Defense Win Marks End of the Line for Bus Driver's Car Wreck Suit

From the "you've got to be kidding me" file. Story thanks to Greg Land and dailyreportonline. Links provided:

The plaintiff said a minor traffic accident led to a cascading series of events that left her hospitalized with kidney failure due to an infections that traveled from her left wrist to her right knee.

March 29, 2018 Originally published on Daily Report Online.  A Cobb County jury was not on board with a bus driver who claimed a minor accident with an SUV caused a cascading series of ailments beginning with a sore wrist and ending with an infected knee that landed her in the hospital.

After a three-day trial, the jury returned a defense verdict.

“I’ve never seen a case like this,” said Daniel Prout, the lead counsel for the defendant, who was driving the SUV. “She claimed she developed carpal tunnel syndrome in her left wrist because of the accident. Then she had carpal release surgery and claimed that, as a result of the surgery, she developed an infection in her wrist that traveled to to her right knee.”

That knee was a prosthetic, and the plaintiff underwent two surgeries to remove and replace it, he said.

Prout said his client admitted being at fault for the accident. The jury question was whether the accident caused all of the plaintiff’s injuries, said Prout, who tried the case with Waldon Adelman Castilla Hiestand & Prout associate Travis Meyer.

The plaintiff, Vanessa Jordan-Peeples, hasn’t worked as a bus driver since the accident and claimed more than $320,000 in medical expenses and more than $500,000 in lost wages, Prout said.

Jordan-Peeples’ attorney, Shoran Williams of Atlanta’s Reid Williams, said she was “torn” on the issue of whether to appeal.

But she decried what she termed “the grave injustice that was served upon my client.”

“I don’t agree with the verdict,” Williams said. “I do believe reasonable minds could disagree with the causation issues.”

According to the lawyers and court filings, Jordan-Peeples was driving a Cobb County Transit bus in 2012 in Marietta when an SUV driven by Sherrie Anderson sideswiped the bus as Anderson made a turn.    

Anderson’s bumper was torn loose, and she was cited for an improper lane change; the bus suffered little damage and was driven away by another driver, Prout said.

Jordan-Peeples did not complain of any injury at the scene, but when she was back at the station filling out a report, her hand began to swell, Williams said.  

“She went through six months of conservative treatment with several different doctors,” Williams said. Her client was ultimately diagnosed with carpal tunnel syndrome.

Surgery relieved her pain for a while, but she began to experience pain both in her left wrist and right knee, which had been replaced with a prosthesis the year before.

Jordan-Peeples underwent an antibiotic treatment regimen, but several months later she was determined to have an infection of the prosthesis, which was removed and replaced with an antibiotic device.

Afterward, she experienced complications and was hospitalized, suffering renal failure.

Once she was stabilized, she underwent another surgery to replace the prosthetic knee.     

In 2014, Jordan-Peeples filed a personal injury suit against Anderson in Cobb County State Court.

During a trial that began March 12 before Judge David Darden, the lawyers said the only experts were Jordan-Peeples’ treating doctors. They “offered conflicting testimony whether she had an infection,” Williams said.

“The hand orthopedic surgeon testified that there was no infection in her left wrist,” said Prout. “So we argued there was no infection to travel to her knee—that breaks the chain of causation.”

In closing, Prout said Williams asked for $5 million in damages.

“We asked for a straight defense verdict,” he said.

On March 14, Prout said the jury took about three hours to deliver just that.

He said Williams “did a fine job representing her client. But the facts, the medical evidence was just not in her favor.”

https://www.law.com/dailyreportonline/2018/03/29/defense-win-marks-end-of-the-line-for-bus-drivers-car-wreck-suit/?kw=Defense%20Win%20Marks%20End%20of%20the%20Line%20for%20Bus%20Driver%27s%20Car%20Wreck%20Suit

Captive trucking helps Walmart weather transport crunch

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Article thanks to Mark Hamstra and supermarketnews.com. Links provided:

Driver shortage has less impact on retailer than others: CFO

Operating its own fleet of trucks has helped shield Walmart to some degree from the rising transportation costs that are impacting many industries, according to Brett M. Biggs, executive VP and chief financial officer.

Speaking at the Raymond James Institutional Investors Conference on Tuesday, Biggs said that although the company does use some third-party trucking, it benefits from having a captive supply chain, including transportation.

“It’s a good time to have your own fleet for a lot of reasons,” said Biggs. “To have the drivers that we have and the long tenured associates in that area is so important.”

According to some recent reports, trucking capacity in the U.S. is maxed out and the industry faces a large driver shortage — about 50,000 open positions, according to the American Trucking Association — that is driving up costs for many companies that rely on trucks to transport goods, including retailers and CPG companies.

Although Walmart noted that its transportation costs rose slightly in the recently ended fourth quarter, compared with a year ago, Biggs said that was due in part to an increase in fuel costs of about 10% to 12%.

“The price pressure that you're reading about and seeing would have less of an impact on us than it would, I think, some others,” he said.

Also, asked what was driving the improved sales performance at Walmart in recent years, Biggs cited, among other things, the improvements in the quality of perishables.

“Over the past three or four years, we put a lot of time and energy into the fresh supply chain,” he said. “We've taken almost three days out of that fresh supply chain, which is a big deal in your home when that produce is still good three days later than it was before.”

He also cited investments in technology, such as self-checkout, which he said is being expanded in remodeled stores. It has been embraced by customers, and is making stores more efficient at the same time, he said.

Walmart has also been making its its Scan & Go mobile app-based checkout system available in more locations. Last month the company rolled out the service to 100 stores in 33 states in the second phase of a rollout that began with a small scale test, according to reports.

http://www.supermarketnews.com/news/captive-trucking-helps-walmart-weather-transport-crunch?mod=djemlogistics

Captain Obvious Finally Arrives: Ride-sharing Actually Congests City Traffic

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Article thanks to Matt Posky and thetruthaboutcars.com. Links provided: 

Feb, 2018  A recurring theme among ride-hailing executives from the likes of Lyft and Uber is that their platforms will help reduce congestion in the world’s most populous cities. However, anyone actually living in these places will tell you it doesn’t appear to be working. Cities like New York were already clogged with taxi cabs but, instead of seeing all of these drivers buy personal vehicles to enlist as independent contractors for ride-hailing firms, Uber and Lyft brought in new drivers, more vehicles, and fresh competition.

Worse yet, ride-sharing alternatives like Uber Pool have moved people away from buses and trains and placed them in the backseats of cars — further compounding the problem. It turns out city dwellers who already owned an automobile didn’t suddenly decide to get rid of it, and those who were heavily invested in mass transit discovered an affordable car-based alternative. 

It certainly sounds good when an executive tells you “private car ownership will all but end in major U.S. cities” by 2025. But it’s another thing to unpack how that’s supposed to work. Back in 2016, John Zimmer, co-founder of Lyft, said millennials don’t value car ownership like their parents did and the upcoming autonomous revolution will obliterate the need to have one in an urban environment — ultimately reducing congestion.

However, there are some problems with that statement. First, the need for a personal vehicle is already less important in an city with reliable public transportation. Second, most millennials are less prone to car ownership, as they typically make less money than their parents did at the same age and are more likely to live in cities. And, lastly, autonomous cars and ride-sharing absolutely do not guarantee reduced congestion or a better experience.

If you are driving somewhere in the city in your own vehicle, it’s an A-to-B journey before you temporarily clog up an area hunting for parking. Meanwhile, any vehicle you can hail for a ride spends much of its time looking for a passenger. While outfits like Uber are typically more efficient than traditional taxis, they both spend a significant amount of time milling about on the street as they wait for a fare.

A study from December attributed large increases in the number of taxis and ride-sharing vehicles to the slowing of traffic in Manhattan. It recommended policies to prevent further increases in “the number of vacant vehicles occupied only by drivers waiting for their next trip request” and suggested implementing fees to make the services less attractive to common folk, thus creating revenue for public transit. While the solution is not without problems, the study itself clearly identifies there is an issue here to be solved.

According to Christo Wilson, a professor at Boston’s Northeastern University, the impact on traffic is becoming progressively more evident. “The emerging consensus is that ride-sharing [is] increasing congestion,” she told the Associated Press after examining Uber’s practice of surge pricing during heavy volume.

One of the university’s studies on the matter surveyed 944 Boston-based ride-hailing users over four weeks in late 2017. Nearly 60 percent said they would have used public transportation, walked, biked or skipped the trip entirely if the ride-hailing apps were not available. “Ride sharing is pulling from and not complementing public transportation,” Wilson said.

However, like Lyft, Uber founder Travis Kalanick suggested in 2015 that his company would alleviate Boston of its traffic problem within five years.

A similar survey in San Francisco, from June, found that ride-hailing drivers make more than 170,000 vehicle trips on a normal weekday. That’s roughly 12 times the number of trips cabs make, and most of them are concentrated in the densest and most congested parts of the city.

Lyft spokesman Adrian Durbin responded to the matter by stating, “Lyft is focused on making personal car ownership optional by getting more people to share a ride, helping to reduce car ownership, and partnering with public transportation.”

Uber has adopted a similar strategy by offering carpooling options like Uber Pool. “Uber’s long-term goal is to end the reliance on personal vehicles and allow a mix of public transportation and services like Uber,” spokeswoman Alix Anfang explained.

However, neither of these services guarantee a secondary party will ever be picked up, and are often priced more competitively than their single-fare alternatives. That makes them more appetizing to users who’d rather not take public transit.

“This could be good for congestion if it causes vehicle occupancy rates to go up, but on the other hand, the Uber Pool rides and I guess these Express rides are really, really cheap, just a couple of dollars, so they’re almost certainly going to be pulling people away from public transport options,” Wilson said. “Why get on a bus with 50 people when you can get into a car and maybe if you’re lucky, you’ll be the only person in it?”

http://www.thetruthaboutcars.com/2018/02/ride-sharing-actually-congests/?utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=TheTruthAboutCars.com_new-content-unsold&utm_source=TheTruthAboutCars.com20180227

HOS rules not optional

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Article thanks to David Heller and fleetowner.com. Links provided:

Drivers will be faced with penalties that make compliance absolute

Feb, 2018  We have all heard the myth that stop signs with white borders are optional. That one always got a laugh, but it concerned me a bit when I sat down to write this column, so I researched the tall tale on Google. This was clearly not the first time that this particular subject was searched for on the Internet. 

Seriously, are folks that gullible, or are they just looking for a way around a particular rule?  I have read the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Regulations cover to cover and could not find a sentence proclaiming that the rules governing the operation of a commercial motor vehicle are optional. 

While my sarcastic demeanor is evident when it comes to this particular subject, I can say that there have been some interesting reactions from our driving community in response to the compliance date of ELD technology. Heralded by its detractors as bringing possible anarchy to our highways, the December 18 compliance date inevitably came and went with little to no disruption to the normal workday.

Hardly a trade secret, these baseless negative opinions were noted, but the general shock and disdain for these devices trumped the reality that ELDs do not represent a problem, the rule is not optional, and its compliance with the federal Hours of Service regulations should never be viewed as a hindrance. 

We have seen all of the quotes from drivers popping up on social media and in the comment threads of our favorite industry publications regarding the implementation date. “The 14-hour clock adds pressure to continue driving.” “Where I was is nobody’s business but my own.” How about this oldie but goodie, “ELDs place pressure on a driver because he is now on a clock.” And my particular favorite, “Privacy and time constraints with ELDs hurt my bottom line.”

So, during the past 10 years, these drivers have either not paid attention to what an ELD is or truly have a problem with the Hours of Service regulations. 

My point is that we, as an industry, cannot advocate for more sensible rules when many are publicly declaring that the rules in question are optional to them. And we, as an industry, can all agree that the 14-hour clock does add pressure to continue driving. Time constraints can be a financial burden, and the previous statements about ELDs are inherently true whether there is a device present or not.

In fact, many of us, including me, have argued about the burden the 14-hour clock places on our industry because of its inability to stop when started—a true obstacle when trying to be efficient with both productivity and safety. The problem with making this argument previously was the lack of proven, accurate data that supported our arguments. We made blanket statements because many drivers camouflaged logs that hid detention time and an inflexible 14-hour duty clock to the point that many viewed our reasoning as baseless. ELDs are going to bring these issues to the forefront of our ongoing conversations about hours of service and the changes that need to happen.

Now, December 18 is no longer the date in question, and the April 1 out-of-service enforcement date looms on the horizon. Shortly after that, drivers will be faced with penalties that make compliance with HOS regulations absolute. Compliant drivers not only create a level playing field but will also tell a story. Yes, an inflexible 14-hour window lacks the real-world opportunity to accurately portray a day in the life of a driver.

Drivers today face an abundantly broad range of issues that consistently delay their schedules or place them in an environment that could potentially interrupt what we would call a relatively productive day.  That being said, the presence of ELDs will now highlight these issues and provide our industry with the opportunity to tell our story, which is supported by ample data.

This new influx of data can help the industry and agencies make meaningful changes to fix an hours-of-service problem that has plagued our industry for years.  With hard dates to adhere to and a chance to accurately comply with a rule that can no longer be viewed as optional by some, we can finally make sleeper berth flexibility a reality rather than a pipe dream. 

Man accused of holding trailer, oilfield equipment for ransom

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Article thanks to Jamie Kelly and the willistonherald.com. Links provided:

Feb. 20, 2018  A truck driver is accused of trying to get thousands of dollars in ransom in exchange for delivering a trailer he’d been hired to transport.

An arrest warrant filed Tuesday in Northwest District Court charged Michael Fisher, 39, with class A felony theft, saying he refused to return a trailer worth $75,000 until he was paid $2,000.

Fisher, who is the owner and operator of Great American Transport, was hired by R&R Oilfield Services to move a flatbed trailer loaded with oilfield equipment from Arnegard to Monohan, Texas, according to an affidavit of probable cause. He picked up the trailer Dec. 26, and the next day called the company that had hired him to say the trailer had broken down in Bismarck and was in for repairs.

On Dec. 29, he called the company again and said he’d paid more than $1,900 for the repairs and asked to be reimbursed, charging documents state. Police say the garage Fisher said he had the work done at doesn’t exist in Bismarck, and that Fisher was actually at a different garage in Bismarck having work done on his truck, rather than the trailer.

Later on Dec. 29, Fisher demanded more than $4,000 for storage, fuel and mileage, according to court records. He changed the price several times, asking for $2,000 and then $3,000.

On Jan. 2, an employee from R&R Oilfield Services asked Fisher to tell him where the trailer was so someone from the company could pick it up, an investigator wrote in the affidavit of probable cause. Fisher said it was in Grand Junction, Colorado, but wouldn’t give an exact location without being paid.

Police say they pulled the GPS tracking on Fisher’s truck and that he never went to Colorado.

Fisher called twice more to try and get money in exchange for telling where the trailer was being kept, according to court documents, and on Jan. 31 he told the company the trailer was in Minot. The Ward County Sheriff’s Office recovered the trailer where Fisher said it would be.

If convicted, Fisher could be sentenced to up to 20 years in prison. No hearing has been set in the case and as of Tuesday afternoon, Fisher had not been arrested.

http://www.willistonherald.com/news/man-accused-of-holding-trailer-oilfield-equipment-for-ransom/article_3e9bd2ee-1696-11e8-8201-7f2017038aca.html

Drivers Skeptical of Adaptive Cruise Control, Lane Keeping Systems: IIHS

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Article thanks to automotive-fleet.com. Links provided:

Feb. 15, 2018  Drivers who participated in an Insurance Institute of Highway Safety (IIHS) study said they are somewhat cautious about adaptive cruise control and active lane keeping features and prefer systems they believe make smooth, gradual movements.

Overall, drivers in the study said they would be reluctant to use the features in challenging driving conditions such as stop-and-go traffic and on local roads, but were comfortable using them in light traffic and on interstates.

The findings came in an IIHS analysis of 51 co-workers test drives to assess drivers reactions to these two semi-autonomous vehicle features.

The IIHS and HLDI employees who participated in the study drove one of five vehicles —  a 2017 Audi A4, 2017 Audi Q7, 2016 Honda Civic, 2016 Infiniti QX60 and 2016 Toyota Prius — equipped with adaptive cruise control. With the feature, the vehicle maintains a set speed and a set following distance from the vehicle in front of it. Three of the vehicles — the two Audis and the Civic — were also equiped with active lane keeping, which provides sustained steering input to keep the vehicle within its lane.

The drivers used the vehicles — with the technology continually activated — for periods ranging from one day to three weeks.

While the drivers viewed adaptive cruise control and active lane keeping somewhat positively overall — the kind of systems installed in the vehicles made a difference in their perceptions of the technology.

For example, drivers of the Audi A4 and Q7 viewed the adaptive cruise control more positively than the active lane keeping feature. The reverse was true for the Honda Civic where the active lane keeping earned higher accolades than the adaptive cruise control.

In addition, the drivers favored active lane keeping that they believed made infrequent steering corrections. They also preferred adaptive cruise control systems that they felt made smooth, gradual changes and consistently detected moving vehicles ahead.

http://www.automotive-fleet.com/news/story/2018/02/drivers-cautious-of-adaptive-cruise-control-lane-keeping-systems.aspx?utm_source=email&utm_medium=enewsletter&utm_campaign=20180220-NL-AF-FleetSafety-BOBCD180214002&omdt=NL-AF-FleetSafety&omid=1000129208

5 U.S. Cities Rank Among World’s Most Traffic-Congested Areas

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Article thanks to truckinginfo.com. Links provided:

Feb, 2018  For the sixth consecutive year, Los Angeles topped the list of the world’s most gridlocked cities, with drivers spending 102 hours in congestion in 2017 during peak time periods, according to the annual INRIX Global Traffic Scorecard.

The U.S. accounted for five of the Top 10 cities worldwide with the worst traffic congestion. In addition to Los Angeles, New York City tied with Moscow for second place with 91 hours in congestion, San Francisco (79 hours) ranked fifth, Atlanta (70 hours) ranked eighth, and Miami (64 hours) ranked tenth.

INRIX analyzed 1,360 cities across 38 countries. Based on the findings, the U.S. ranked as the most congested developed country in the world, with drivers spending an average of 41 hours a year in traffic during peak hours. The report concludes that congestion costs drivers nearly $305 billion in 2017, an average of $1,445 per driver.

While the economic impact is one issue, gridlock can also have a major impact on road safety. Experts have long known that frayed nerves from sitting in hours of congestion can lead to aggressive behavior.

A study published in 2016 by the AAA Foundation for Traffic Safety found that 78% of U.S. drivers reported having engaged in at least one aggressive driving behavior during the past year. The most common behaviors included: Intentionally tailgating another vehicle (50.8%); yelling at another driver (46.6%); and honking the horn “to show annoyance or anger” (44.5%). The study suggests that underlying issues in the driving environment, such as congestion, can contribute to aggressive driving.

However, the new data from INRIX implies that traffic congestion across the country is unlikely to clear up anytime soon. Additional noteworthy facts from the report include:

New York’s Cross Bronx Expressway topped the list as the U.S.’s worst corridor for the third year in a row, with the average driver wasting 118 hours per year

Commuters within Boston and San Francisco had the highest U.S. congestion rates on arterial and city streets during the peak commute hours (23 percent)

The worst downtown slowdowns were in El Paso, Texas, where speeds dropped from 43 mph at free flow speeds to 5 mph when congested

New York businesses suffered the most from congestion with an average of 14 percent of travel time on weekdays in gridlock and where drivers wasted the most daytime hours stuck in traffic in the entire U.S.

Santa Cruz, Calif., had the worst overall daytime congestion on arterial and highways, with drivers spending 12 percent of their days sitting in traffic. 

Read the full report here.

http://www.truckinginfo.com/news/story/2018/02/five-u-s-cities-rank-among-world-s-worst-traffic

Vigilance lost…and patience too: Needless accidents stacking up

Article thanks to TomQuimby and hardworkingtrucks.com. Links provided:

Jan 30, 2018  Some Good Samaritans in Colorado nearly paid an unthinkable price this week while trying to save the life of a truck driver.

This heart- and gut-wrenching scene serves as yet another prime reminder to drive carefully because a split-second is all it takes for a bad decision to turn deadly.

Boulder residents Jeff and Krysten Fogg and been driving Monday with their two-year-old son on U.S. 36 in Boulder County when a tractor-trailer ahead of them suddenly slowed down and began to roll in reverse.

The truck, which had been towing a dry freight trailer, kept backing down the highway until it jackknifed onto the side of the road. Jeff Fogg and another motorist went to see if they could help the trucker, while Jeff’s wife stayed behind in their SUV to call 911.

A dispatcher instructed Krysten Fogg to first make sure the hazard lights were on in their SUV and then asked her to go check on the driver. As she walked towards the truck, the unthinkable happened: a pickup traveling at around 60 mph crashed into an oncoming ambulance and then collided into the Fogg’s SUV sending it and their two-year-old son inside about 30 feet from where it had been parked.

“I was screaming. I was like my baby is in that car, my baby is in that car, and my husband took off running,” Krysten Fogg told Fox 31 Denver.

Thankfully, Hudson was still buckled safely in his car seat and appeared to be unharmed. Jeff Fogg said his son was more concerned about the glass in his Pringles chips.

No details have been released on the trucker who unfortunately died of an unknown medical cause.

The Foggs, obviously still shaken up by the day’s events, are hoping that motorists will drive more carefully. We are too.

“People just don’t pay attention as much anymore,” Jeff Fogg said. “They’re on their phones or doing whatever and I don’t know if this man was on his phone, but there were lights and sirens on both side of the road and he decides to fly through them. Man, just slow down. Being late is not a big deal.”

The Fogg’s story recalls a harrowing accident on Detroit highway last week when a tow-truck driver was shown on video nearly getting hit by a speeding car whose driver had apparently been oblivious to him and the Michigan state trooper parked nearby.

Amazingly, the tow-truck driver was not hurt. Too many others have not been so fortunate.

The sad part here is that all of these incidents were completely avoidable if the drivers had been more concerned about driving safely versus doing God knows what else, whether that’s texting while driving, looking for a dropped cell phone or getting impatient with traffic. On that note, take a look at the video below and watch as a pickup driver in Florida, tired of waiting for a train, darts across the tracks and avoids getting nailed by just a second or two. Really?!

Jeri West, who had given her husband Geoff a dashcam for Christmas never thought that they’d record such lunacy. Sorry to say, but that camera will probably be capturing a lot more reckless driving in the days ahead among the dumb and the senseless.

https://www.hardworkingtrucks.com/vigilance-lost-and-patience-too-needless-accidents-stacking-up/?utm_source=hwt&utm_medium=email&utm_content=02-05-2018&utm_campaign=Hard%20Working%20Trucks&ust_id=ac3913ef69635b68afde05f06de0a439

A weak used truck market is weighing on Ryder's performance

Article thanks to freightwaves.com. Links provided:

Feb 22, 2018  It may be a strong trucking market by all accounts, but it isn’t a strong market for the sale of used trucks. On Thursday, Ryder chairman and CEO Robert Sanchez addressed that issue at a Miami conference, and so did the transport analysis group of Stifel Financial.

Sanchez, speaking at the Citi 2018 Industrials Conference in Miami, said a 2 ½ year decline in used truck pricing appears to have leveled off. That decline has weighed on the Ryder’s earnings, significant enough that Stifel led its section on used truck sales with the rhetorical question: “Used trucks--when's the pain gonna stop?”

“There’s an oversupply of used trucks, and there aren’t enough buyers,” Sanchez said at the Citi conference.  But he said by the fourth quarter of 2017, prices had stopped sliding. As to whether there was an upturn, Sanchez said Ryder’s expectations are that prices “won’t pick up yet. We just have not seen it and we didn’t want to forecast it.” Sanchez said the company needs to sell between 15,000 and 20,000 trucks annually.

Later in the presentation, Sanchez expressed some confidence that the cycle on used truck sales would turn. “If it follows a normal used truck cycle, it would tell you that what you have is upside,” Sanchez said. “It came down for 2 ½ years, it’s now flattened out and it should go back up, if that’s the history.”

But as Sanchez noted, that’s not in Ryder’s forecast. In its projections for 2018, Ryder, after talking about positive growth projections, states: “These benefits are expected to be partially offset by impacts from the extended downturn in the used vehicle market.”

The Stifel report showed an aerial shot of a lot of used trucks in Iowa. The smallest quantity of vehicles could be seen in 2014, a significantly larger number of trucks in 2016, and a smaller number in 2017 though clearly more than the ’14 vehicle count. The report cited the ELD mandate as a reason why reversing the market may be difficult. The mandate “disproportionately (is) pressuring small fleet operators (the main buyer for used tractors). It is unlikely the used market will get significantly better soon.”

Independent research analyst CFRA said recently of the used truck market, “Although Ryder saw strong operating revenues amid good demand, continued weakness in used vehicle values hurt results somewhat.”

Will ELD enforcement weaken the market further?

Sanchez did not address the Stifel report specifically, but said in his remarks that he believes the ELD mandate is already “baked in” to the used truck market. If the ELD mandate was going to push an owner/operator out of the trucking market, it would have occurred already, and “I don’t see them coming in in April and getting out,” a reference to when the ELD mandate is to be more stringently enforced.

On a separate issue, Sanchez said his estimate is that driver wages are up 3-4% in the last year, a number that drew some skepticism from his questioner, who asked Sanchez whether such a number, seen as less than what other companies are reporting, could be a result of the fact that Ryder drivers are home most evenings. “That’s the key,” he said. “Our deliveries are typically closed-loop, the drivers come home every night. So the more experienced drivers seek those routes that have them coming back to the same place.”

The driver shortage has helped Ryder’s Dedicated Transportation Solutions division, Sanchez said, discussing Ryder’s sector that essentially takes over a client’s transportation requirements. Two to three years ago, that division had an 8-9 percent growth rate, with Sanchez attributing it to a serious driver shortage. In late 2016-2017, Sanchez said the driver shortage subsided, “and growth dropped a bit.” But the pipeline of new activity into 2018 is strong enough in that division, spurred by renewed driver tightness, to have Ryder project a growth rate in fleet size of 9% for the year, with 6 percentage points coming from its rental sector.

Stifel asks: where have the margins gone?

Beyond the discussion of used truck sales, the Stifel report was critical of Ryder’s margins in its Fleet Managements Solution division, which includes the vehicle rental and leasing activities. In a chart showing the margins of the FMS group, Stifel asked: “Where have FMS margins gone? Assuming 2014-2015 was boosted by strong used truck pricing, normal EBT margins have not approached 2004-2008 since. Is it the lower-return world leading to lower required returns, or is something else wrong?” Elsewhere, Stifel noted, “the company is indicating that we'll see single-digit margins for the third straight year (disappointing).”

Still, although Stifel lowered its EPS estimate on Ryder for 2018 to $5.52 from $6.32 (with a minor 1-cent decline in its 2019 estimate to $6.57), it kept a Hold rating on Ryder’s stock.

https://www.freightwaves.com/news/ryder-used-trucks?utm_source=FreightWaves+Daily+Newsletter+Subscribers&utm_campaign=ce1d407c17-EMAIL_CAMPAIGN_2018_02_23&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_6b16748ce6-ce1d407c17-96725731