NHTSA Shrugs for 3 Decades
July, 2014
Here’s a little hope offered by NHTSA — 30 years after its corporate captivity accelerated under Ronald Reagan.
“One Ms. Marianne Karth of the Truck Safety Coalition and 11,000 signatories have succeeded where the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety – with all its fancy-pants testing – and the Canadians – with their much tougher standard – had failed, persuading the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration to initiate a rulemaking to upgrade the rear underride standard.
Earlier this month, the agency published a notice in the Federal Register announcing that it would issue two separate notices – an Advance Notice of Proposed Rulemaking on rear impact
guards and other safety strategies for single-unit trucks, and an NPRM on rear impact guards on trailers and semitrailers. Apparently, it was a May 5 meeting between the Coalition and Secretary of Transportation Anthony Foxx that turned the tide. The advocacy group presented their signatures and made the case that amendments to FMVSS No. 223, Rear Impact Guards, and FMVSS No. 224, Rear Impact Protection were long overdue.”
See SRS report at http://www.safetyresearch.net/blog/articles/nhtsa-finally-tackles-rear-underride
Bear in mind that an Advanced Notice of Proposed Rulemaking (ANPRM) has little legal significance more than a Press Release. And an NPRM has often either gone nowhere or was later watered down to be largely ineffective.
Lou
