Putting the highway back in Highway Hero

Jorge Orozco-Sanchez is an OOIDA member from Firestone, CO. You may recognize that name from the pages of our May issue. Jorge is the 2008 Goodyear Highway Hero.Last fall, he was involved in a wreck in which an SUV veered into the path of his truck. The horrific head-on crash took the life of a 27-year-old mother, but Jorge was able to rescue the two children strapped in the car seats in back.

Declawing CARB (temporarily)

The California Air Resources Board has drawn heaping piles of criticism from truckers for years, and especially during the last two to three years, when the environmental agency began aggressively implementing emissions regulations on trucks.Whether it was the ban on idling that took effect in 2008, this year’s impending reefer regulation, or the upcoming ban on older trucks by 2015, truckers

Longer, heavier trucks won’t help environment

I don’t know where the Canadian Trucking Alliance gets its environmental statistics from, but perhaps the greater mystery is why some provincial governments take the bait.The CTA and affiliate Ontario Trucking Association continue to say that putting longer, heavier trucks on the highways will conserve fuel and reduce greenhouse gas emissions.A single tractor would replace two tractors hauling

Say it ain’t so, Ohio

A couple of days ago I was minding my own business perusing the Internet for the latest statehouse happenings that would be of interest to truckers. On any given day I come across a gamut of topics. Some of the topics could be considered juicy while some might be labeled dry.Well, thanks to a couple of knuckleheads in the Ohio House what popped up on my computer monitor was a bill well-suited for

‘Krazy Karl’ is bound for The Wall

On this Memorial Day weekend, I can’t help thinking about our Life Member “Krazy Karl” Haartz.On his big blue Honda Gold Wing, Karl is doing “The Run for The Wall.” He should be rolling into DC about now, along with thousands of other bikers.For those soldiers who never made it home, the annual “Run for The Wall” is a motorcycle pilgrimage by military veterans, friends and relatives and others,

Taking on the toll-happy

In Massachusetts, a group of fed-up toll payers have filed a lawsuit demanding their money back. An anti-toll coalition in Pennsylvania is pressuring lawmakers to defeat the proposal to toll Interstate 80. And in Texas, an anti-toll group is rallying against legislation that would allow private companies to build and own toll roads for profit.Fighting against excessive tolling is nothing new, and

Who is Dan Blower?

About 10 years ago, I interviewed a guy named Dan Blower, a researcher with the University of Michigan Transportation Research Institute. He was the guy whose study revealed that most of the car-truck fatalities were not the fault of the trucker. Yes. THAT guy.Dan told me something that knocked me out. He said that even if truckers NEVER made an error, if the truckers NEVER operated in an unsafe

A sad day

I just got off the phone with Dr. John McElligott, who shared some sad news.The Professional Drivers Medical Depot and its five truck stop clinics will remain shuttered, Dr. John told me Tuesday afternoon.“I hate to lose momentum on this because many truckers were just starting to pay attention,” Dr. John told me.Sad news about a business that offered a valuable service to drivers – many of whom

More people should learn trucker math

How many people know exactly what they pay in taxes at the pump or where their fuel taxes go?While everyone has the free will to look up the answers to those and other pertinent questions, chances are that most people don’t. In many ways, the motoring public lives under a gas-and-go rock.Increases in the price of fuel can be a wake-up call for some, but not everyone sits down and does trucker

Dr. John reaches out to truckers

OOIDA’s Call to Actions blast out of our Missouri headquarters frequently. They are e-mailed or sent any way we can get them to you. If you don’t have a computer, phone or address, we’ll send you smoke signals.When we think an issue needs your attention, we move on it, notifying big numbers of people and doing it fast. Mostly, it’s regulatory or legislative or maybe a fraud alert. But this week,