Trucking Schools, Students and Heavier Trucks

Student truck drivers. Are they ready to haul “heavy” loads? Are student truck drivers being properly trained to drive trucks?

What is the purpose of truck driving schools? And are trucking schools really preparing new drivers for the trucking industry?

Trucking schools are only doing what they have been required to do for years. There is proper regulation for these trucking schools. All they do is follow state guidelines. Which is considered proper training in the industry. Truck driving schools today are called “CDL Mills” for a reason.

The government has gotten involved with placing unemployed workers into the trucking industry. People who otherwise would never ever consider being a truck driver. Many of these people soon find out it is not what they expected and either get fired or quit driving.

Trucking schools and some trucking companies make good money on the new drivers. The government will pay a school a large amount of money to get a new driver his or her Commercial Drivers License. The companies make money, because they get the freight hauled cheaper due to the fact they don’t pay entry level drivers well.

Students have been rushed through the schools and some only really taught how to shift gears and back up. A lot of schools last from two to four weeks. After which the students are rushed into the industry at companies without enough existing drivers qualified to mentor and further train the newcomers.

Some companies only require a driver to have six months total driving experience in a commercial vehicle, in order to become a trainer and begin training incoming drivers. Six months is simply not enough experience to be considered qualified to train new drivers.

How much experience should a truck driver have to be qualified to train a brand new driver? Well that’s hard to say for sure, because if anyone claims to know all there is to know about trucking then most will call them a liar and he or she will not be believed. As for a person qualified to train somebody to drive, most feel the trainer should have at least a couple years experience with no accidents, also have a good record of no discrepancies with the loads they have hauled. It would be good for them to have mountain driving experience and winter driving under their belts too.

With the introduction of H.R. 1799: the (so called) Safe and Efficient Transportation Act of 2009, we now have something else to look forward too This bill would allow for individual states to increase their gross (maximum) weight for tractor trailers. In most states eighty thousand pounds is the gross allowable weight that can be hauled legally without a permit. This bill will allow that figure to increase to ninety seven thousand pounds legally hauled without a permit.

The bill suggests that more weight hauled per truck would mean less trucks on the highway. Which in turn would seem to be less fuel consumed. But in reality it would consume as much or more fuel because it would require more power and therefore more fuel to move the increased weight. This will increase the dangers involved with trucking because higher weights translate into longer stopping distances.

Claims are being made that statistically, hauling heavier loads will not increase the chances of accidents. How did they get statistics on this? They must have looked at permitted (over weight) loads, which I might add, make up a relatively small percentage of loads on the road. And typically only a more experienced drivers get to haul these, not student drivers.

Now they want to increase the weight and allow student drivers with minimal experience hauling eighty thousand pounds to haul ninety seven thousand pounds? Why do you suppose that companies that haul over weight and over-sized loads insist on experienced drivers?

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