Category Archives: Truck Safety

Annual Motor Vehicle Inspection Form: Are underride guards adequately inspected?

Safety Advocacy, Truck Safety, , ,

While we were getting set up for a side guard crash test this morning, I was taking photos of the tractor-trailer that was part of the test. I noticed an Annual Motor Vehicle Inspection form on the trailer. I looked it over trying very hard to find a line item by which the inspector and truck owner/driver would be reminded to check the condition of the rear underride guard which is required by law to be installed and maintained.

Side Guard Crash Test May 2016 032

I could not find anything  listed about underride guards.

Actually, I had picked one of these forms up in a truck stop previously and couldn’t find anything related to inspection of underride guards in the past. Just thought I would check again.

Scan

There is something not right about this picture.

Side Guard Crash Test #3: Successful Prevention of Truck Underride Once Again!

Safety Advocacy, Truck Safety, , ,

This Saturday morning found us helping out at Aaron Kiefer’s third crash test of his side guard prototype. We managed to complete two crash tests–both successful with no Passenger Compartment Intrusion (PCI). People in the car would probably have survived.

  1. The first crash resulted in the car bouncing back with no part of the vehicle going under the truck. We concluded that the car being in neutral allowed it to be sent backward after the collision. If the car had been in gear, then it probably would not have done that. Because the hood was bent, we took off the broken front bumper to get the hood up in order to charge the battery on the car to prepare it for the second test.
  2. The second crash still had no PCI but the side guard tore at two points–quite likely from sharp parts of the car where the bumper had been taken off. Because the guard tore, it allowed the car to go under the truck up to the point of the A-pillar–although still leaving the passenger compartment totally intact.

Another successful crash test day with promising results for future underride protection which can be manufactured for trailers and single unit trucks. Aaron envisions kits for retrofitting existing trucks, at around 200 pounds for maybe $1,000/truck.

The biggest failing of the day was my crash test video on the first crash; I held my camera at the wrong angle so you’ll have to tip your head to view it properly (audio also seemed to be muted at some points). Thankfully, my bloopers had no impact on the success of the underride prevention technology!

Photo Album from the Crash Test Day:  https://www.facebook.com/AnnaLeahandMaryforTruckSafety/posts/15529895183376422

Here is a video of the preparation and aftermath analysis:

Side Guard Crash Test May 2016 030 Side Guard Crash Test May 2016 018

Previous crash testing of Aaron Kiefer’s side guard prototype (March and April 2016: Witnessed safety defect in action at underride crash tests; this is what snuffed out my daughters’ lives.

If Sec. Foxx & DOT are embracing Vision Zero, why do we have to fight to get a strong Underride Rule?

Safety Advocacy, Truck Safety, ,

Secretary Anthony Foxx talks here about DOT embracing Vision Zero:

We embrace the vision of Toward Zero Deaths; it provides an overarching and common vision that drives and focuses our efforts to achieve our shared goal to eliminate injuries and fatalities on our roadways. The U.S. Department of Transportation will do our part by aggressively using all tools at our disposal – research into new safety systems and technologies, campaigns to educate the public, investments in infrastructure and collaboration with all of our government partners to support strong laws and data-driven approaches to improve safety.
–U.S. Transportation Secretary Anthony Foxx

Is it just meaningless words or are there some teeth to that statement?

If that is really happening, then why do we have to fight so hard to get an Underride Rule which will be as safe as possible? When a preliminary cost/benefit analysis calls lives saved “not significant”, how is that embracing a vision of Toward Zero Deaths?

And why does the deadly problem of tired truckers get left to the mercy of a political tug-of-war? If we truly had Vision Zero as a NATIONAL goal, these things would get addressed more effectively.

After our truck underride crash, as I engaged in safety advocacy efforts — calling, emailing, and meeting with legislators — I quickly realized that all too-often it was 2 steps forward 3 steps backward. I began to ask, “Why is it so difficult to get anything done to save lives?”and “Why isn’t the best possible protection being adopted?”

I learned that one of the biggest obstacles was that public policy and more specifically DOT rulemaking is impacted by a requirement for cost/benefit analysis which tips the scale in the favor of industry lobby and the almighty dollar and makes a mockery out of the word safety. Human life becomes devalued in the process when a safety measure is rejected because it “may not have significant safety consequence.”

This is illustrated in the history of Federal rulemaking on truck underride guards outlined by the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety, where it was indicated that in

1974: US Secretary of Transportation says deaths in cars that underride trucks would have to quadruple before underride protection would be considered cost beneficial.

I determined to battle such an inconceivable, incomprehensible, and unconscionable attitude and determined to find a better way to protect travelers on the road. After talking with numerous engineers who either were convinced that safer underride guards could be made or had already designed ones, I also discovered a global movement that calls for the reduction of crash deaths and serious injuries: Vision Zero – An ethical approach to safety and mobility.

That is when we launched the Vision Zero Petition to call for a paradigm shift in this country’s approach to traffic safety. Yes, there are cities and communities and organizations here and there across the country working on Vision Zero. But I am calling for us to unite as a nation and make it a priority to work together in a collaborative effort to reduce crash deaths.

Do it, President Obama, for We the People of this United States of America! #VisionZero

Here is our book with over 20,000 signatures which we delivered–in print–to President Obama in March. Vision Zero Petition Book 3rd Edition And he still has not responded to our petition.

Adopt a Vision Zero Policy 047

Adopt a Vision Zero goal and sign an Executive Order to Save Lives Not Dollars

Save Lives Not Dollars: Urge DOT to Adopt a Vision Zero Policy

So WHY is it that this country does not have a National Vision Zero Goal?

Safety Advocacy, Truck Safety,

In my humble opinion, a multitude of traffic safety issues including tired trucker tragedies and seat back failure fatalities could be aggressively and comprehensively addressed with the granting of our AnnaLeah & Mary Vision Zero Petition Requests to President Obama and Secretary Foxx:

  1. Set a National Vision Zero Goal.
  2. Establish a White House Vision Zero Task Force.
  3. Sign a Vision Zero Executive Order which would pave the way for a Vision Zero Rulemaking Policy.

So WHY is it that this country does not have a National Vision Zero Goal? And don’t tell me that DOT embraces Toward Zero Deaths and that that is the same as what I am calling for!!!

Vision Zero Goal11wjd2

See Lou Lombardo’s latest email:

Dear Care for Crash Victims Community Members:

Crash victims demand safety
1..Media educates the public.  Watch video

http://www.cbsnews.com/news/cbs-news-investigation-of-seat-back-failures-sparks-action-by-congress/
Progressive legislators provides pressure.  See letters

  1. http://www.markey.senate.gov/letters-to-automakers-on-seatback-safety
  1. Reporters investigate.

http://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2016-05-25/crash-test-dummies-get-in-back-seat-to-make-uber-riders-safer

  1. Auto Safety Advocates Build the Case

 http://www.autosafety.org/nhtsa-urged-to-warn-parents-of-seat-back-failure-dangers-to-children-in-rear-seats/

It is now up to citizens to voice their views as voters and consumers.

The tragedies will continue until the pressure builds to ends these senseless deaths and injuries.

Lou

Please read the news report by our local reporter, Brie Handgraaf, about our recent delivery of 20,000+ Vision Zero Petitions to Washington: Family continues fight for trucking safety. The story is also told by Care 2: Mom Continues to Fight for Truck Safety After Daughters’ Tragic Death.

If you have not already signed the petition, it will remain open until a Vision Zero Rulemaking Policy is adopted. So sign here: Save Lives Not Dollars: Urge DOT to Adopt a Vision Zero Policy. Then share the petition with someone who has not yet heard about it.

Then, contact President Obama online and ask him to read the Vision Zero Petition Book, which was delivered to him at the White House yesterday.

(Note: When the Contact Form asks you for a Subject, click on Transportation.)

Letter to President Obama from the Karth Family

Vision Zero Petition Book 3rd Edition

LIKE this law firm’s facebook page & they will donate $2 to AnnaLeah & Mary for Truck Safety (May only)

AnnaLeah and Mary, Safety Advocacy, Truck Safety,

Here is a simple way to help AnnaLeah & Mary for Truck Safety. During May, LIKE this law firm’s page: https://www.facebook.com/NurenbergParis/ For each LIKE, Nurenberg, Paris, Heller & McCarthy – Cleveland, Ohio will donate $2 to ALMFTS (up to $1,500). We could really use this for our truck safety/underride efforts.

Please LIKE & then SHARE! Thanks!

ALMFTS logo on truck

Reflections from a bereaved dad on the Underride Roundtable & what that means for rulemaking

Safety Advocacy, Truck Safety, , ,

Jerry Karth submitted some additional comments on the proposed underride rule–with reflections on what was learned through the Underride Roundtable. These comments have now been posted on the Federal Register: Additional Comments on Underride Rulemaking by Jerry Karth, May 19, 2016

He included the following important points:

After participating in the Underride Roundtable, I would like to offer these additional comments (also attached as pdf with clickable links):

1. When the Karth family petitioned Secretary Foxx on May 5, 2014, we requested an upgrade in rear underride guards. At the time, we requested that the U.S. guards meet or exceed the Canadian standard. Since that time, having done extensive online research, we have come in contact with researchers who have shown that much more is possible given existing or proposed underride research.

2. One of the questions raised at the Underride Roundtable was whether underride protection could be produced to prevent underride at higher speeds. In the Preliminary Regulatory Evaluation of the NPRM, NHTSA requested information about underride guard crash tests at higher speeds (than the 35 mph currently being proposed). In fact, underride research has been conducted for decades which has demonstrated that it is possible to prevent underride crashes at higher speeds. It is research which has been available and known to regulators and the industry. For example, the Monash University Accident Research Centre (MUARC) in Australia tested energy-absorbing guards to 75 km/h or 47 mph in the early 1990s. http://www.monash.edu/__data/assets/pdf_file/0006/216924/muarc026.pdf

3. The image of a MUARC energy-absorbing underride guard can be seen in the attachment.

4. The U.S. final underride rule should, at minimum, copy the new Australian/New Zealand proposed rule published in April 2016 as the next underride guard rule rather than the present Canadian rule which is 11 years old. The Australian rule mentions test speeds under the heading Test Requirements on p. 60, Clause G7.3: “Current vehicle crashworthiness technology indicates that occupants will not suffer serous injury in an equivalent frontal impact speed of up to around 64 km/h into a deformable barrier if the car is a modern five star Australian New Car Assessment (ANCAP) vehicle. . . The development of effective energy absorbing TUBs [Truck Underrun Barrier] would both reduce the serious injury to vehicle occupants and increase the effect frontal impact speed DeltaV above the 70 km/h test speed compared with a rigid TUB.”

5. It is technically feasible to develop an improved underride guard in less than a year, as the VA Tech Students demonstrated.

6. The consumers of the trailers have requested and received, from 4 of the trailer manufacturers (Wabash, Manac, Vanguard, Stoughton) improved underride guards.
7. Four of the major trailer manufacturers were more than willing to step up and provide a better underride guard (successfully tested at 35 mph for a 30% offset crash).

8. It is cost-effective to design and build a better underride guard.

9. The Cost/Benefit Analysis (CBA ) used in this rulemaking is faulty as clearly demonstrated by some of the manufacturers’ willingness to step up and provide a better underride guardeven without regulation. (Truck Safety Marketplace)

10. It is possible to bring all of the parties involved into the process, to have meaningful conversation, and to make progress.

These attachments were included:

Jerry submitted his original public comment regarding the proposed underride rulemaking on February 16, 2016. A Bereaved Dad Takes a Close Look at the Flaws in Underride Regulatory Cost/Benefit Analysis

Underride Roundtable Timeline74 gertie 2314PetitionHeader_option2Underride Roundtable May 5, 2016 141

“Visualizing Rulemaking”: Ordinary citizens use highly visual tools to effect change in regulatory realm

AnnaLeah and Mary, Safety Advocacy, Truck Safety,

Just this weekend, we started the ball rolling for the next step after the Underride Roundtable. I posted about our idea and then sent out an email to the people who attended that event–inviting them to a follow-up meeting to hammer out a specific and comprehensive underride rule proposal to submit, as a group, to NHTSA in hopes of shaping their final underride rule to be as effective as humanly possible.

Yesterday, I was struggling with feelings of uncertainty about what-did-I-think-I-was-doing?! Who-do-I-think-I-am to try to make things happen like that? Then, I went and got the mail and found a thick manila envelope addressed to me from the School of Law at the University of Washington in Seattle. I thought, What’s this? I haven’t been in contact with anyone there.

After I opened it and started reading the cover letter, I started crying and thanking the Lord for His guidance to our family over these last three years as we have worked relentlessly to put an end to preventable crash deaths. This letter was a gentle but powerful affirmation that He has indeed been using our family (with all of our strengths & weaknesses) as His vessels to bring about needed change. May it be so.

University of Washington School of Law Letter

This is an excerpt from that letter:

We are law professors at the University of Washington in Seattle, and we are writing because we have been deeply moved by your website in memory of your daughters and inspired by your campaign to improve truck safety by mandating new underride protections. Between the two of us, we have five children, and we now never drive on the highway without thinking about your family’s accident and the need for increased safety measures.

We found your website when we were researching and co-authoring a law review article titled “Visualizing Rulemaking,” which discusses the way that people are harnessing the power of visual images and social media to influence the federal administrative rulemaking process. We describe your rulemaking campaign as an excellent and powerful example of ordinary citizens using modern, highly visual tools to effect change in the regulatory realm. Kathryn Watts and Liz Porter

The two photos which they want to use:

Mary and AnnaLeah at Battle Park, Rocky Mount, NCIMG_4464

The professors included a copy of the draft of their 95-page article, which will be available digitally in a few weeks and published in the NYU Law Review in November. I will share the links when they are available.

Here is their published article: VISUAL RULEMAKING ELIZABETH G. PORTER† & KATHRYN A. WATTS‡, NYU Law Review, Volume 91, Number 5 (longer version)

Our story is included on pages 41 and 42 (1223, 1224) and 64 (1246) of the pdf.

Here we are with another way that Mary is getting her wish, “I want to be famous someday. I don’t know how, but I just do,” Mary wrote to herself a few weeks before her crash.

Washiington Vision Zero Petition photos 013Petition Photo Bags at DOT, best

Imagine an Executive Order propelling us toward zero crash deaths. What are we waiting for?

Safety Advocacy, Truck Safety, , ,
When I read Lou Lombardo’s Care for Crash Victims email this morning, it reminded me of what I keep thinking about the proposed underride rule. . . the regulatory analysis needs to include the cost of the lives lost (and injuries sustained) in the past — all the years of too-weak or non-existent guards even when they knew that better could be made — and all the lives which could be saved into the future.
What conclusions would the analysts then draw? Would they deem spilled blood too great a price to pay?

Dear Care For Crash Victims Community Members:

As we think about Benefits and Costs we need to think about Who gets the Benefits and Who gets the Costs.  People’s lives vs. Corporate monies.

 

Think about the power of Presidents and their responsibilities as OMB is a key arm of government in the White House.
 

See OMB Draft Report at

Imagine an Executive Order directing the Justice Department to require all settlement agreements to include payments to the government commensurate with the costs in lives lost in the past and projected into the future – and the benefits of sentencing executives to the elimination of vehicle violence forevermore – Vision Zero. 
 
Lou
Thanks, Lou, for your always-thoughtful questions and comments.
Adopt a Vision Zero Policy 047

A Bereaved Dad Takes a Close Look at the Flaws in Underride Regulatory Cost/Benefit Analysis

Safety Advocacy, Truck Safety, , , ,

Jerry Karth submitted some additional comments on the proposed underride rule–with reflections on what was learned through the Underride Roundtable. These comments have now been posted on the Federal Register: Additional Comments on Underride Rulemaking by Jerry Karth, May 19, 2016

Jerry submitted his original public comment regarding the proposed underride rulemaking on February 16, 2016. Here is an excerpt from that which addresses NHTSA’s preliminary cost/benefit analysis:

I would like to respond to the utilitarian logic approach that NHTSA has appeared to have applied to this issue. Their utilization of a cost/benefit analysis (called for by Executive Order 12866) is sadly lacking moral and ethical depth on the benefits side.

This type of logic was applied in 2000 by the Philip Morris Company in the Czech Republic when they funded a research study on the costs/benefits of smoking in the Czech Republic. http://www.mindfully.org/Industry/Philip-Morris-Czech-Study.htm The study concluded that it would be more beneficial for the people of the Czech Republic to smoke than not. What was this startling conclusion based on? A cost/benefit analysis.

The results are summarized in Figure 1:

Figure 1: The public finance balance of smoking in the Czech Republic in 1999 is estimated at +5,815 mil. CZK

Income and positive external effects 21,463 mil CZK
  Savings on housing for elderly 28,mil CZK
  Pension & soc. expenses savings due to early mortality 196 mil CZK
  Health care costs savings due to early mortality 968 mil CZK
  Customs duty 354 mil CZK
  Corporate income tax 747 mil CZK
  VAT 3,521 mil CZK
  Excise tax 15,648 mil CZK
Smoking related public finance costs 15,647 mil CZK
  Fire induced costs 49 mil CZK
  Lost income tax due to higher mortality 1,367 mil CZK
  Days out of work related public finance costs 1,667 mil CZK
  ETS related health care costs 1,142 mil CZK
  Smoking (first hand) related health care costs 11,422 mil CZK
NET BALANCE +5,815 mil. CZK

The study concluded that $1,227 was saved in pensions, health care, and housing every time a smoker dies. [Photo and caption from http://www.mindfully.org/Industry/Philip-Morris-Czech-Study.htm ]

$1,227 ?

That’s how much a study sponsored by Philip Morris said the Czech Republic saves on health care, pensions and housing every time a smoker dies.

photo: American Cancer Society full-page SF Chronicle advertisement 2aug01


In comparison, let’s look at how this approach could be applied to the underride issue. This type of cost/benefit analysis could lead us to conclude that it is not beneficial to require stronger underride guards because the benefits of keeping weak and ineffective standards for underride guards are greater than the cost of upgrading them to the best possible protection. What might those benefits be?

  1. Save the trucking industry money by holding down manufacturing and installation costs.
  2. Save the consumer money by holding down shipping costs.
  3. Reduce medical costs by killing people at a younger age (and avoiding costly medical costs of the elderly population).
  4. Preserve the Social Security fund by decreasing the number of people who draw from their account due to early Death by Motor Vehicle.
  5. Improve the job market due to the decrease in the workforce from the elimination of workers through Death by Motor Vehicle.

In both cases, the conclusions lack common sense. I hope that we can agree upon that.

In other words, this kind of analysis could potentially require that we decide whether we are willing to fork over money to protect people from Death by Motor Vehicle. It forces us to choose between saving a life or saving costs. When that life is one of your loved ones, what would you choose?

In contrast, a cost-effectiveness approach may be a better solution because it compares the relative costs and outcomes (effects) of two or more courses of action. “Cost-effectiveness analysis is distinct from cost-benefit analysis, which assigns a monetary value to the measure of effect.” https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cost-effectiveness_analysis In this situation, the desired outcome of both courses of action would be an underride guard which did not fail upon collision with a vehicle. The two solutions could be compared based upon cost, but a performance standard of a successful crash test would guarantee that lives would be saved.

Cost.Benefit Analysis

See why truckers oppose Speed Limiters & why others promote them #VisionZero strategy needed

Truck Safety

Yet another tug-of-war over traffic safety. Need a Vision Zero resolution.

Truckers Fighting Speed Limiter Regulation:

  1. Speed limiters are unsafe when sharing our highways with motorists, specifically, concerns with car–truck speed differential.
  2. Points for the NHTSA to consider:
    • Possibility that fatal truck accidents can actually be caused by the use of speed limiters.  FMCSA studies should be conducted showing the comparison of high speed fatal truck accidents (without speed limiters) vs. fatal truck accidents involving the use of speed limiters.
    • Better company CDL training programs mandated and enforced to ensure new drivers are safe and responsible.  Trainers should remain in passenger seat at all times observing trainee behavior and not sleeping in the birth.
    • The ATA has stated repeatedly, especially during their arguments involving the new hours of service proposal, that fatal truck crashes have been reduced significantly in the last few years.
    • If speed limits are no longer considered safe, then perhaps it is the speed limits themselves that need to be re-evaluated rather than placing speed limiters on certain commercial vehicles.  This would also address the need to reduce fuel consumption and fuel emissions for ALL vehicles, not just heavy trucks.  It would also prevent a speed differential between trucks and cars, which JB HUNT has stated, “This speed differential may cause a safety hazard…”
    • CSA, better driver training, PSP driver profiles for hiring, higher wages, and well rested drivers will create the safest roads…. not more regulations.  Regulations are just the quick fix to divert from the more deep rooted problems of the trucking industry.

Has their concern been adequately addressed? 

Here are comments on the issue as posted in the Federal Register:

Summary of Comments

On January 26, 2007, NHTSA and FMCSA published a joint Request for Comments Notice in theFederal Registersoliciting public comments onthe ATA and Road Safe America petitions. The Department of Transportation Docket Management System received approximately 3,850 comments into Docket No. NHTSA-2007-26851, the majority of which were submitted by private citizens. Of these, many comments supported a regulation that would limit the speed of large trucks to 68 mph, which included comments from trucking fleets and consumer advocacy groups, and others. Other comments submitted by independent owner-operator truckers, a trucking fleet association, and private citizens were opposed to the rulemaking requested in the petitions. The remaining comments did not explicitly indicate a position with regard to the petitions.

Comments from private citizens supporting the petitions include responses from individuals who were involved in crashes with heavy trucks or had friends/relatives who were involved in crashes with large trucks. The private citizen supporters of the petitions are typically non-truck drivers who stated that they are intimidated by the hazardous driving practices of some truck drivers, such as speeding, tailgating, and abrupt lane changes. These commenters expressed the belief that limiting the speed of heavy trucks to 68 mph will result in safer highways.

Some of the organizations supporting the petition provided similar reasons for their support and the selected comments summarized below cover the range of issues they discussed.

Schneider National, Inc., a major trucking fleet, indicated that its trucks have been speed limited to 65 mph since 1996. According to Schneider’s crash data from its own fleet, vehicles without speed limiters accounted for 40 percent of the company’s serious collisions while driving 17 percent of the company’s total miles. Schneider stated that its vehicles have a significantly lower crash rate than large trucks that are not speed limited or have a maximum speed setting greater than 65 mph.

J.B. Hunt Transport, Inc., another trucking fleet, commented that a differential speed between cars and large trucks will result from trucks being equipped with speed limiters set below the posted speed limit. This speed differential may cause a safety hazard. However, J. B. Hunt believes that the current safety hazard caused by large trucks traveling at speeds in excess of posted limits is a greater safety hazard.

Advocates for Highway and Auto Safety (Advocates) commented that large trucks require 20-40 percent more braking distance than passenger cars and light trucks for a given travel speed. Advocates does not believe that the data in the 1991 report to Congress (2) are still valid because the speed limits posted by the States over the past ten years are much higher than the national posted speed limit of 55 mph that was in effect in 1991.

The Insurance Institute for Highway Safety (IIHS) stated that 97 percent of the occupants that are killed in crashes between heavy trucks and passenger vehicles are passenger vehicle occupants. IIHS stated that on-board electronic engine control modules (ECM) will maintain the desired speed control for vehicles when enforcement efforts are not sufficient due to lack of resources. IIHS stated that there is already widespread use of speed governors by carriers and a mandate will result in net safety and economic benefits.

The Governors Highway Safety Association (GHSA) stated that large trucks are 3 percent of registered vehicles and represent about 8 percent of the total miles traveled nationwide. Also, GHSA believes that it is prudent to consider speed limiting devices since they are currently installed in large trucks and can be adapted to be tamper-resistant. It stated that conventional approaches to vehicle speed control do not provide optimal benefits because of a lack of enforcement resources and too many miles of highway to cover.

Several comments, including those from ATA’s Truck Maintenance Council, provided information concerning economic, non-safety benefits that would result from large truck speed limiters. The Truck Maintenance Council stated that an increase of 1 mph results in a 0.1 mpg increase in fuel consumption, and for every 1 mph increase in speed over 55 mph, there is a reduction of 1 percent in tire tread life.

Comments opposing rulemaking that would require speed limiters on large trucks to be set to a maximum speed of 68 mph were received from many independent truck drivers, the Owner-Operator Independent Drivers Association (OOIDA), the Truckload Carriers Association (TCA), and private citizens (non-truck drivers).

OOIDA commented that the 1991 report to Congress (3) is still valid today—there is no need to mandate speed limiters because the target population (high speed crashes) is still small compared to the total number of truck crashes. According to OOIDA, speed limiters would not have an effect on crashes in areas where the posted speed limit for trucks is 65 mph or below. OOIDA believes that the petitioners are attempting to force all trucks to be speed limited so that the major trucking companies with speed limited vehicles can compete for drivers with the independent trucking operations that have not limited their speeds to 68 mph or below. OOIDA also stated that it is not necessary to set large truck speed limiters at 68 mph to realize most of the economic benefits cited by the petitioners because improved fuel economy and reduced emissions can be achieved with improved truck designs.

TCA commented that a speed differential will be created in many States by the 68-mph speed limit for heavy trucks and a higher speed limit for other vehicles. This speed differential will result in more interaction between cars and trucks and may be an additional safety risk for cars and trucks.

According to comments from CDW Transport, a trucking fleet, speed limiters should be required on passenger vehicles as well as commercial motor vehicles.

Several comments from private citizens and small businesses opposed to the petitions stated that speed is not the only cause of crashes, that weather and highway conditions are also significant factors. There were comments stating that passenger vehicles cause the majority of the crashes between trucks and passenger vehicles. Some comments stated that truck drivers will experience more fatigue with a 68-mph maximum speed, which could result in more crashes; some comments expressed the opinion that State and local law enforcement agencies should enforce the speed of all vehicles on the nation’s roads and highways; several comments favored a 75-mph limit for truck speed limiters, instead of 68 mph, to match the highest posted speed limit in the country.

The Truck Manufacturers Association (TMA) provided information concerning the cost of tamper-proof speed limiters for large trucks. TMA estimates a one-time cost of $35 to $50 million would be required to develop ECMs with tamper-resistant speed limiters and a one-time cost of $150 million to $200 million to develop ECMs with tamper-proof speed limiters. With both of these ECM designs, there would be additional costs to make adjustments to the ECM for maximum speed, tire size, and drive axle and transmission gear ratio information.