Household goods routing often outdated
Household goods miles route truckers on roads that are not safe for today’s trucks and longer trailers.
Better routes may exist now, but older ones are still used and the driver paid as such. An example is Atlanta to Asheville, N.C. The HHG miles route you up U.S. Highway 25 out of Greenville, S.C., to Interstate 26 in Hendersonville, N.C. The more efficient route is to stay on I-85 to I-26 in Spartanburg, S.C., and then go north.
Highway 25 is a narrow, winding two-lane road and is treacherous. A total of 34 miles is lost on that route, but to the owner-operator, the loss is more significant.
If we want our roads safer, then we should actually do something to make them that way instead of wasting millions of dollars on frivolous studies that are meant only to please a special interest group.
DOUG NORTON | Owner, Norton Transport | Augusta, Ga.
“If there’s nothing good on, I sing to myself.”
— Ed Manninga, 71, in the Park Rapids Enterprise (Minn.) newspaper, about listening to the radio while logging 1.1 million accident-free miles with R.D. Offutt Co.
Some truck stops need more security
In August, my husband parked at the back of a Nevada truck stop because all the front parking was filled. That stop had no camera in back, no security and no lights in the parking lot.
After my husband had gone inside and was returning to his truck, two men pulled him from his truck door and held a gun to his head and a knife to his back. They took all of his money, and he suffered a mild concussion.
Large truck stop chains, like the one where my husband stopped, profit greatly from truckers’ fuel purchases. The least they could do is provide adequate security to thwart criminals.
DEBRA WELLS
Wells Expediting Services
Rockford, Ill.
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E-mail your letter to the editor to Lucinda Coulter at [email protected] or mail it to Overdrive, P.O. Box 3187, Tuscaloosa, AL 35403.
What do you think of the federal proposal to ban all cell phone use while driving except in emergencies?
JOHN AERICKO
Sun Belt Transport company driver | Woodville, Ala.
CLIFF MATHEWS
Coastal Carriers | St. Louis
ANTHONY HOWARD
J&G Global Transport company driver | Houston
ANDY GARDEA
EWO Transport company driver
El Paso, Texas
RAYMOND SANIMOCENCIO
Lease-purchase owner-operator for PGT Trucking | New York
CLARIFICATION: Owner-operator Terry Kennedy, leased to N-Motion, says his response in the October SpeakOut to a question about driver demand and changing carriers should have included: “I’m very happy where I’m at, home weekly and making good money.”
