Overdrive Magazine | Trucking Business News & Owner Operator Info
Issue link: https://read.dmtmag.com/i/85438
central for the past couple years, "we're seeing on average 60 new trucking companies a month," says North Dakota Trucking Association Executive Vice President Tom Balzer. Most have one to three trucks and many serve various aspects of the fracking operations, such as bulk water, sand and crude haulers. Others are flatbeds and dumps "for gravel hauling, housing materials" to account for the population boom. "Anything that goes along with that kind of boom, you'll see big growth," Balzer says. For example, "Diesel sales here are unbelievable." Owner-operators and drivers are "making pretty significant money," he says, "and trucking companies in that area are adding multiple drivers on a daily basis." Based in the similarly booming area around Williamsport, Pa., Landstar agent Brenda Hoover notes strong, though sporadic long- and regional-haul heavy-equipment volume both in- and out-bound from varied states, such as Texas, Pennsylvania and North Dakota. She's seeing "a lot of flatbed freight and a lot of oversize equipment on double-drops, lowboys." Since 2010, when the boom really Oil field hours exemption stirs controversies A May 15 New York Times story suggested many on-highway deaths could be blamed on the oil field exemption to hours of service regulations, based on analysis of truck- related fatalities. The exemption permits a 24-hour restart provision for drivers dedicated to oil field operations. Further, it allows an extension of the 14-hour on-duty clock during on-site waiting, available to drivers of vehicles "that are specially constructed to service oil wells." There is some debate about how strictly to interpret that last qualification. Brian Remus, a safety manager with WHW Trucking of Billings, Mont., says Montana DOT told him his dry bulk haulers — including belly dump, side dump and pneumatic trailers — cannot take the exemption due to the equipment's versatility potential, even though dedicated to got going, Williamsport has ranked among the nation's top 10 fastest growing metro areas. Truckers are servicing wells. Yet in Pennsylvania, says owner-operator Steve Bixler, hauling sand in a pneumatic tank, he's had no problems extending his clock as recently as February, when inspected by a DOT officer. On the other hand, other Reed Trucking-leased owner-operators have been told by inspectors that they're not eligible. "Like a lot of things with DOT," Bixler says, "it depends on the officer who checks you. How they personally see it is how they're going to write it." The Owner-Operator Independent Drivers Association told Bixler that its reading of the regs is that his dedicated equipment is eligible for the special hours provisions, even though it holds the versatility to be used elsewhere. Some oil services haulers are able to take advantage of many states' more permissive intrastate hours regs, given the local nature of the work. Owner-operators Mark Kathrein and Wendy Wing, hauling intrastate in Texas, can "drive 12, work 15, take an 8-hour sleeper period and a 24-hour restart," Kathrein says. If they cross state lines, however, they're back on the regular federal hours rules, with the restart exception. following the money there. Strong demand for capacity is bringing in competition as large JULY 2012 OVERDRIVE 33