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Show I j l;riiF'fj)gtTBjtl businesses should not inspect O ozz;n trucks The practice of allowing trucking firms to conduct their own safety inspections on vehicles needs a second look. A recent study conducted by the Salt Lake Police Department showed an astonishing number of trucks on city streets are unsafe. un-safe. Four random surveys, conducted con-ducted at several locations and different times in Salt Lake, showed that nearly one-third of all trucks observed by the officers offi-cers had possible safety violations. viola-tions. During these surveys the trucks were not actually stopped, but officers noticed safety hazards which would have given them probable cause to stop the vehicles. And according to another survey, where trucks were actually actu-ally inspected, they would have been right. During a recent off-road off-road inspection by Salt Lake City Police Department inspectors inspec-tors at random locations, a total of 76 inspections netted 32 vehicles, 43 percent which had safety violations so severe they were placed out of service. There was a total of 454 accu- j r mulated violations on those 76 vehicles. The study showed there is an increase of commercial carriers traveling through cities, "but also an impressive amount of traffic accidents associated with commercial carriers in the city limits." The challenge for the cities is how to find unsafe vehicles and r i r r r get them off the road. Chances are, if the trucks are traveling the interstate, they will be caught if they are unsafe. Utah Highway Patrol conducts random inspections on 1-15 as does the Utah Department of Transportation. But what about the trucks that stay off the interstate in-terstate and travel on city streets and through neighborhoods? One driver, after being stopped by the police on a routine inspection, said he was coming from Davis County and he was traveling through city limits because, "If I drive on the freeway, the highway patrol will get me,...but, if I stay on the city streets, nobody stops me... everybody knows that.' We need to change what everybody knows. Every trucker should know they will be stopped on city streets for violations viola-tions as quickly as they will be stopped on the freeway. Local police must demand funds to conduct inspections. If that can't be done, the state should require truckers to comply to state inspection in-spection regulations. |
