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Are ELDs making the trucking industry safer?

Regulators take on issue as truckers, safety advocates weigh in on exemption request

ELDs getting more scrutiny from regulators. (Photo: Jim Allen/FreightWaves)

The Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration has required full industry compliance with the ELD mandate since December 2019, so it’s reasonable to ask, is the device making the trucking industry safer?

While there is as yet no government-approved study providing definitive answers, Ronnie Brown III, who drives for Waterloo, Iowa-based Gray Transportation, says no.

“ELD and hours of service as they are set make drivers such as myself drive tired at times without the ability to stop for a nap without interfering with the hours of service for that day,” Brown said in his FMCSA petition for a five-year exemption from the rule.

The majority of the over 1,200 public comments on Brown’s petition — which come from independent owner-operators — agree with him. Many complain that the electronic device’s lack of flexibility in logging hours of service, versus the paper logs that the devices replaced, forces them to drive while tired and rest when they feel alert.


“The extreme overregulating control of this ruling creates vastly more unsafe conditions than it eliminates,” said Prabhasa Ishaya, an independent trucker from Shenandoah, Virginia, in his comments on Brown’s petition. “While intending to ensure absolute compliance with HOS regulations, this mandate ignores long-standing features of such regulatory provisional allowances that have become, in practice, impossible to use.”

Ishaya also asserts that the cumulative effect of not being able to round off drive times logged into an ELD “potentially cuts an additional half hour or so of legal drive time out of the day. The elimination of this aspect alone greatly increases the need to ‘race the clock’ when drive times are tight to begin with.”

Others commenting in support of Brown have cited statistics from the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration showing that crashes involving large trucks have increased since the mandate was issued.

But the Truck Safety Coalition argues that FMCSA mandated the use of ELDs “in part because [they] bring about improvements in safety by making it difficult for drivers and carriers to falsify drivers’ duty status, which in turn deters violations of the [hours-of-service] rules,” the group noted in its comments on Brown’s petition.


The coalition further contended that the devices are “a crucial component” of efforts to ensure trucks are safely operating since they are used in on-site and off-site motor carrier inspections. It also cited recent FMCSA reports revealing that the two most common critical violations in carrier audits are not using the appropriate method to record hours of service and false reports of duty status records.

The industry will soon accumulate even more data on how well ELDs are working. The Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act signed into law last year required the U.S. Department of Transportation to report on the cost and effectiveness of the devices, along with efforts made to protect personal information obtained from them.

In addition, FMCSA last week began soliciting the public on ways to improve the current regulations governing the use of ELDs and address concerns about technical specifications that  have been raised by the industry.

The 400-plus comments received in just the first week, however, might be summarized by one anonymous submission: “For the love of God, please leave us alone.”

Click for more FreightWaves articles by John Gallagher.

52 Comments

  1. ThunderWookie

    My question is why is the Federal government always trying to add more expenses and regulations to drivers and companies with ELD’s, soon to be GPS DOT sensors, ineffective collision litigation systems, lane departure systems, emissions systems etc?

    The ELD costs each driver on average $40 per month, which is constantly needing to be updated because the software has glitches, flaws or some new change to the HOS is enacted.

    The DOT sensor is just a new electronic to be forced upon drivers and companies at an expense to the company or driver of course.

    The collision litigation and lane departure system is extremely flawed and has caused drivers new and old to become complacent in an industry that has zero room for complacency. It has also taken the word “Professional” out of the word driver. All we have on the road now are drivers who have no idea on how to drive a manual transmission, drive with their feet on the dash, watch movies/videos as they drive down the road, because they’re relying on the collision litigation or lane departure system to alert them or slow down or lock up the brakes. How is that safe?

    The emissions systems (DEF, DPF, EGR, etc) has turned out to be the biggest ripoff in the industry. Motors are having to be rebuilt after roughly 500k miles, more trucks are catching fire, more trucks are causing unnecessary fires, and we’re paying what $4+ per gallon for pig piss all for the safety of the environment.

    The HOS is a joke, why do we need the government or a machine to tell us when we can or cannot drive, when we are or are not tired, why are we racing a clock? The government has turned this industry into a giant NASCAR race, but with 80k+ lb road trains with the implementation of the ELD and HOS regulations.

    Why can’t we be trusted as adults to just do our job?

    Enough with the regulations, enough with the overstepping, let us do our jobs and leave us alone.

    One last question, why is ok for us drivers to drive 24/7 when the country needs us, but as soon as the crisis is over and the HOS suspension is lifted, we’re treated like garbage again and regulated to the nuts?

    Do the research, when the FMCSA suspends the HOS there are less truck related accidents, than there are when the HOS is in full effect.

    Figure that one out you commonless sense pencil pushing bureaucratic idiots.

  2. Rick Wick

    I have no problem with using the ELD .It is what is ,I believe it has made the roads safer.
    Alot people complaining are the ones who where running 2 and 3 log books for years to beat the DOT system,it has finally caught up to them,where Fedederal Motor Carriers said alot dont want to follow rules by running on a honor system of how many hours on a paper log,so they stepped in said ok well take from here,everyone will be regulated electronically.
    So sitting behind for from what I’ve heard from old school truckers for 20 plus years,taking illegal drugs just to stay awake was not only unhealthy but dangerous at same time.
    Plain and simply people hate change,being told what to do.
    I’ve been running electronic logs for 10 years,I see no issue with them,when that clock starts clocking down it gives uou one hour to find a place to park for night .
    So all you cowboys can fight this all want ELDS are here to stay,aren’t going anywhere anytime soon.

  3. Mohammad

    I think it would be better if humans control robots not other way around. ELD forces you to drive no matter whether tired or not. The stupid ELD doesn’t know when I am tired nor it knows when I am alert. There have been times many times I have been setting in my truck starting at the pice of silicon to allow me to drive while I was alert and hours passed it didn’t let me drive but as I started getting bored and tired, feeling sleepy, it was like ( you can drive for eight ours now, you don’t even have to take a break). See how dumb this little computer called ELD is. It doesn’t know that now I am tired and I have to sleep it tells to drive for eight hours forces me to drive while I am tired. Do you still think that it make the road safer?

  4. Robert

    If truckers could park anywhere they wanted then ELD’s wouldn’t be so much of an issue BUT THEY CANT so it’s makes the job so much harder.

  5. John Whitehouse

    the ELDs and the constant changing of the rules is why I no longer drive, after almost 30 years and 4 million plus miles, I’ve retired from the one job I really truly loved, obviously the FMCSA doesn’t have a clue what really goes on in the trucking industry, I suggest that before they are allowed to make rules for an industry they can’t seem to figure out, that THEY get behind the wheel and drive for a few years for low mileage pay to try to support their families so that they can finally understand that most of the time it’s not the drivers that are the problem, it’s the dispatches pushing for more miles/loads, and the greedy corporations not paying a living wage, the driver gets mileage pay, which is usually cents per mile, while the corporations make thousands of dollars for the same load, either pay by the hour, like local drivers get, or a percentage of what the load pays, I got 88% of each load I hauled when I had my own truck, and I did very well, and so did the company I was leased to.

  6. Cory Walker

    ELD is good in theory but is beyond ignorant in it’s application. I am way more fatigued than when there were paper logs… to much politics into this profession trying to regulate this industry when there needs to be some loosening of the leash instead of always trying to micro manage. Let the truckers do our job. You guys need to start worrying about other things. To many cheifs creates chaos which is exactly where we are at.

  7. Mike Bandi

    The ELDs do not make roads safer, I’ve heard numerous guys talking about driving while you’re tired being a factor and it is, but not once on any social media platform have I heard anybody talk about other truckers defensive driving these days, holding up lanes of traffic because they won’t slow down to move over to pass one another because they are racing a clock. Another huge issue I see on the road is guys speeding through construction zones, passing through construction zones all while once again racing a clock. Speeding through truck stops, rest areas, small towns, weaving in and out of traffic cutting people people off more then the passenger vehicles do anymore. I personally have seen a much bigger number of trucks wrecked and in ditches throughout the winter months, these trucks constantly racing a clock have not made any road safer worse off in fact. I got out of driving a truck 9 years ago recently got back into driving truck almost a year now, the difference from back then to now is unbelievable in the way these guys drive anymore, it’s dangerous down right dangerous.

  8. Halfcalf

    no. in fact it’s causing more issues. drivers racing to max their clocks or stressing out trying to find a place to stop because your about to go into violation. I agree to the 10 hours off in sleeper. or the 30min break in the US but let me drive as I see fit.

    1. Robert Burch

      I Do Agree the Government should STOP telling us O.T.R. ( Over The Road ) Truck Drivers when to drive, when to take a Break, & when to take Our 10hr Break. We often drive tired, & Can’t shut down for a nap as it is now!

Comments are closed.

John Gallagher

Based in Washington, D.C., John specializes in regulation and legislation affecting all sectors of freight transportation. He has covered rail, trucking and maritime issues since 1993 for a variety of publications based in the U.S. and the U.K. John began business reporting in 1993 at Broadcasting & Cable Magazine. He graduated from Florida State University majoring in English and business.