Semi Trucks May Get Speed Controls

The U.S. Department of  Transportation is once again considering mandatory speed control equipment for tractor-trailer trucks to reduce the number of fatal semi truck accidents

The safety measure has support from the Governors’ Highway Safety Association and at least one association representing large commercial trucking companies.

“It’s crazy that it is legal in this country to drive an 80,000-pound vehicle as if you were driving a car that weighs 3,000 pounds,” said Steve Owings, who founded the advocacy group Road Safe America after his 22-year-old son, Cullum, was killed by a tractor-trailer in Virginia.

Owings’ organization and other advocates for speed control equipment are pushing for a top speed limit of 68 mph for large rigs. The public comment period for the proposed change expired March 27.

The Transportation Department’s National Highway Traffic Safety Administration will have the final say. The agency studied the issue in 1991 and said it wasn’t needed.

Nationally, one of nine traffic fatalities in 2007 resulted from a collision involving a large, commercial truck. In Minnesota, excessive speed contributes to about 150 traffic deaths and 7,000 injuries a year.