ATA finds flaws in FMCSA study supporting HoS restart provision

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ARLINGTON, Va. — The American Trucking Associations (ATA) says an FMCSA study that supports its current hours-of-service restart provision, is flawed.

“We appreciate FMCSA releasing the results of its restart field study,” said Dave Osiecki, ATA executive vice-president and chief of national advocacy. “However, in many respects this short report is lacking critical analyses on several important issues.”

As the report indicates, this new research found that drivers with fewer nighttime rest periods may have incrementally slower reaction times, for example, as short as one-third of one second and a modest increase in lane deviations. FMCSA is cautious, though, in suggesting how important these findings are regarding the rule’s efficacy.

The ATA claims the report failed to evaluate the safety effects or efficacy of the once-per-week restart restriction, commonly called the 168-hour rule. Similarly, the study did not address the real-world safety implications of putting more trucks on the road during daytime hours, a time when more passenger vehicles are also on the road, ATA contends.

“The study acknowledges that the two or more night restart periods result in more trucks on the road during the day, but it does not address the corresponding safety or congestion impacts,” Osiecki said.

The ATA also argues the study does nothing to evaluate health benefits of the restart changes which were used to justify the rule change.

“While the study includes some findings favorable to certain portions of the new restart rule, the incomplete nature of the analysis and the lack of justification for the once-weekly use restriction is consistent with the flawed analyses that led the agency to make these changes in the first place,” Osiecki said.

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  • The Canadian HOS rules are much more flexible in comparison to the US rules.
    They allows the drivers to take a short ‘top-up’ recharge rest and it does not close
    your on duty window. I find myself working in a fatigued state when “forced” to
    Drive by the clock with no allowance for extending the window in a given schedule.

  • I wrote a short article in the new magazine “The Face”. The main point was companies wasting money on re-training their drivers every time the USA changes the rules. The second and most important part, the drivers are away from their families attending training due to the new USA rules. Canada has not changed their HOS since Jan 2007. This gives every one lots of time to educate and be educated on HOS. Wish the USA would get their stuff together…
    Martin