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Mark Zaluski was one of the lucky ones. At 3:10 p.m. on Oct. 25, his rig occupied one of only 16 truck parking spaces on the north side of a travel plaza off Interstate 94 about 40 miles north of Chicago.

The average price of retail diesel fell 1.5 cents last week to $3.41 a gallon, ending a string of five straight increases that had pushed the fuel to record levels, the Department of Energy reported.

The head of the Louisiana state trucking association said that shippers and freight transporters should expect major delays after a part of Interstate 10 was closed in the wake of a natural gas fire.

John Ficker, president of the National Industrial Transportation League, will step down at the end of November, NITL said Monday.

Private Equity firm Fenway Partners, New York, N.Y., said Monday it acquired Canadian transportation firm Consolidated Fastfrate.

The value of U.S. Freight Shipments to Canada and Mexico in 2006 rose to a record $866 billion from $790 billion in 2005, the Department of Transportation’s Bureau of Transportation Statistics said Monday.

ATLANTA — UPS Inc.’s incoming chief financial officer told shippers here what freight carriers have long heard: The U.S. transportation network is so clogged — and getting worse — that Congress must create an infrastructure improvement plan and pay for it with dedicated taxes on the system’s users.

Heavy-duty retail truck sales in the United States fell 53.1% in October, the sixth straight month in which sales fell 50% or more below 2006 levels, according to WardsAuto.com.