������ý

Is another big-time merger among less-than-truckload carriers in the offing.

The North Carolina Court of Appeals ruled that the family of a truck driver who was killed while trying to stop a robbery at a rest stop is not entitled to worker’s compensation benefits.

The Department of Transportation is responding to criticism from safety groups that the Federal Highway Administration is not adequately handling truck safety.

Captive rail shippers pleaded with the Surface Transportation Board last week to “restore and enhance” competition in the Houston and Gulf Coast areas by granting other railroads access to Union Pacific lines and allowing some customers to build links to other carriers.

Congress is expected to try again next year to update the nation’s postal laws, but any changes will likely be far from the privatization efforts that have taken hold in Europe.

American Trucking Associations last week announced the merging of its Logistics and Information Technology councils.

The state-owned German post office, Deutsche Post AG, has launched a $1.1 billion bid to acquire Danzas, the Swiss-based international transport and logistics company. The Danzas board of directors met Dec. 10 and recommended that shareholders accept the offer, which will begin officially in mid-January.

Xtra Corp. ended merger discussions with Apollo Management and Interpool Inc. and said it intends to remain an independent public company.

Diesel, gasoline and oil prices are at very low levels, and there appears to be little concern within trucking that this will change drastically in the near term. At the recent Oil & Money Conference conducted by the Energy Intelligence Group, executives and analysts within the oil industry seemed to concur with this assessment. Most speakers at the conference believe the price of oil will probably bounce around its current levels, at least for the next few months, and perhaps even longer.

The Department of Transportation’s inspector general has launched a sweeping review of the federal motor carrier safety program in response to congressional requests.