The Trucker News Staff

WASHINGTON – U.S. Secretary of Transportation Pete Buttigieg announced Friday that the Biden administration will invest nearly $1 billion in American infrastructure through the Rebuilding American Infrastructure with Sustainability and Equity (RAISE) discretionary grants program. The funding has been awarded to 90 projects in 47 states, the District of Columbia and Guam. “We’re proud to support these great projects that will improve infrastructure, strengthen supply chains, make us safer, advance equity, and combat climate change,” Buttigieg said. “As in past years, we received far more applications than we could fund: this cycle saw about a ten-to-one ratio of requests to available dollars. But going forward, with the passage of President Biden’s Bipartisan Infrastructure Law, we will be able to support far more infrastructure projects to support jobs and everyday life in communities across the country.” The program selection criteria encompassed safety, environmental sustainability, quality of life, economic competitiveness, state of good repair, innovation, and partnerships with a broad range of stakeholders. Within these criteria, the grants reflect the Department’s priorities for creating good-paying jobs, improving safety, applying transformative technology, and explicitly addressing climate change and advancing racial equity. Listed below are examples of FY21 that are representative of the overall grants that were awarded: RAISE Manchester: Connecting Communities The City of Manchester in New Hampshire will receive $25 million to reconnect the city’s South Millyard district to surrounding neighborhoods and downtown Manchester. The project includes four integrated parts: South Commercial Street Extension, South Willow-Queen City Avenue Intersection Reconfiguration, Gas Street Extension and Active Transportation Corridor, and Pedestrian Connection Improvements. Reconnecting the South Millyard is part of facilitating new, mixed-use development and adaptive redevelopment of existing buildings. The infrastructure improvements will mitigate existing traffic congestion, increase driver and pedestrian safety, improve a critical rail crossing and freight mobility, and provide improved and accessible transportation options for the community. US 64 Corridor Improvements: Improving Tribal Highway Mobility and Safety The New Mexico Department of Transportation will receive $25 million to reconstruct approximately 21 miles of US 64 in Northwestern New Mexico. The project includes the replacement of four bridges with wider, more resilient structures; improvements along 21 miles of roadway including enhanced lighting, widened shoulders, rumble strips, and new pavement. Fiber optic cable will also be installed to connect communications and monitoring equipment, which will improve corridor management practices. To improve safety, the project widens inadequate shoulder and lane widths and increases sight distances. In addition, new drainage will improve the environment and resilience of the corridor by reducing runoff and damage to the corridor during major weather events. West Florissant Avenue Great Streets  St. Louis County, Missouri will receive $18.2 million to reconstruct approximately 1.5 miles of West Florissant Avenue, a principal arterial in the Greater St. Louis area, from Stein Road to Ferguson Avenue, through the towns of Dellwood and Ferguson. The project includes a new shared-use path, upgrades to transit stops, new traffic signals, medians, modified property access, new crosswalks, and improved ADA-compliant sidewalks. The project will also relocate and add additional bus stops, pedestrian wayfinding, and create new greenspace and landscaping. Pedestrian-scale lighting will also be included. The project addresses safety challenges for vehicles, pedestrians, bicyclists, and transit riders while removing barriers to opportunity for the community. A new multi-use path will improve pedestrian and bicyclist safety. The pathway will be essential for residents who do not have access to cars and will provide viable transportation alternatives, improving quality of life. Improvements that make transit, biking and walking more attractive will help improve environmental sustainability. Charlotte Multimodal Transit Hub The City of Charlotte, North Carolina will receive $15 million to construct a new multimodal transit center to replace the existing open-air bus terminal in downtown Charlotte.  The new transit center will include an underground bus concourse with seamless connections to LYNX Blue Line light rail, the CityLYNX Gold Line streetcar, local and regional bus service, and a new bicycle and pedestrian trail.  The City of Charlotte intends to develop new retail and office space atop the new facility once completed. The redesigned terminal will eliminate the need for riders to cross active bus lanes to access various bus stops and will improve street-level access with signalized crosswalks.  By enhancing connections to LYNX rail and constructing a new bicycle and pedestrian trail, the project supports quality of life by providing more transportation options. By constructing the new transit hub underground, the project supports additional development in a dense and transit-rich area of Charlotte, increasing environmental sustainability and economic competitiveness. The Stitch – Capping I-75/85 in Downtown Atlanta  The City of Atlanta will receive a $900,000 planning grant to advance a project to “cap” Interstates 75/85 in downtown Atlanta. The cap will reconnect the divided Midtown and the Old Fourth Ward communities that were separated from downtown Atlanta by construction of the Downtown I-75/85 Connector. Once completed, the project, known as the “Stitch,” will reconnect the local community with pedestrian-oriented, multimodal streets. The planning phase of this project includes community engagement; multimodal transportation analysis; zoning, land use, and affordable housing policy recommendations; a sustainability strategy; and park design. The proposed construction phase of this project will also enhance pedestrian infrastructure with approximately14-acres of greenspace and accelerate the building of affordable housing, improving living environments for its residents. East Marginal Way Corridor Improvement Project  The City of Seattle will receive $20 million to reconstruct a 1.1-mile segment of the East Marginal Way roadway and upgrade the route to Heavy Haul Network standards to help reduce supply chain bottlenecks and improve operations along this important freight route. The project also will add adaptive traffic signals using Split Cycle Offset Optimization Technique technology to enhance safety and improve traffic flow at several of the City’s busiest freight intersections. This project will improve safety for cyclists by creating an improved, fully protected, separated bike lane, and protected intersection crossings along the corridor. Adaptive signals will be installed to help reduce traffic crashes. The project will reduce travel time for drivers and freight during peak periods. Improving freight travel time reliability will reduce costs for shippers, and encourage growth in local exports, creating economic competitiveness benefits. Reduced idling and the diversion of a portion of the trips along the corridor to non-motorized modes will reduce air pollution and improve environmental sustainability. The new pavement will be constructed to higher standards to ensure the road can support the heavy freight traffic and the pavement will extend the project’s useful life to 50 years. Fiscal Year 2021 RAISE Transportation discretionary grants are for planning and capital investments in surface transportation infrastructure and were awarded on a competitive basis for projects that will have a significant local or regional impact. RAISE funding supports roads, bridges, transit, rail, ports or intermodal transportation. Per statute, the U.S. Department of Transportation is awarding 50% of RAISE Transportation grant funding to projects located in rural areas and 50% to urban areas that deliver positive benefits for these communities.  For this round of RAISE Transportation discretionary grants, the maximum grant award is $25 million, and no more than $100 million can be awarded to a single State, as specified in the appropriations act. Click here for full program details.

LOS ANGELES — North Dakota, Virginia, Missouri, Kentucky and North Carolina have the most cost-effective highway systems, according to the Annual Highway Report published Thursday by the Reason Foundation, a nonprofit think tank. New Jersey, Rhode Island, Alaska, Hawaii and New York have the worst combination of highway performance and cost-effectiveness, the study finds. The Annual Highway Report measures the condition and cost-effectiveness of state-controlled highways in 13 categories, including urban and rural pavement condition, deficient bridges, traffic fatalities, spending per mile, and administrative costs per mile of highway. A number of states with large populations and busy highways performed well in the overall rankings, including Virginia (2nd overall), Missouri (third), North Carolina (fifth), Georgia (14th), and Texas (16th). Nationally, the study finds America’s highway system is incrementally improving in almost every category. However, a 10-year average indicates the nation’s highway system problems are concentrated in the bottom 10 states and, despite spending more and more money, these worst-performing states are finding it difficult to improve. For example, 43% of the urban arterial primary mileage in poor condition is in six states — California, Massachusetts, New York, New Jersey, Nebraska, and Rhode Island. Approximately 25% of the rural Interstate mileage in poor condition is in just three states (Alaska, Colorado, and Washington). While a majority of states reduced their percentages of structurally deficient bridges, five states — Rhode Island, West Virginia, Iowa, South Dakota, and Pennsylvania — still report more than 15% of their bridges as deficient. For total spending, three states — Massachusetts, New York, and New Jersey — spent more than $250,000 per lane-mile of highway. In contrast, five states — Missouri, South Carolina, West Virginia, North Dakota, and South Dakota — spent less than $30,000 per mile of highway. “States need to ensure their highway spending produces safer roads, smoother pavement, fewer deficient bridges, and less traffic congestion,” said Baruch Feigenbaum, lead author of the Annual Highway Report. “The states with the best overall rankings maintain better-than-average highways with relatively efficient spending per mile.”

SHREVEPORT, La. – The Louisiana Department of Transportation and Development (DOTD) has announced major repairs to a heavily-traveled section of Interstate 20 in Bossier City, as well as additional repairs along the I-20 corridor in Shreveport. The project went to bid on Nov. 10 with an apparent low bid of $82,564,848.20, according to a news release. “The long-awaited project includes a full reconstruction of all lanes of I-20 from just west of LA 3 (Benton Road) near Hamilton Road to LA 782-2 (Industrial Drive),” the news release stated. “The pavement will be removed down to the roadway sub-base and replaced along this 3.5 mile section of interstate, which services between 62,000 – 86,000 vehicles per day.” The reconstruction will be performed in phases; it also includes all on and off-ramps of the five interchanges between Benton Road and Industrial Drive in Bossier City. “An incredible amount of work as part of the project development process has gone into preparing this project for this month’s letting,” said Shawn D. Wilson, DOTD secretary. “We fully understand how highly anticipated these major repairs are and we’re anxious to begin construction.” Additionally, concrete patching repairs will be conducted on I-20 stretching from Pines Road in Shreveport to Interstate 220 in Bossier City outside of the complete reconstruction area. This work will address other sections of the busy interstate corridor that serves both residents and the thousands of motorists passing through the region on a daily basis. “An innovative queue detection system will be implemented for this project, which will provide advanced warning to motorists that they are approaching a line of congestion and may choose to detour,” according to the news release. “This type of system is effective in improving safety during construction projects – particularly on an interstate – and for helping to mitigate traffic congestion approaching the work zone.” The project also includes the replacement of the street lighting system components along the stretch of I-20 that is being reconstructed in Bossier City. Actual construction work will begin in early 2022, following the contractor’s allotted assembly period.

ALBANY, N.Y. — Individuals between the ages of 18 and 20 will finally be able to obtain their Class A commercial drivers licenses (CDL) in New York. New York Governor Kathy Hochul signed the legislation on Nov. 16, making her state the final one in the union to authorize such a measure. After a “rigorous program,” drivers will be able to travel only within the borders of New York, according to a news release from the Trucking Association of New York (TANY). “The legislation was a priority issue for TANY during the 2021 legislative session and a critical piece of our workforce development initiative,” the news release stated. “As we continue to focus on encouraging high school students to consider careers in the trucking industry, it was imperative that they have the opportunity to obtain their Class A CDL prior to the age of 21.” To address safety concerns regarding younger drivers operating large commercial vehicles, the legislation provides for training that closely mirrors the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration’s entry-level driver training requirements and sets a minimum of three-hundred (300) hours of behind-the-wheel training under the immediate supervision and control of an experienced driver.

HARRISBURG, Pa. — A plan to add tolls on nine bridges suffered a setback Tuesday when the Pennsylvania state House passed a bill to void the proposal, although the legislation requires one more Senate vote and faces opposition from Democratic Gov. Tom Wolf. The tolling plan would pay for the bridges’ repair or reconstruction, freeing up money from the new federal infrastructure bill for other projects across the state. But opponents say tolls would hurt the local economy near the bridges, and there wasn’t enough public input. “We are all elected to represent our areas and have a voice for them, but the way this transpired, we did not have a voice,” said Rep. Sheryl Delozier, R-Cumberland, whose district would be affected by proposed tolls on the Interstate 83 South Bridge to Harrisburg. State representatives voted 125 to 74 for requiring legislative approval of specific proposals to add tolls. The bill would require PennDOT to publicly advertise toll proposals, take public comment and seek approval from both the governor and the Legislature. PennDOT has not made final decisions on which bridges to toll. Rep. Mike Carroll of Luzerne County, the ranking Democrat on the Transportation Committee, noted Republicans turned aside a Democratic proposal to require approval of specific projects by the Legislature when the Public Private Transportation Partnership was authorized by the majority Republican General Assembly in 2012. “It was your caucus’ idea,” Carroll told House Republicans. “You voted for it — your caucus. You advanced it to Gov. (Tom) Corbett and he signed it.” The infrastructure bill just approved in Washington  is a “sudden influx of money” that can be used to fund bridge repairs, said Rep. Tim Hennessey, R-Chester, the Transportation Committee chairman. “Frankly the citizens of Pennsylvania will have a hard time understanding the need for tolling in light of that,” Hennessey said. But Carroll warned that “Every single county in the state will have projects that do not get done if we have to dedicate $2 billion of the $4 billion to fix nine bridges.” Tolls would be between $1 and $2, probably both ways, to help pay for about $2.2 billion in construction work. The tolls would be put in place from the start of construction in 2023 and could last for 30 years, PennDOT officials have said. The nine that could be tolled are I-78’s Lenhartsville Bridge in Berks County; I-79’s bridges over State Route 50 in Allegheny County; I-80’s bridges across Canoe Creek in Clarion County, Nescopeck Creek in Luzerne County, North Fork in Jefferson County and the Lehigh River, near Wilkes-Barre; I-81 over the Susquehanna River in northern Pennsylvania; I-83’s South Bridge across the Susquehanna River; and Girard Point Bridge in Philadelphia. The Public Private Transportation Partnership board gave PennDOT the go-ahead a year ago to pursue tolls, the first time it’s approved a plan involving user fees since it was created in 2012.

MIAMI — A new study on autonomous trucking conducted by Ryder System, Inc. and Georgia Tech is promising to be a road map for commercializing self-driving trucks at a significant cost savings. According to a news release, Ryder officials say the research is based on real-world data. “I’ve worked on a lot of different transportation problems in the past, and if you have 1% (cost) improvement, that’s magic,” said Pascal Van Hentenryck, chair and professor for innovation and entrepreneurship at the H. Milton Stewart School of Industrial and Systems Engineering (ISyE) at Georgia Tech. “Here, we’re talking about 29-40%, so it’s massive. It’s really massive.” Already familiar with ISyE through the Ryder Charitable Foundation’s support of research and scholarships at the university, Ryder officials approached Van Hentenryck, who leads the Socially Aware Mobility Lab, about the idea for such a study, the news release stated. “The challenge was for Van Hentenryck and his team of students and post-doctoral researchers to apply their multimodal approach for public transportation to autonomous freight transportation,” according to the news release. Analyzing real-world data from Ryder’s dedicated transportation network in the Southeast, Van Hentenryck and his team developed an Autonomous Transfer Hub Network (ATHN) that combines autonomous trucks on highways with conventional trucking operations for the first and final miles. The team then introduced optimization models for routing and dispatching, and evaluated the proposed autonomous network by comparing it with existing operations under various assumptions. The analyses indicated that the ATHN with optimization technology can reduce costs by 29% to 40% for a large network, depending on the price of autonomous trucks as well as the direct and indirect cost of operating them. “The team looked at our dedicated transportation network, where trucks and drivers are committed to specific customers. While that particular transportation model guarantees capacity 24/7, it also creates situations where our customers’ trucks haul empty trailers,” said Karen Jones, chief marketing officer and head of new product innovation for Ryder. The researchers’ ATHN and optimization models significantly reduced the number of miles driven with empty trailers, which accounts for a large part of the cost reduction. “In the transfer hub network, there is no need to return back empty after a delivery, and there is no need to limit working hours or to return to a domicile at the end of the day,” Van Hentenryck said. “As a result, only 35% of the automated distance is driven empty, compared to 50%. This means that even if autonomous trucks would be as expensive as trucks with drivers, costs would still go down by 10%.” The study found additional cost savings came from reduced labor costs and idle time. Researchers also factored in increased flexibility in delivery appointments to keep autonomous trucks moving around the clock. “In addition to the significant projected cost savings, I think this study is particularly notable because it is based on real-world data and addresses real industry challenges,” Jones said. “It’s clear that, in order to realize the full benefit of autonomous trucking, shippers, receivers, and 3PLs will need to evolve today’s operating practices to meet the needs of tomorrow’s robotic trucks.” Ryder is planning several pilot projects with autonomous trucking companies Embark, Gatik, TuSimple and Waymo. “Our goal with these strategic alliances and our collaboration with ISyE is to help accelerate autonomous trucking nationwide,” Jones said. “If you think about ever-escalating consumer demands combined with capacity constraints, driver shortages, and regulatory and safety pressures, autonomous technology is on track to solve a host of industry disruptions. “I think the work of Pascal and his team shows that we’re on the right track, and to have that kind of validation from world-class researchers at the top school for industrial and systems engineering—that’s priceless.”  

WASHINGTON — The U.S. Supreme Court is asking the U.S. Solicitor General’s Office for its opinion on the California Trucking Association’s (CTA) arguments against California Assembly Bill 5 (AB5). The solicitor general of the United States is the fourth-highest-ranking official in the United States Department of Justice. California adopted AB5 in 2019 to expand a 2018 ruling by the California Supreme Court that limits businesses from classifying certain workers as independent contractors. The bill sought to determine who was an actual employee of a company — in other words, a worker with access to the full range of benefits and rights. The bill was originally directed toward the “gig” economy, such as Uber drivers, but found a home in the trucking industry. In essence, when the bill was signed into law, it endangered the independent contractor business model for trucking companies in California. “The decision by the U.S. Supreme Court to call for the view of the solicitor general validates the critical nature of reviewing AB5’s disruptive impact in the midst of a historic, global supply chain crisis,” CTA CEO Shawn Yadon said in a statement. “Since the introduction of AB5, the California Trucking Association has worked to protect the more than 70,000 owner-operators in California who choose to work independently because of the freedom, flexibility and business grown potential that this model has afforded them for decades. These small-business truckers face irreparable damage should AB5 be enforced.” In the 2018 ruling, the California Supreme Court’s established the ABC Test, which considers all workers to be employees unless a business can show that three things are established. The test states that “(A) A worker is free from the control and direction of the hirer in connection with the performance of the work, both under the contract for the performance of the work and in fact; (B) A worker performs work that is outside the usual course of the hiring entity’s business; and C) A worker is customarily engaged in an independently established trade, occupation or business of the same nature as that involved in the work performed.” When the CTA sued in 2019, the U.S. Southern District Court of California granted a preliminary injunction to stop the state from enforcing AB5 on motor carriers. The trucking group argues that AB5 violates the Federal Aviation Administration Authorization Act, which prevents states from enforcing a law or regulation related to a price, route or service of motor carriers. On April 28, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit ruled 2-1 that California’s AB5 “is a generally applicable labor law” and called for the removal of the preliminary injunction. Two months later, the Ninth Circuit denied CTA’s petition for a rehearing. The CTA then filed a petition to the U.S. Supreme Court. That petition allowed the injunction to continue until the case is either heard or rejected by the U.S. Supreme Court.