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The Illinois State Police and the Northwestern University Traffic Institute are using a federal grant to study the uniformity of roadside truck safety inspections.

Discrepancies in roadside inspections have been a source of complaints by drivers and carriers for years. They also say a lack of accurate data at inspection sites has resulted in vehicles being needlessly re-inspected.

“In each state, the inspectors seem to have a different attitude,” said Eileen Kilian, who drives for Midwest Coast Transport, Sioux City, S.D. “Most of the time, if they are professional; they will tell you up front what they are doing. But some states don’t honor other states’ inspections. You can show them an inspection sticker, and they’ll do it all over again.”

The Federal Highway Administration provided $100,000 for the study, which includes a mail-out survey and visits to seven states. Surveys were sent to 2,000 randomly selected owner-operators and private and for-hire carriers.

The questionnaire seeks information such as the number of out-of-service orders a company has had in the past year, what levels of inspection were encountered and whether the checks were at weigh and inspection facilities or the result of traffic stops.

“One observation is that drivers don’t know much about the inspection being performed,” said Roy E. Lucke, director of research and development for NUTI. “The fact that inspections are not uniform is the driving issue.” In some cases, he said, inspection officers don’t inform drivers of what type of inspection is being done.

So far, observation teams made up of truck drivers, industry safety professionals and enforcement and inspection officers have visited sites in Springfield, Ill. The teams plan to visit six more sites in the next several months. They also will talk with state police, state transportation officials and local safety coordinators.

For the full story, see the Dec. 7 print edition of Transport Topics. Subscribe today.