EOBR and Local Trucking
Posted by | Posted in Equipment Issues, Legislative Issues, Technology for Local Trucking | Posted on 20-03-2011
EOBRs, or Electronic On-Board Recorders, are a hot topic in Washington. The general movement is to require almost ALL carriers to install in the next few years at an annual expense of $500-900 per truck. GOOD NEWS! Local trucking organizations using the 100 or 150 mile HOS rules appear to be exempt from this expensive regulation. We will alert you if anything changes, but for now, for us local guys, the issue is moot.
The Rights of All
I am alarmed and deeply angered at the recent proposal and remarks of Ray LaHood, Secretary of Transportation. In defending his proposal to require approximately 500,000 carriers install Electronic On-Board Recorders (EOBRs) on nearly all trucks, he said, “We cannot protect our roadways when commercial truck and bus companies exceed hours-of-service rules. This proposal would make our roads safer by ensuring that carriers traveling across state lines are using EOBRs to track the hours their drivers spend behind the wheel.”
Here’s a proposal for Mr. LaHood. Let’s put Internet-trackable GPS Electronic Tethers (IGETs) on him and each of the 55,000 people under his command at Transportation. We citizens cannot protect our freedoms when commercial politicians like him exceed the constitution’s rules. This proposal would make our nation safer by ensuring that politicians who rule across state lines are using IGETs so we can track the hours they and their staffs are spending.
After Mr. LaHood has developed this IGET system with a very small part of his $70 billion taxpayer-paid-for annual budget, prototyped it on himself and his 55,000 employees for, say, three years, he can expand his program to include all elected politicians and their staff members in the federal government. After that, he should come back to us lowly truck drivers and we’ll discuss together the installation of his EOBR spy boxes in our trucks. Then we can all spy on each other and be one big happy community together. It’ll be great! It’ll make our roads safer, right?
Dan the Trucker