The Parking Zone – June 2020

New reports regarding local truck parking are too numerous and small in scope to report on individually. However, what each of these news items means to the underlying national problem is too significant to ignore. Below is a roundup of the latest truck parking-related news items from across the United States, ranging from proposed legislation regarding fines to new truck stops.

During the COVID-19 pandemic, the trucking industry has seen a tremendous response from the public and private sectors, including everyday citizens opening their lots. Desperate times call for desperate measures. Unbeknownst to the general public and lawmakers, desperate times for truck parking have lasted for more than a decade.

The trucking industry has struggled to get states to increase truck parking capacity. To the general public and lawmakers, truck parking is not a high priority. Until now.

One of the common excuses for not increasing truck parking capacity is the lack of funds. Federal and state governments could never seem to find the money to build more truck parking spaces. Then the COVID-19 pandemic happened. By some kind of miracle, funding for truck parking appeared out of thin air.

Bottom line: If the government really wants to do something, it will get the money needed. It’s not a matter of if it will get the money. Rather, it’s a matter of when it will get the money.

State government funding

For example, Arizona fast-tracked “an emergency project due to the current public health situation” that added 38 truck parking spaces to the Haviland rest area along Interstate 40 west of Kingman. According to the Arizona Department of Transportation, the $4 million contract was given on April 28, with construction to be completed by July.

Furthermore, ADOT temporarily reopened the Parks and Christensen rest areas along I-40 and I-17, respectively, in northern Arizona, exclusively for commercial vehicles. Those rest areas have been closed for more than a decade. All of a sudden, boom! They’re available for truck parking.

Why weren’t these spaces created when Jason’s Law identified Arizona as one of the states experiencing “problems at designated parking areas such as pullouts, private and public spaces, and where trucks are either not permitted or in places such as commercial areas?”

Arizona is not the only state to suddenly find truck parking solutions. In Missouri, the Highway Patrol announced that trucks can park at scale houses, including overnight parking, throughout the federally declared emergency.

Meanwhile in New York City, two major freight hubs allowed truckers to park at their facilities. Although these are private entities, the move was in coordination with the N.Y.C. Department of Transportation, Department of Sanitation and Economic Development Corp. According to Jason’s Law survey results, New York had one of the lowest amounts of public and private spaces per 100 miles of National Highway System. It was also the second-highest ranked state among OOIDA respondents reporting states with parking shortages.

Federal funding

It wasn’t just the state governments that found a newly discovered interest in truckers. During the pandemic, swift action at the federal level began swooping in as well.

To start, the Federal Highway Administration temporarily lifted certain restrictions that ban commercial activity at federally funded rest areas. Specifically, it gave states the option to allow food trucks to serve truckers a meal that was more than the potato chips and a soda you can get in the vending machines.

Loosely related to truck parking, the federal government also used rest areas to give truckers the medical attention they deserved and needed. In late April, the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration began working on a plan to administer COVID-19 testing to truck drivers at high-volume rest areas.

FMCSA acting Administrator Jim Mullen was also working on ways to get truckers gloves and sanitation products. Around the same time, FMCSA announced the distribution of nearly 1 million masks to truckers at rest areas across the nation. The move came soon after the Owner-Operator Independent Drivers Association wrote a letter to President Donald Trump urging him to provide immediate action to protect truck drivers.

All of a sudden, top brass in the federal government are paying attention to truck drivers and not just the corporate mega fleets. Magically, money fell into their coffers to provide truckers with something they have been requesting for the past decade or two.

Truck parking after COVID-19

When the pandemic is completely over, federal and state governments should take a cue from actions taken during the crisis. Not only should governments make temporary truck parking relief permanent, but they should also ride on the current momentum.

This brings us around to the Truck Parking Safety Improvement Act, or HR6104. The bill is a way for federal and state governments to address the truck parking crisis in one fell swoop. It was introduced by Reps. Mike Bost, R-Ill., and Angie Craig, D-Minn., on March 5. It sat dormant while lawmakers were too busy addressing COVID-19-related concerns. On April 17, three more lawmakers joined the bill: Rep. Brian Babin, R-Texas; Rep. Greg Pence, R-Ind.; and Rep. John Garamendi, D-Calif.

Other House representatives need to put federal money where their mouth has been when praising truckers during the pandemic. Truckers probably saved the economy from billions of dollars of further potential losses by staying busy. The least the government can do is put a fraction of those savings toward more truck parking. LL