°®¶¹´«Ã½

Contract talks between West Coast port operators and longshoremen went nowhere this week, both sides said as their old contract neared its July 1 expiration.

An official with the National Industrial Transportation League said there has been little progress made on a new contract between longshoremen and terminal operators at West Coast ports.

Shipper groups have asked President Bush to help prevent a work stoppage they say could cripple freight movement at West Coast ports if the longshoreman’s union and terminal operators fail to reach a contract agreement by the July 1 deadline.

Ohio Gov. Bob Taft and American Trucking Associations President William J. Canary last week officially enlisted the Buckeye State in ATA’s American Trucking Army, a program that trains drivers to keep an eye out for suspicious activity on highways.

Even though big rigs can’t fly, a growing number of truck operators are in-volved in the airfreight business.

Trucks haul the vast majority of freight by weight, but the expensive cargo often takes to the air.

The Texas Motor Transportation Association bought a $1-million truck-driving simulator to improve safety for truckers and car drivers.

Despite some early hitches, truck traffic is moving smoothly and safely on the detours around a collapsed bridge on Interstate 40 in Oklahoma, said a state official and the Oklahoma Trucking Association.

Hastily arranged detours around the collapsed Interstate 40 bridge in Oklahoma are narrow, slow and possibly unsafe, but probably will not stop freight on one of the nation’s key east-west trucking lanes, trucking executives said.

Beginning June 13, trucking companies employing a driver with a Washington state commercial driver license must notify the state within three days if that trucker tests positive for drugs or alcohol.