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I applaud Bill Graves, president of American Trucking Associations, for trying to get the Obama administration to make highway infrastructure rebuilding the No. 1 priority.

Just say “no” to the T. Boone Pickens plan and to H.R. 1835, the New Alternative Transportation to Give Americans Solutions Act — the NAT GAS Act of 2009 — a bipartisan bill recently introduced in the House of Representatives by Rep. Dan Boren (D-Okla.).

Over the past 25 years of running a freight brokerage operation, I have seen numerous commentaries in Transport Topics written by disappointed and disgruntled carriers putting down the brokerage industry.

Are third-party logistics providers a necessary division in the trucking industry? My opinion is “yes.” We are a group of people who work hard to keep customers and drivers happy, at an agreeable rate.

This is in response to the letter in the July 27 issue with the headline “Brokers Revisited”: Your complaint is not justified with me.

This is just a comment on the letter headlined “Safety, Reregulation” that ran in the July 20 issue.

Three different articles in your July 20 publication underline the huge disconnect between current policymakers’ perception and the realities of our industry.

I differ from the “Reregulation, Please” letter writer’s view that small carriers are offering transport service prices that are too cheap. Yes, there are some shoestring trucking operations hauling for very low freight rates, but there also are large carriers doing the same.

In reference to the story, “Safeway Fleet Set to Fill Tires With Nitrogen,” which appeared July 6 on p. 8, I have been using nitrogen in my fleet since 2005. We have noticed that the tires stay at a constant pressure, and we have been able to get well over 250,000 miles out of our drive tires and 150,000 miles out of our steer tires.