NASHVILLE, TN. The Canadian Trucking Alliance (CTA) is hoping to speed up the implementation of Canada’s electronic logging device (ELD) mandate, which was officially proposed last December just as the U.S. ELD mandate went into effect.
Speaking here at the Omnitracs Outlook 2018 user conference, Geoffrey Wood, CTA’s senior vice president of policy, said his organization is suggesting that Transport Canada – equivalent to the U.S. Department of Transportation – shorten the implementation time period for the mandate from two years to 12 months, once it reaches the “final rule” stage, which he said the industry hopes will be sometime in June of this year.
“Right now it’s evolving in the right way,” he said during a presentation at the conference. “The goal of this effort is to mirror the U.S. ELD rule, as there are so many trucks going back and forth across the [U.S.-Canada] border. Right now, we don’t see a lot of issues with what’s been put forward. We see no deal breakers in this rule.”
Wood said CTA hopes that if a “final rule” of Canada’s ELD mandate is issued as expected in June of this year, speedier implementation of mandate would allow it to go into effect sometime in the fourth quarter of 2019.
One reason CTA is pushing for a faster implementation timeline is that there has been “no public pushback to the rule” compared to what’s been experienced in the U.S., Wood explained. “That really hasn’t happened to us,” he added.
That being said, CTA would like to see some changes made to Canada’s ELD rule before it becomes final:
- Right now, Canada’s ELD rule, like the U.S. one, is applicable only to commercial vehicles with model year 2000 engines or newer. CTA, however, would like to see that pushed back to the 1995 model year so it would cover an additional 60,000 commercial trucks. Wood added that Canada’s speed limiter rule, established back in 2009, encompasses 1995 model year truck engines or newer.
- The technical standards drafted for Canada’s ELD rule call for the device to be fully functional one minute after a truck’s engine is started. CTA does not believe that time limit is reasonable and would prefer to see three minutes or higher set as the standard.
- It is not explicitly stated in the Canada’s ELD rule that the failure to have a functioning ELD on board a commercial vehicle would result in an out-of-service (OOS) violation. CTA described this as a “clerical error” but an important one that needs to be fixed.
- The language of Canada’s ELD rule requires that drivers using such devices need to “immediately” provide hours of service (HOS) from it when requested to law enforcement personnel. CTA feels the word “immediately” can be misconstrued and would like it removed from the language of the rule.
- The group is also requesting a 30-day waiver from the ELD rule for leased and/or rental vehicles, which is shorter than the 90-day waiver granted in the U.S.
