COURTESY OF AN AMENDMENT TUCKED INTO THE $1.1 trillion fiscal year 2015 federal spending bill, the two most contentious aspects of the government’s truck driver hours-of-service regulations have been shelved until Sept. 30. Until then, drivers are not restricted to one 34-hour weekly “restart” in their eight-day workweek, and they don’t have to be sidelined during their restart for two consecutive days between 1 a.m. and 5 a.m.

The amendment by Republican Sen. Susan
Collins of Maine does what sensible legislation
is supposed to do: strike an effective balance
between public and business interests. A driv-
er’s workday is still capped at 14 hours. Drive
time is still capped at 11 hours. Drivers must
still take a 30-minute rest break during the first
eight hours behind the wheel. The amendment
sunsets at the end of September, meaning it
has a short shelf life. In the interim, the Federal
Motor Carrier Safety Administration (FMCSA)
will study whether it should change the restart
rules or leave them as is. If it chooses the latter,
it will need to explain the logic and the science
behind removing drivers from the highways
when the roads are practically deserted and
when many are accustomed to driving, and
forcing them instead onto the roads during morning rush hours
with millions of harried amateurs known as “motorists.”
Yet sustainable improvements in highway safety will not come
from legislative or bureaucratic initiatives, even sensible ones. They
will come from the marketplace, and specifically from changes in
shipper practices and behavior. For decades, shippers have reaped
the fruits of “capacity assurance,” or knowing there will always be
rubber tires to move their goods. Production schedules and ship-
ping dates were set for the shipper’s convenience. Carriers were
expected to follow along and to tolerate such “inconveniences” as
arriving at a dock at a pre-arranged time only to wait two hours
because the freight wasn’t ready, or being forced to queue up with
everyone else on Friday because that was when the goods were
released. It mattered little to shippers that there were no insur-
mountable obstacles to adjusting production schedules so as to
make things easier for the driver.

The worm has turned. Truck capacity today is far from assured,
and the leverage belongs to the carriers. Long dock
waiting times will not be tolerated save for excep-
tional circumstances. Shippers will need to spread
out their production schedules to avoid the Friday
backlog. They will have to accept that their freight
may get there a few hours, maybe a day, later than
they are used to. They will have to bring “good
freight” to the table; not neces-
sarily freight commanding the
highest rate, but freight that’s
cost-effective for the trucker to
carry. If they don’t, they will
find themselves searching far-
ther afield to find a carrier and
likely paying higher rates for
less-than-optimal service if they
do find one.

It may be tough love, but it could be the medicine that improves highway safety. Drivers won’t feel as pressured to hit challenging delivery windows.

They won’t be as tired on the road if they spend less time idling at a shipper’s dock. They will feel more motivated to produce because they can be more productive. And, surprise, supply chains may operate more efficiently.

We’ve written extensively about the looming truck capacity “crisis.” Here’s the silver lining: Shippers will be compelled, or forced, to reconcile their production and distribution schedules. They will also become cognizant of the fact that a driver is a partner, not chattel. Failure to do both could cost them wheels. Call us naïve, but we think the realities of a free market for trucking services will do a better job of policing the roads than government by itself is able to do.