National Association of Small Trucking Companies still seeking elimination of ELD and Speed Limiters.
The Owner-Operator Independent Drivers Association is not giving up their fight to convince regulators to kill the electronic logging device mandate, which is set to go into effect this December.
Their latest effort is a letter to Transportation Secretary Elaine Chao. OOIDA, along with the National Association of Small Trucking Companies and 15 other groups representing various agricultural, industrial and transportation segments, sent the later asking Chao to “delay and remove” the ELD rule, saying its costs of implementation outweigh its benefits. The estimated cost is $2 billion. The letter was also sent to members of Congress who serve on House and Senate transportation committees.
The organizations summarized their feelings with “Of all the regulations your department will consider repealing…none will have a greater positive impact on American businesses than these two costly and burdensome rules. We encourage you to prioritize the ELD mandate and proposed speed limiter rule when identifying regulations for elimination.”
The Trucking Alliance shot back with their letter asking Chao to keep the ELD mandate, arguing it has safety and economic benefits that exceed its costs to carriers.
The Trucking Alliance is a group of large carriers, including Maverick USA, Knight, Swift, U.S. Xpress, and J.B. Hunt, whose main objective is promoting what they consider safety reforms. They are in favour of ELD’s, speed limiters, and more extensive drug testing of drivers.
It is believed that anything under which is being promoted as a “safety measure” must have immediate support. The truth is the “Safety Flag” is used far too often to promote ideas that present absolutely no better safety result. In this case, the safety flag should be replaced with a control flag to be completely honest.
The carriers simply want to have full control over the industry while foisting most of the capital and operating cost off to some one else (the small business owner operator trucker), a class of trucker the carriers created in order to break the union hold on trucking.
