Missouri and Kansas Truck Accident Attorneys will applaud a proposal by the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration that could soon end with all commercial trucks being required to have speed limiting devices installed on them. The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration has announced that it will soon initiate a Notice of Proposed Rulemaking, requiring speed limiting devices on all commercial trucks.
The initiative comes in response to a petition signed by the American Trucking Association and several trucking safety groups, asking them to mandate such speed limiting devices on all trucks. Specifically, the petition asks the NHTSA to mandate speed limiting devices on trucks that weigh more than 20,000 pounds. Speeds would be limited to a maximum of about 68 mph.
The American Trucking Association has strongly supported the petition for speed limiting devices, but another industry group, the Owner/Operators Independent Drivers Association has opposed any petition to mandate speed limiting devices on trucks.
As a Missouri truck accident lawyer, I have been very encouraged with some of the recent momentum on truck safety issues. In January, the federal administration announced a ban on texting while driving for all commercial truck drivers, and in December, proposed a ban on all hand-held cell phone use while driving for commercial truckers. As I have recently discussed on this blog, it has also proposed reduced work hours for truck drivers to reduce the number of accidents traced to driver fatigue. This proposal to mandate speed limiters on trucks seems to be another step towards trucking safety. For many years, our trucking safety rules have languished in a state of perpetual stupor, too outdated for modern times, and too out of touch with the realities of increased traffic and highway design. That could be changing.
