Truck Driver Hours Rule Effective July 1

New truck driving limits go into effect on July 1, 2013. The major provisions in the new rules that impact commercial motor vehicle drivers in the construction industry are as follows:

• Daily driving time limit of 11 hours is maintained (FMCSA had proposed reducing this time to 10 hours).
• The 60- and 70-hour weekly driving limits are also unchanged.
• Consecutive hours of driving are limited to 8 hours following an off-duty break of at least 30 minutes.
• Maximum on-duty time will remain at 14 hours.
• Construction industry drivers transporting construction materials and equipment to and from an active construction site within a 50-air-mile radius of the driver’s normal work reporting location are allowed to restart the on-duty counting period following any off-duty period of 24 or more successive hours.
• Drivers that do not meet the construction driver definition can restart the weekly on-duty clock following a 34-hour off duty period that includes at least two periods between 1:00 a.m. and 5:00 a.m.
• The rule limits the use of the “34-hour restart” to once a week thus limiting restarts to one every 168 hours.
• The practical effect of new on-duty limits result in weekly driving time being reduced from 82 to 70 hours during a seven consecutive day driving period.
• A summary of the rule and the rule is available here.

These new rules have been challenged in court by the American Trucking Association (ATA). The Court denied a request by ATA to stay the implementation of the rule until a final decision is reached but the court declined that option. The House Transportation and Infrastructure Subcommittee on highways and transit held a hearing last week to further examine the rules. Both the Subcommittee Chairman tom Petri (R-Wisc.) and Ranking member Peter DeFazio (D-Ore.) and numerous other subcommittee members suggested to FMCSA Administrator Anne Ferro that delaying implementation until a court ruling is final made sense but she responded that the decision has been made to move forward. AGC commented twice on the proposed rule change recommending that FMCSA: maintain the construction exemption but increase the distance coverage to a 100-air-mile radius, continue to allow 11 hours of driving time in each driving window, continue to allow the existing 14 hours maximum on-duty time within driving window, “on duty” time for construction drivers should not include waiting time to deliver product. AGC was successful in having the construction exemption included in statute in 1993.