Sweeping the Freeways for Unsafe Truckers

No sooner had California Highway Patrol Officer Stuart Hertel merged onto the Long Beach Freeway than big riggers began barking a terse warning over their CB radios: “DOT bear southbound at 3rd Street.”

“They’re talking about me: an officer with authority to enforce U.S. Department of Transportation laws,” chuckled Hertel, who has been policing commercial traffic since 1993. “But truth is, there’s so many of them, and so few of us, the odds are in their favor.”

Still, at the start of a statewide crackdown on commercial trucks this month, Hertel was only one of hundreds of CHP officers eyeballing everything on wheels. Their quarry were truckers and motorists who refused to share the road safely.

Hertel’s assignment was the 43-year-old Long Beach Freeway, which is often packed with traffic from the ports of Los Angeles and Long Beach and plagued by cracked pavement and errant driving.

Big rigs constitute about 13% of the Long Beach Freeway’s traffic. The roadway’s original design anticipated that trucks would make up about 5%.

Long Beach officials regard it as the portal to their city and the most direct route to the shoreline and its attractions, including the Queen Mary and the Aquarium of the Pacific.

But with its noise, traffic congestion, ongoing roadwork and miles of teeth-chattering pavement, it can be a treacherous ride.

The CHP’s statewide enforcement strikes have become weekly events. They were prompted last June by a rash of truck crashes across the state. Collisions in which a truck driver was to blame increased 9.5% between 1999 and 2000. Truck fatalities were up 8.2% during the same period.

“Yet, less than 3% of fatal accidents involving trucks are related to mechanical errors,” said Hertel, citing CHP figures. “About 97% are due to errors committed by truck drivers--like that guy up ahead who’s making an illegal lane change.”

Hertel flipped on his flashing lights and began shepherding the big rig over to the right and to an eventual stop.

The driver, Jose Mendez, 29, proved to be typical of many of the big riggers who ply the Long Beach Freeway. CHP officers refer to them as “short haulers” and they specialize in picking up containers at ocean terminals and then hauling them to railroad yards 20 miles north in Vernon and the city of Commerce.

Typically, they are independent operators earning about $35 for each round trip. Given those minimal wages, short haulers are tempted to make as many trips--and as few mechanical repairs on their trucks--as possible.

Working hard to shave even a few minutes off their trips, they maneuver through trucks and passenger vehicles on a winding freeway that state authorities believe has exceeded its original life expectancy by 23 years.

Like many of those stopped during the crackdown, Mendez argued that he was not to blame.

“A little car put its emergency lights on right in front of me,” he said.

“That’s why we have brakes,” answered Hertel, before handing Mendez a ticket that carried a fine of about $350.

Just half a mile down the road, Hertel pulled over another truck.

“You have no brake lights, but it seems to be because of a bad connection,” he told the driver, who was visibly surprised. “I’m giving you a verbal warning. But I also want you to get off the freeway and fix them before you get back on.”

Back on the freeway, he said, “I have nothing against trucks or their drivers. As long as they are driving in a professional manner, I want them to go home to their family, and I want to go home to mine. That’s the bottom line.”

Up ahead and to the right, he spotted another truck in the stop-and-go rush hour traffic with brake lights that didn’t work.

“If I can’t see your brake lights, I won’t let you go any farther,” Hertel informed the driver, who admitted that he had failed to inspect them before leaving the train yards.

“Well, then, you failed to do your job,” drawled Hertel.

The driver was handed a “fix-it” ticket, which requires repairs be made within 30 days.

Warren Hoemann, vice president of the California Trucking Assn., which represents 2,500 trucking organizations, said his members welcome the crackdowns.

“We love them; they’re making roads safer for everyone,” he said. “Any time there is an accident, no matter who is at fault, the trucking companies pay. They can lose time, their load, the customer, sometimes even the driver.”

Trouble is, it is hard to ensure that even seasoned professional drivers always follow the rules of the road.

Scoping out a big blue rig heading north, Hertel noticed that the driver’s shoulder harness was dangling near the door, unattached.

After pulling the truck over, the driver leaped out of the cab with a fervent explanation: The shoulder strap felt uncomfortable, so he simply flipped it over his head. “But I kept my lap strap on,” he said.

No dice. Hertel handed him a ticket, which carried a fine of less than $30.

A few miles north, just shy of the northbound Santa Ana Freeway connector, a big rig turned on its left turn signal and began moving into a curved lane occupied by two small passenger vehicles. Just as quickly, he pulled back to the right, avoiding a potentially nasty accident by less than a yard.

Hertel stopped the trucker, but let him go with a verbal warning because he could not be sure at what point the passenger vehicles showed up alongside the truck.

As the truck was easing back into traffic, a passenger car rear-ended a big rig about 30 yards away on a freeway offramp.

That accident was handled by CHP Officer Bill Glass, who is scheduled to retire from the force on Dec. 31, after prowling the Long Beach Freeway for 26 years.

“Every quarter-mile along this freeway I can show you where there was an accident and somebody got killed,” he said. “Officers regard it as the bottom of the barrel. It’s too darned dangerous.”