Department of Transportation March 16, 2011 – Federal Register Recent Federal Regulation Documents

This notice provides information regarding MARAD's finding that a Buy America waiver, stated in 41 U.S.C. 10b, is appropriate for the purchase of foreign Mobile Harbor Cranes in the Federal-aid/TIGER II grant for the Port of Providence. The waiver for this project involves the purchase and use of specific items that are not produced in the United States and deemed necessary for the construction of the project. MARAD has reached out to industry on the domestic availability of these items. No domestic manufacturers have been located. The Port of Providence's TIGER II project is to expand and upgrade the Port of Providence in Rhode Island. TIGER II dollars in the amount of $10.5 million will help replace two aged diesel cranes, one of which is currently non-functional, with new electric, barge-based cranes that will enable the Port to handle container traffic. Replacing these cranes will allow the port to expand its container short sea shipping operation, help relieve bottlenecks along the I-95 corridor, and support jobs in and around the economically distressed are of Providence. This waiver is being requested because mobile harbor cranes are not produced in the United States. These cranes are considered to be specialized equipment and other types of cranes cannot be adapted to meet the mobility, lift, precision, and efficiency requirements necessary for marine cargo operations at the Port of Providence. MARAD has consulted and coordinated directly with appropriate industry associations and has determined that it has been more than 15 years since cranes of this type were manufactured in the United States. It should also be noted, the purchase of foreign built cranes to complete this, and other port development projects, is only one part of the overall port modernization and expansion effort. All other materials used in the construction of all port construction projects will be produced in the United States, and MARAD has been working with the Manufacturing Extension Partnership, under the National Institute of Standards and Technology, to identify manufacturing opportunities for domestic harbor crane construction and repair.

We propose to adopt a new airworthiness directive (AD) for the products listed above. This proposed AD results from mandatory continuing airworthiness information (MCAI) originated by an aviation authority of another country to identify and correct an unsafe condition on an aviation product. The MCAI describes the unsafe condition as:

In accordance with the Paperwork Reduction Act of 1995, the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration (FMCSA) is making available for public comment a modification of the proposed information collection request (ICR) related to the notice of proposed rulemaking (NPRM) for the National Registry of Certified Medical Examiners (NRCME) published on December 1, 2008. In the comments on the NPRM, a commenter inquired as to what a motor carrier had to do to verify that a medical examiner's certificate had been issued to a commercial motor vehicle driver by a medical examiner listed on the proposed NRCME. In response to this and other comments, FMCSA is considering whether to require employers to verify that the medical examiner is listed and to place a record of such verification in the driver qualification file. This document is to inform the public that a modified ICR that includes this verification requirement under consideration is available for public comment. The other information collection requirements were made available for public comments at the same time as the NPRM. Therefore, comments will only be considered in response to this document with respect to the information collection aspects of the verification requirements under consideration by the Agency. Comments on the other information collection requirements proposed with the NPRM will not be considered.