Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration November 20, 2024 – Federal Register Recent Federal Regulation Documents

FMCSA announces its final decision to grant an exemption renewal requested by Groendyke Transport, Inc. (Groendyke) to allow the use of an amber brake-activated pulsating lamp on the rear of its trailers in addition to the steady-burning brake lamps required by the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Regulations (FMCSR). FMCSA concludes that renewing the exemption, subject to the terms and conditions set forth below, is likely to achieve a level of safety equivalent to or greater than the level of safety that would be achieved absent the exemption.

FMCSA proposes amendments to its property broker rules in response to petitions for rulemaking from the Owner-Operator Independent Drivers Association (OOIDA) and the Small Business in Transportation Coalition (SBTC). Under current regulations, the parties to a brokered freight transaction have a right to review the broker's record of the transaction, which stakeholders often refer to as "broker transparency." Contracts between brokers and motor carriers frequently contain waivers of this right. OOIDA requested that FMCSA promulgate a requirement that property brokers provide an electronic copy of each transaction record automatically within 48 hours after the contractual service has been completed, and explicitly prohibit brokers from including any provision in their contracts that requires a motor carrier to waive its rights to access the transaction records. SBTC requested that FMCSA prohibit brokers of property from coercing or requiring parties to brokers' transactions to waive their right to review the record of the transaction as a condition for doing business and prohibit the use of clause(s) exempting the broker from having to comply with this transparency requirement. Though the proposed rule is responsive to the petitions in reinforcing the broker transparency requirement, the proposed provisions differ from those requested by OOIDA and SBTC. The proposed rule would revise the regulatory text to make clear that brokers have a regulatory obligation to provide transaction records to the transacting parties on request. The proposal would also make changes to the format and content of the records.