Trucking Industry News

Heavy trucks used to creep through town, rumbling past shoppers and the well-known L.L. Bean store because big rigs weren't allowed on Interstate 295 a quarter-mile away.

According to an AP report, however, most of the trucks have disappeared, seemingly overnight, with the passage of a new law that allows heavier trucks — weighing 100,000 pounds — to use interstate highways in Maine.

Those 50-ton behemoths no longer have to dodge tourists and shoppers crossing busy Freeport's Main Street since President Barack Obama signed a measure Dec. 16 allowing the heavy trucks on Maine's interstates. A similar one-year pilot program was approved in Vermont, as well.

Category: General

The Ford Transit Connect van claimed the 2010 North American Truck of the Year award at the North American International Auto Show, which kicked off this week in Detroit.

Vehicles that are either completely new or substantially redesigned from the previous model year are eligible for the award. The Transit Connect, which Ford hopes will catch on with commercial buyers, triumphed over the Chevrolet Equinox and Subaru Outback.

It’s small, has an appealing exterior shape and is very, very functional since it was designed as a commercial vehicle for a very practical-minded set of European customers, who had to carry lots of stuff on very narrow city streets.

Category: General