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The battle for acceptable hours-of-service regulations continues, but is this battle moving forward or backward?

The Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration has been given until Dec. 27 to cure the defects a federal appeals court found in its latest driver hours-of-service regulations. We all need to hope that FMCSA officials are successful in that effort.

The Transportation Security Administration said it would begin to enroll truck drivers and other port workers in its Transportation Worker Identification Credential program at the port of Wilmington, Del., this month.

Several new regulations expected from the U.S. Department of Transportation will be delayed and others, including a long-awaited regulation encouraging the use of electronic onboard recorders, could fall even further behind schedule because of a recent court ruling scrapping part of the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration’s driver-hours rule, DOT said.

The California Air Resources Board, in a September staff report, proposed to require Class 8 trucks to be outfitted with fuel-efficiency technologies such as cab fairings, skirts, low-rolling-resistance tires and automatic tire-inflation systems by 2010.

The California Trucking Association said it is advocating a “collaborative strategy” with Southern California port officials to develop an alternative plan for trucks to meet emission goals.

Weber Distribution, Santa Fe Springs, Calif., said it has purchased a new fleet of 150 “environmentally friendly” refrigerated trailers.

A measure of chief executive officers’ confidence declined slightly in the third quarter from the second, the New York-based Conference Board said Friday.