original equipment manufacturer executives have not been lounging poolside.

After 10 years of deliberation, two agencies of the Department of Transportation have finally published a proposal that would limit the maximum speed of the largest commercial vehicles to a rate yet to be determined.

For the last week, our collective eyes here at Transport Topics have been fixated on a school outside Louisville, Kentucky.

Updating the adage that the pen is mightier than the sword, we note that a PDF available online will come to shape truck and trailer manufacturing through the late 2020s, namely, the final version of Phase 2 of the federal greenhouse-gas rule.

By the time you read this, a new grand champion will have been crowned at the National Truck Driving Championships in Indianapolis.

We are usually big fans of bipartisan cooperation. Democrats and Republicans should proclaim their ideals and preferences with clarity — especially during election campaigns — but after citizens vote there comes a time to get to work and start solving problems.

Scott Darling is officially the fifth administrator of the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration to have been confirmed by the Senate, which did so July 14 by unanimous consent (see story, p. 5).

We bring you in this issue, our annual report on the size, shape and nature of trucking: the Transport Topics Top 100 list of for-hire carriers, our habit since 1989.