WASHINGTON -- Just hours after taking office, US President Barack Obama switched the red light on a list of rules until they can be reviewed by his own incoming staff, including a rule requiring at least some trucking carriers (perhaps most) to install electronic onboard recorders (EOBRs).

Obama's chief of staff notified the heads of all government agencies that his own people must decide on any 11th hour regulation not having cleared the White House Office of Management and Budget.

A final rule on EOBRs was expected in November but was delayed. It was still on the shelf awaiting review by the White House as the final days of the Bush administration slipped away.

During an address at an EOBR conference sponsored by the Commercial Vehicle Safety Alliance last month, former Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration boss John H. Hill said the final rule had more teeth than the original proposed rule, which only required EOBRs for carriers with two or more "serious" hours-of-service violations in a two-year period. Hill didn't give specific details on how the rule was toughened up.

Under Hill's watch since 2006, the FMCSA has cleared a substantial backlog of transport rules, including hours of service, tougher trucking entry standards, inspection standards for intermodal equipment and requirements for driver medical certification -- all of which were approved and published in the Federal Register in the last weeks of the Bush administration.

 -- with files from Truckinginfo.com