Posts Tagged “parking”
The American Transportation Research Institute, the trucking industry’s not-for-profit research organization, released its 17th annual Top Industry Issues report, identifying a number of the industry’s key concerns including the driver shortage, driver retention, driver compensation, lawsuit abuse reform, truck parking and for the first time, the shortage of diesel technicians.
Nearly 25 percent of the survey respondents were professional truck drivers and among driver respondents, Driver Compensation and Truck Parking tied for the number one industry concern. Detention / Delay at Customer Facilities was ranked by drivers as their second most pressing concern.
“The ATRI list of top industry issues provides a critical snapshot of the challenges impacting our industry at any given moment,” said ATA Chair Sherri Garner Brumbaugh, president and CEO of Garner Trucking, “and this year is no exception as supply chain constraints dominate the nation’s headlines. ATRI’s annual analysis not only captures the industry’s sentiment on the criticality of each of these issues but also maps out a course for addressing each through the stakeholder-ranked strategies.”
For the fifth year in a row, the Driver Shortage topped the list of industry concerns, garnering more than four times as many first-place votes as the number two issue, Driver Retention. Further reflecting the industry’s workforce challenges, Driver Compensation was ranked third overall. Lawsuit Abuse Reform rose three spots this year to take the number four spot and the lack of available Truck Parking rounded out the top five industry concerns. The Diesel Technician Shortage made the top-10 list for the first time this year, as the 10th ranked most critical issue in the industry.
More than 2,500 trucking industry stakeholders participated in this year’s survey, including motor carriers, drivers, industry suppliers, driver trainers, law enforcement, and others.
“This year’s large response shows just how serious our industry is about identifying the most critical concerns and more importantly, figuring out how we collectively deal with each issue,” said ATRI President and COO Rebecca Brewster.
“It really is no surprise that truck driver-related issues – notably the driver shortage and driver retention – ranked so high on the survey. Coming out of the pandemic, with the increased demand for goods and other pressures on the supply chain, getting and keeping drivers has been a real challenge industrywide,” Brewster said. “We also see the impacts of the current supply chain crunch in how highly issues like driver compensation, truck parking, infrastructure and driver detention ranked on the list.”
The complete results of the annual survey were released as part of 2021 American Trucking Associations’ Management Conference and Exhibition. The full report can be found at ATRI’s website.
Beginning today (September 7th) Maryland State Police are beginning a zero-tolerance policy to issue tickets amounting to $60 
to truckers parking on the shoulder of Interstate 83. The police say commercial truck drivers should plan in advance where they ant to park when they need a break — and not park on the shoulder of Interstate 83.
There has been an increase in tractor-trailers parked on the side of the highway between Interstate 695 in Towson, MD and the Pennsylvania state line, the police claim. Police say the parked trucks lead to “extremely dangerous conditions.”
Fact is, there simply are not enough parking spaces available for the trucking industry, not only on I-83, but the entire state of Maryland. There are not any truck stops along I-83 in Maryland, which runs from Baltimore to Harrisburg, Pa.
“For the Maryland State Police to take the position that drivers needs need to adequately plan routes to make sure they can stop at a parking facility represents a fundamental misunderstanding of what these drivers face every day — weather, congestion, available hours to drive — without providing them with adequate parking. What other option do they have? Drive tired? No one wants to see them to do that,” a spokesman for the Maryland Trucking Association told The Trucker.
Truckers can’t be forced to move because most stop only because they are out of hours. Truck drivers are urged to stop at rest areas, welcome centers or weigh stations.
The state police said electronic highway signs will also be used to remind drivers about the increased enforcement..