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The Surface Transportation Board issued new rules to make it easier for captive rail shippers to obtain temporary alternative rail service to alleviate service “inadequacies,” but it refused requests from shippers in the Houston-Gulf Coast area for permanent access to other carriers to guard against future service problems.

American Trucking Associations commemorated the third anniversary of the suspension of a key North American Free Trade Agreement trucking provision by urging President Clinton to completely open four southwestern states to Mexican trucks.

Powered by an expanding domestic economy and lower fuel prices, FDX Corp., the parent of Federal Express Corp. and RPS Inc., posted better-than-expected profits in its second fiscal quarter.

Holland’s TNT Post Group paid $360 million to acquire the French express delivery company Jet Services, giving the Dutch giant a greater presence in France.

In a move that represents a significant loosening of its vertically integrated structure, Volvo Truck Corp. has decided to outsource its heavy-duty rear axles to U.S.-based Meritor Inc.

Fears apparently were unwarranted that U.S.-led air strikes against Iraq would raise world crude oil costs and disrupt the record low diesel prices trucking has been enjoying.

Our government is broken and, honesty forces me to admit, I have done precious little to help fix it, beyond voting for the right people on occasion.

Throughout 1997 and the first half of 1998, motor carrier safety enforcement and industry alike faced a critical period in the reauthorization of the Motor Carrier Safety Assistance Program in the highway bill. It was a remarkable time.

Folks used to say if you wanted to find a good place to eat on the road, you looked for a place with trucks parked in front of it.

It’s a dark night, it’s drizzling and you’re approaching a foreboding curve with various looming undulations of landscape on both sides of the road. Your eyes focus on the brightly shining reflectors running along the centerline of the narrow highway. If the reflectors weren’t there to catch your headlight beams, if they weren’t evenly spaced to mark the coming route like stitches on the planet’s crust, you’d probably feel uneasy. Without them to point the way, you could find yourself hurtling off the dark asphalt.