Overdrive Magazine | Trucking Business News & Owner Operator Info
Issue link: http://read.dmtmag.com/i/535950
L ast year, Swift-leased owner-op- erator John Raff one was on a run west across Interstate 10 that would take him to California's notorious Banning scale. His 2013 Ken- worth was pulling an older company van that showed its age. When Raff one got to Phoenix, Swift's headquarters city, he stopped for preven- tive maintenance at the main terminal. It'd been some time since the last one, he knew from the trailer's papers. Call it preparation, Raff one says, for what is perennially a contender for the top spot in Overdrive's CSA's Data Trail inspection-intensity rankings. California sits at No. 2 again with this year's update, after falling to No. 3 as Pennsylvania climbed the rankings last year. But there's a diff erence between California and the next-closest two states of Maryland and Pennsylvania, and that's geography. The Golden State comprises large swathes of land with low population den- sity – "we've got deserts," says California Highway Patrol Lt. James Portilla, with the Commercial Vehicle Section – as well as some of the most densely populated parts of the country. That's spread out over an area second in size only to Texas in the continental United States, with a boatload of National Highway System lane-miles in its borders. California's inspection-intensity mea- sure remains high – 11 inspections per lane-mile in the 2014 update. The state operates 51 fi xed weigh and inspection stations statewide, with a large new one near the Nevada line on I-15 expected to open in September. While some states have no scales open in the wee hours, Portilla estimates slightly more than half of California's facilities are open 24/7. Portilla and Sgt. Josh Clements, both working out of CHP's Sacramento head- quarters, are two of the nearly 1,000 in- spectors involved in the program. Among them, 429 are offi cers certifi ed for Level 1, hazmat and cargo tank inspections, and 137 of those are mobile, Clements says. "The rest are assigned to the facilities." 50 | Overdrive | July 2015 The Golden State Inspection fanatic or truckers' best friend? BY TODD DILLS CSA's FALLOUT STANDOUT STATES California 1. Mississippi: 0.84 2. Montana: 0.86 3. North Dakota: 0.89 4. California: 0.88 5. Tennessee: 0.92 6. South Dakota: 0.86 7. West Virginia: 1.11 8. Delaware: 0.87 9. Nevada: 1.15 10. North Carolina: 1.22 TOP STATES FOR CLEAN INSPECTIONS States are ranked according to the highest clean-inspections percentage. In all of these states, more than half of all inspections were recorded without a single violation, from 66.1 percent clean in Mississippi to 50.1 percent in North Carolina. THE ACCOMPANYING NUMBERS measure violations per inspection. States whose ratio is less than 1 perform overall more inspections than they issue violations, a select group of seven among the 48 continental United States. California is by far the leader of this group in total inspections, performing more than five times the number of the next closest contender, North Carolina. SOURCE FOR ALL DATA WITH THIS STORY: RigDig Business Intelligence (rigdig.com/bi, 866-237-7788) data from calendar year 2014. Rankings exclude Alaska, Hawaii and the District of Columbia.