U.S. Proposes Changes to Major Truck Safety Program

WASHINGTON, D.C. – Changes are in the works in the U.S. when it comes to the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration’s (FMCSA) key truck safety program.

The agency announced on Monday it is proposing enhancements to its Compliance, Safety, Accountability (CSA) program, including changing some intervention thresholds to better reflect crash risk.

The agency said the enhancements to the Safety Measurement System (SMS) will improve its ability to prioritize and intervene with motor carriers that pose the greatest safety risk.

“These enhancements to SMS allow us to sharpen our focus on carriers with high crash rates, more effectively identify driver safety problems and hazardous materials carriers with serious safety problems, and more accurately account for carriers that are driving on our roads the most,” the agency said on its website.

These proposed changes are based on results from the agency testing and input from industry, enforcement, and other safety stakeholders. 

The proposed SMS enhancements include:

  • Changing some of the SMS Intervention Thresholds to better reflect the Behavior Analysis and Safety Improvement Categories’ (BASICs) correlation to crash risk.
  • Segmenting the Hazardous Materials Compliance BASIC by cargo tank and non-cargo tank carriers.
  • Reclassifying violations for operating while out-of-service (OOS) as under the Unsafe Driving BASIC, rather than the BASIC of the underlying OOS violation.
  • Increasing the maximum Vehicle Miles Travelled used in the Utilization Factor to more accurately reflect operations of high-utilization carriers.

FMCSA is accepting public comments on its plan through the end of the month and will later announce the changes it will implement.

 


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