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The Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration said it is exploring the feasibility of a “negotiated rulemaking” to include minimum federal behind-the-wheel and classroom training requirements for entry-level truck drivers.

A proposed reverse logistics rule would offer an exception from existing regulations for certain reverse logistics shipments by highway that will create “opportunities for reduced compliance costs among hazmat shippers and carriers, without any decrease in safety,” federal hazmat regulators said.

Insufficient motor carrier route planning, a failure by a pilot/escort to warn of potential hazards and inadequate evaluation of oversize load permit requests by state officials were the probable causes of an oversize truck strike that brought down the Interstate 5 Skagit River Bridge in Washington state, according to a final investigation report of the National Transportation Safety Board.

A federal judge in New York on Aug. 6 dismissed a class-action lawsuit filed last year by American Trucking Associations alleging that the New York State Thruway Authority is improperly spending more than a billion dollars in toll revenue on maintenance and improvements on the state’s mostly recreational canal system.

Sales of diesel particulate filters for trucks and buses in California increased at the end of 2013 and in the first half of this year compared with the first half of 2013, according to a survey released Aug. 5 by the Manufacturers of Emission Controls Association.

State law enforcement disparities create uneven safety playing fields for carriers that have different operating patterns and mileage exposure, according to an American Transportation Research Institute study released July 31.