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The Intermodal Association of North America’s Web-based equipment registry, designed to simplify compliance with new container safety rules, has begun operations, the group said.

Due to the weekend snow storm in the Mid-Atlantic, Transport Topics Online will be closed on Monday, Dec. 21. Please check back later this week for the latest trucking and freight transportation news.

Beginning Jan. 1, officials at the Southern California sister ports of Los Angeles and Long Beach will face yet another challenge as they begin the second phase of their clean trucks plans: fewer trucks.

Trucking fleets focused on survival in 2009 as freight haulers battled a widespread economic downturn and confronted the prospect of significant new safety and environmental regulations from the Obama administration.

In a flurry of activity before its holiday recess, Congress approved more than $40 billion in new highway spending for 2010, moved toward adding another $27 billion, approved a truck-weight exemption and quietly dropped a prohibition on a federal pilot program allowing trucking across the U.S.-Mexico border.

The steep, yearlong decline in heavy-duty U.S. truck sales slowed to 16.4% below the 2008 level in November, or nearly half as much as the 11-month fall of 31%, according to the latest survey by WardsAuto.com.

One silver lining in the financial storm of the past year or so had been a steep decline in the price of oil generally and diesel fuel in particular.

U.S. intermodal rail traffic dropped 3% in the week ended Saturday compared with the same week last year, the Association of American Railroads said.

As this horrendous year finally winds to a close, the most recent economic news is notably better than what we’ve had to endure for nearly all of 2009. And because almost every economic forecast predicts at least a gradual recovery, 2010 can’t get here too soon.