SAN DIEGO—The nation’s highest-ranking transportation official came to American Trucking Associations’ Management Conference & Exhibition with a purpose: “To express our administration’s understanding that trucking is absolutely vital to the supply chains that are the backbone of the American economy.”
U.S. Department of Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg paid industry stakeholders a visit to discuss his plans to not only make trucking safer and more efficient but also to make life better for the men and women who haul the nation’s freight.
Buttigieg detailed the Biden administration’s Trucking Action Plan, which includes a roadmap to improve truck driver pay and truck leasing agreements and address the unique challenges that women face in the industry. Earlier this year, the U.S. Department of Transportation also launched a National Roadway Safety Strategy to drive down the number of traffic deaths.
“Last year, we lost over 800 truck drivers to traffic crashes, and reducing those tragedies is a shared responsibility across government at every level, for passenger vehicle drivers and truck drivers,” Buttigieg told MCE attendees.
The administration also is intent on bringing more drivers into the industry, including women and veterans, and creating debt-free pathways into the career. As part of this effort, DOT has partnered with the U.S. Department of Labor to increase the number of registered truck driver apprenticeship programs.
“We’ve taken steps to streamline the issuing of commercial driver’s licenses, providing additional funding for the states to remove barriers, which has helped them to add 43,000 CDLs this year,” Buttigieg said, noting that is 32% more than the same period in 2019 and 14% more than last year.
A former military officer who served in Afghanistan and operated heavy equipment, Buttigieg said the department also is providing grants to cover training costs for veterans to get their CDLs.
Truck parking, infrastructure investments
Buttigieg noted that he has heard pleas directly from truck drivers and associations like ATA and the Owner-Operator Independent Drivers Association about fixing the nation’s lack of truck parking.
In September, DOT announced trucking parking investments through the administration’s INFRA grant program. Investments included $15 million to add 120 new truck parking spaces along the critical Interstate 4 corridor in Florida between Tampa and Orlando and a $22.6 million investment to add 125 spaces along I-40 east of Nashville, Tennessee.
DOT is using funds from the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act to modernize roads and bridges, Buttigieg said.
“For all of those whose workplace is infrastructure, roads, bridges, highway interchanges, and more that we’re working on right now, we’re working to make that a better workplace with funding levels not seen since the interstate highway system was created in the first place,” Buttigieg said. “I want to express my optimism on everything that we can deliver together. My hope is that we will be looking back on the 2020s as a period when trucking modernized its future while staying true to its finest traditions.”
Making truck driving more appealing for all
The signing of the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act last fall by President Biden created a Women of Trucking Advisory Board, which Buttigieg chartered in February. The board is tasked with identifying industry trends that directly or indirectly discourage women from trucking careers; how trucking companies and organizations can facilitate support for women in trucking; how to expand existing opportunities for women in the industry; and how to enhance trucking training, mentorship, education, and outreach programs that are exclusive to women.
Currently, women hold only 24% of all transportation jobs.
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