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The Commercial Vehicle Safety Alliance said overall out-of-service rates during Roadcheck 2011 were the lowest on record.

Rising demand for freight hauling is generating more business for trucking companies, but rising costs and a dwindling supply of drivers are making it difficult for the nation’s top for-hire carriers to provide additional capacity to meet that demand.

Rising freight rates and effective cost controls are expected to push many publicly traded second-quarter freight industry earnings to their highest levels since 2008, with three companies likely to post record profits for any quarter.

Truck manufacturers sold 14,647 Class 8 vehicles in June, a 64.6% increase over last June and the highest monthly total since March 2007, and they said they expected sales to continue to rise this year despite the weak economic recovery.

The average price of U.S. retail diesel rose 4.9 cents a gallon last week to $3.899, the first increase in four weeks and the largest in three months, according to the Department of Energy.

Consumer confidence fell to a two-year low this month, according to the Thomson Reuters/University of Michigan consumer sentiment index released Friday.

Industrial production rose 0.2% in June as factory output held steady and utility output increased, the Federal Reserve said Friday.

The consumer price index decreased 0.2% in June, the first decline in a year, the Labor Department said Friday.

Container shipping line APL, which is part of Singapore’s Neptune Orient Lines Ltd., said it will build a new intermodal terminal in Joliet, Ill.

UPS Mail Innovations, the business mail services division of UPS Inc., said July 13 that tracking information for its shipments is available on www.ups.com.