Buttigieg publicizes almost $40 million in grants to increase truck parking
Hundreds of thousands of {dollars} in federal funding can pay for a whole lot of truck parking areas in Florida and Tennessee together with expertise to assist truck drivers struggling to search out out there spots, U.S. Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg stated Friday.
The infrastructure investments embody a $15 million grant so as to add about 120 new truck parking areas alongside the Interstate 4 hall between Tampa and Orlando, Florida, and a $22.6 million award so as to add about 125 areas alongside Interstate 40, east of Nashville, Tennessee.
Individually, the Federal Motor Provider Security Administration awarded $1.4 million in Excessive Precedence Progressive Know-how Deployment grants to Montana and Kentucky to enhance truck parking.
“We’re deploying funding that may assist help secure truck parking across the nation,” Buttigieg stated throughout a digital assembly of the Nationwide Coalition of Truck Parking.
The awards search to handle the added pressure brought on by elevated freight demand lately, which {industry} teams advised Buttigieg in a February letter has resulted in a median of just one out there parking house for each 11 drivers.
“We all know we have a number of work to do,” the secretary stated. “Nearly each truck driver in America has been in a state of affairs the place you are on a protracted journey, or forward of schedule, and needed to pull over on the shoulder of the freeway, on the aspect of an exit ramp, right into a vacant house as a way to relaxation due to the dearth of correct truck parking.”
The variety of truck parking areas within the U.S. has risen 6% lately, in keeping with a survey required as a part of Jason’s Legislation, laws handed in 2012 to advocate for the difficulty following the killing of truck driver Jason Rivenburg whereas he was parked in a single day at an deserted fuel station.
However the nation’s freight transportation system wants extra, in keeping with the Division of Transportation’s Truck Parking Growth Handbook. The FMCSA and Federal Freeway Administration additionally issued a steering memo final month on truck parking grant alternatives for native governments.
The handbook comprises case research and methods for truck parking improvement “that helps freight transportation security corridors, integrates parking wants with truck producing amenities and ensures compatibility with adjoining land makes use of.” It urges states and native entities to pursue public-private partnerships, particularly in instances the place land and assets are restricted.
“Via correct planning and acceptable land use insurance policies truck parking may be in concord with neighborhood livability targets,” the handbook says. “This Handbook is designed to assist communities deal with the challenges related to fashionable industrial, warehousing, and business developments that generate truck site visitors and create demand for truck parking.”
Truck driver fatigue is a consider about one in each seven business motorized vehicle crashes, FMCSA head Robin Hutcheson stated through the assembly.
“That is partially a operate of a scarcity of high quality sleep, and we all know that this may be exacerbated when business drivers cannot park in secure, quiet and designated areas for big vehicles, particularly,” Hutcheson stated.
The shortage of driver parking is persistently a top-three precedence for American Trucking Associations members within the group’s surveys, stated Darrin Roth, vp of freeway coverage. The problem tied driver compensation as members’ high concern final 12 months.
The ATA and its companions on the Legislation Enforcement Advisory Board, a trucking industry-police joint security initiative, are sending letters to all 50 states to tell them of the federal discretionary and system funding out there to enhance truck parking, Roth stated.
“Proper now, ATA is targeted totally on ensuring that state and native governments are conscious of each the issue and the federal assets which might be out there to them,” Roth stated. “So the DOT steering memo outlining eligibility is definitely very well timed, and very useful.”
Tiffany Wazlowski-Newman, vp of public affairs for the Nationwide Affiliation of Truck Cease Operators, stated the group appreciates the federal authorities’s dedication to creating extra parking house. The affiliation’s members function 90% of the nation’s truck parking.
“To the extent that Federal {dollars} are utilized for truck parking, we expect that partnering with the personal sector within the present places is one of the simplest ways to maximise using these {dollars},” Wazlowski-Newman stated.
