A measure that would increase from $750,000 to $2 million the minimum liability insurance requirement for commercial motor vehicles was approved by the House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee and included in a recent highway funding bill. The amendment was inserted into the INVEST in America Act by Rep. Jesus Garcia, an Illinois Democrat, and cleared the panel June 18. It comes nearly six years after the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration, concerned about increasing jury verdicts, issued an advance notice of proposed rulemaking for a possible increase in the insurance minimum. The proposal was withdrawn in 2017 by the Trump administration, which cited a lack of sufficient data on which to base a decision.

Analysis by the American Transportation Research Institute revealed an increase in large jury verdicts against motor carriers from 2006-19. It showed that over the past five years, there were nearly 300 court cases resulting in jury verdicts over $1 million against trucking fleets. Of 600 cases analyzed by ATRI, only four involved verdicts over $1 million in 2006. However, at their peak in 2013, over 70 cases had verdicts over $1 million. There were 71 cases of the 600 analyzed that were $10 million or higher — ATRI’s definition of a nuclear verdict

American Trucking Associations said truck tonnage fell 9.6% in May compared with May 2019. ATA’s For-Hire Truck Tonnage Index registered a 106.1 last month and a 117.6 in May 2019. It was the biggest year-over-year drop since June 2009, when tonnage declined 10.7% compared to June 2008. But there was some good news. Sequentially, tonnage ticked down just 1% from April to May. That month-to-month drop was a much steeper 10.3% from March to April, showing the economy is slowly recovering from the recession caused by the coronavirus pandemic.

In the absence of a comprehensive policy proposal about autonomous vehicles in Congress, two key senators are pushing to enhance cybersecurity protections. Democratic Sens. Ed Markey of Massachusetts and Richard Blumenthal of Connecticut say that vehicles connected to the internet have the potential to be hacked and controlled remotely. They have sent a letter to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration seeking input about efforts to promote safety across industries, including trucking, that are proceeding with autonomous technologies. The letter says the senators are “deeply troubled” by NHTSA’s “deafening silence” regarding risks of internet-connected cars being hacked

The COVID-19 pandemic has transformed 2020 into a challenging and unprecedented year for the trucking industry, but at least for now, Transport Topics' annual ranking of the largest for-hire carriers in North America remains fairly stable. Today we release the new Top 100 list, along with rankings in 11 sectors, including truckload and LTL. UPS and FedEx remain the dominant players in this space at No. 1 and 2, but check out the rankings in print or online to see how the rest of the top 10 shakes out.

Democrats in the U.S. House of Representatives unveiled a $1.5 trillion plan to rebuild the nation’s infrastructure. The House is scheduled to vote on the plan before the July 4 recess. Speaker Nancy Pelosi said that she hopes bipartisan interest prevails in addressing deficient roads, bridges and other inadequate infrastructure. What still is not known is how those rebuilding efforts would be funded. The Trump administration has privately discussed a $1 trillion measure as a way to stimulate jobs growth in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic. But both sides have balked at committing to a means of funding, including raising the gas tax or other fees.

Zero-emission truck maker Nikola Corp., which recently transitioned to a publicly traded company, has begun building prototypes of its heavy-duty battery-electric model in Germany and is set for groundbreaking on a plant in the United States this summer. Further out, Nikola sees its longhaul models operating autonomously if needed. Nikola will build and sell the battery-electric trucks in Europe, exporting some to the U.S. market, with production scheduled to begin in 2021. Hydrogen fuel cell trucks targeted for the longhaul market will come next, and will be made in Europe and the United States.

Military officials have pulled back a sweeping multibillion-dollar contract intended to address military families’ long-standing problems with delays and damaged goods during their estimated 400,000 annual moves to assignments worldwide. The contract, which could have netted American Roll On Roll Off Carrier Group of Parsippany, N.J., up to $20 billion over nine years, is being re-examined by the U.S. Transportation Command after two competitors protested the award to the Government Accountability Office. Sources said that among the complaints was an allegation that the contract award failed to take into account the past criminal history of ARC’s parent corporation, Wallenius Wilhelmsen Logistics of Oslo, Norway. In July 2017, the U.S. Department of Justice announced that three Wallenius executives were part of a conspiracy dating to 2000 to allocate certain customers and routes, rig bids and fix prices for the sale of international ocean shipments of cargo to and from the United States.

U.S. retail sales of medium-duty trucks fell in May, landing below 15,000, a drop of more than 33% compared to last May. Sales of Classes 4-7 trucks in the month dropped to 14,809 compared to more than 22,000 in the 2019 period. Year-to-date, sales were 81,766, down 18.6% compared to more than 100,000 a year earlier.

Transportation Intermediaries Association President and CEO Robert Voltmann will step down from his post later this year, the third-party logistics association announced. Voltmann said while the decision to leave was difficult, he believes he has accomplished everything he was hired to do. He will end his 23-year run at the end of September. TIA said that under Voltmann’s leadership, its membership has more than tripled and that it now represents nearly 80% of the market by value. According to board Chairman Brian Evans, TIA’s annual budget was $721,000 when Voltmann started in 1997, and last year, it was $7.5 million.