WASHINGTON -- An Obama-led Department of Transportation has agreed to turn back the clock on hours-of-service and reconsider the rules that have been in place since 2004.

The DOT's Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration has been defending the rules since then from unions and special interest groups, who claim that the system leads to more tired truckers.

In a statement, the groups announced that the DOT under the new administration has agreed to put down its sword and redraft new regulations within nine months and publish a new final rule in 21 months.

Public Citizen, Advocates for Highway and Auto Safety, and the Teamsters union have challenged the rules in court several times over the last five years.

Twice, courts forced the FMCSA to revise the rules. In 2004, the U.S. Court of Appeals threw out the rules because they failed "to consider the impact on the health of drivers."

The government complied with a court order to tighten up the rules -- much to the chagrin of many carriers -- by dumping the split sleeper berth provision. Drivers were required to take eight consecutive hours off rather than be allowed to split their 10 off-duty hours into two periods of their own choosing. 

And in 2007, a U.S. court ordered the FMCSA to better explanation its justifications for adopting the 11-hour drive time and 34-hour restart provisions of the rule. The agency did that and the provisions have since been upheld, despite an additional challenge from the interest groups.

The current rules, based heavily on circadian sleep rhythm science, generally allow drivers to drive 11 hours, one more than previously permitted, but require them to take more time off in a day, including the eight consecutive hours off. Plus, the rules shut drivers down at 60 hours in a week.

The American Trucking Associations has spent years refuting claims, oft-repeated by mainstream media, that the current rules are more dangerous to drivers and lead to an increase in highway crashes.

"Another myth sowed by these groups is that the 34-hour restart allows significantly longer driving and on-duty times in a week than the pre-2004 rules," ATA said. FMCSA found that "longer hypothetical hours in driving and duty schedules" envisioned by critics "requires an imaginary world with nearly perfect logistics."

In the real world, drivers have found that the 34-hour restart gives them more rest and time off, not less, according to the ATA.
Highway crash rates and fatalities have fallen steadily since the rules took effect in January 2004.