Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration April 23, 2007 – Federal Register Recent Federal Regulation Documents

The FMCSA announces its decision to grant Volvo Trucks North America, Inc.'s (Volvo) application for an exemption for three of its drivers to enable them to test-drive commercial motor vehicles (CMVs) in the United States without a commercial driver's license (CDL) issued by one of the States. Volvo had requested that the exemption cover three Swedish engineers and technicians who will test drive CMVs for Volvo within the U.S. They stated the exemption is needed to support a Volvo field test to meet future air quality standards, and to test- drive Volvo prototype vehicles to verify results in ``real world'' environments. Each of these drivers holds a valid CDL issued in Sweden, but lacks the U.S. residency necessary to obtain a CDL issued by one of the States in the U.S. The FMCSA believes the knowledge and skills testing and training program that drivers must undergo to obtain a Swedish CDL ensures that these drivers will achieve a level of safety that is equivalent to, or greater than, the level of safety achieved without the exemption.

The FMCSA invites public comment on its intent to request approval from the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) to revise two (2) information collections (ICs) entitled, ``Motor Carrier Safety Assistance Program'' (2126-0010) and ``Transportation of Household Goods; Consumer Protection'' (2126-0025). These revised ICs are necessary to ensure that motor carriers and the States comply with changes made by various provisions of the Safe Accountable, Flexible, Efficient Transportation Equity Act: A Legacy for Users (SAFETEA-LU), that will be implemented in a separate final rule. On November 20, 2006, the agency published a Federal Register notice with a 60-day comment period to solicit the public's views on three information collections. The agency received one comment, which contained no substantive remarks pertaining to any of the information collections, and consequently was not incorporated into our supporting statement. We are required to publish this notice in the Federal Register by the Paperwork Reduction Act of 1995 and implementing regulations.