On November 19th, the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration (FMCSA) issued its final rule on hours of service for commercial truck drivers, maintaining the 11 hours driving time and 34 hour restart provisions. These provisions would allow drivers to be on the road for 11 rather than 10 consecutive hours and to restart their weekly duty after only 34 consecutive hours off, adding up to 17 hours more each week that a driver could work and increasing the chances of fatigue related accidents. These provisions are the same ones that have been thrown out twice before by the US Court of Appeals for the DC Circuit, once in 2004 and again in July 2007. However, the 2007 court ruling's effective date was continually delayed, and on January 23, 2008, the court declined to enforce its' own order to strike these provisions.

   FMCSA's rule is set to take effect on January 19, 2009. The Teamsters, along with Public Citizen and Advocates for Highway Safety, have filed a petition for the reconsideration of this rule.

 (IBT Legislative Update)