After being cancelled earlier this year, the pilot program allowing Mexican trucks to carry cargo on U.S. roads may be back on. This is due to a six billion dollar lawsuit aimed at the U.S. government as well as the steep tariffs imposed on U.S. goods as punishment. Industries on both sides of the border have been calling for resolution.

The program was a long delayed response to NAFTA’s call for the creation of a trans-border trucking program to exist by the year 2000 and represents the first step toward compliance. For many, this news raises concern over the safety issues that initially delayed the project.

In 1995, the government responded to concerns that Mexican trucks could not pass U.S. safety checks by restricting them to designated commercial zones within twenty miles of the border. Goods destined for other areas of the U.S. and Canada were required to be transferred to new trucks to continue their journey. The safety issues in question are related to Department of Transportation studies that show forty one percent of Mexican trucks did not pass safety checks in 1998. In comparison, there is a twenty five percent failure rate for U.S. trucks and a seventeen percent failure rate for Canadian trucks. But these failures seem to be primarily related to certification, logbook issues, and English language fluency rather than poor equipment. When a meeting was called earlier this year to address these concerns, the American Trucking Association noted that the pilot program was working fine.

A load board provides a series of services to the trucking community. It is the entrance to an online network of trucking resources, the simplest of which is the posting of loads to ship and trucks needing cargo. This simple and original premise of a place to find carriers and loads, a place to find work, has been expanded over time to include all the tools and technologies necessary for planning and overseeing a successful trip.

The most important service a load board offers is access to information. This information, including ratings for trucking lanes, locations for support services and truck stops, automatic matching for trucks and loads, backhaul planning, accurate mileage reports, weather and road condition reports, and credit information for freight holders among other things, is designed provide as comprehensive a set of tools for trip planning as possible. Load boards are about getting the information together, making it accessible, and providing the tools to use it effectively. One of the most recent additions to load boards is the ability to use their services from a cell phone as well as via the internet. This makes it possible for a trucker to get vital information from a much wider geographic area, without needing to stop and find or pay for wi-fi along the road. Without load boards, a trucker’s world would be a lot smaller.

Transportation companies of all kinds were among the first to feel the effects of economic slowdown. Freight volumes began to be affected as early as 2007 and they have only continued to lower as consumers have reduced their spending further and further. The good news is that economists and other insiders are suggesting that we have finally found the bottom of our economic freefall.

What does this mean for our freight volumes? Well not as much as you might think. All sorts of freight carriers are reporting a slight improvement from last quarter’s extremely weak freight levels. Unfortunately no one is seeing the traditional peak in freight volumes that comes with back to school sales to signal the beginning of a carrier’s busy season. Some companies are predicting that it simply won’t come. Retailer inventories may be so affected by the economy that they are able to restock slowly without triggering the expected spike. This in turn, means that freight volumes may stay low through what is normally a carrier’s busy season. They may be low, but crucially, steady. Though there is little growth predicted as the economy comes out of free fall, cuts are waning, markets are firming, and freight volumes are rising. The transportation industry may not lead the economy out of its depression this time, but its fortunes will continue to rise steadily into the future.

A freight broker is the middleman of the freight shipping industry. He connects the shipper to the carrier, negotiating a percentage-based fee for his services. The key to his usefulness, for both parties, is his knowledge base. A good broker must know his area of the shipping industry, the technologies available to him to move freight, as well as the carriers best equipped to do it. Frequently this knowledge comes from having been a carrier himself at one time or another. By maintaining a large number and variety of contacts, the broker is able to connect a shipper and his specific needs with the right kind of carrier. The shipper moves his freight and the carrier fills his vehicle. Everyone saves time, aggravation, and money. Everyone wins.

Or do they? Because the broker represents his shipping clients in the transaction between shipper and carrier, the interests of carrier and broker can sometimes compete. A broker must protect the customer base that represents its income, but a carrier needs to know that it will be adequately compensated. He needs to know that his interests will be looked after if the is a dispute about payment.

So how to keep from getting burned? The key is communication. A properly structured agreement between broker and carrier will keep all three parties protected and their business relationship flourishing.

Brokers and dispatchers can easily book theirempty trucks and equipment. Freightfinder. com Freightmail. comEquipment is usually booked soon after being posted. Common users include Truck loadbrokers, truckers looking to fill their trucks, fleets, shippers,and other transportation logistics industry your Internet Truck Freight Specialists. No feescharged for posting freight loads or searching loads Free LoadPosting and Free Load Searching. 4 TruckLoads Offers trucking industry resources that cater toOwnerOperators such as load finder services, weather and roadconditions, truckers radio stations, and job boards for truckingjobs. A1 Loads DirectFreight Load Finders LoadsFreightTrucks NetTrans The FreightBoard The NewInternet Truckstop TruckersEdge TRUCKit Webhauler 123Loads RedBookTransportation Brokers Directory.

No feescharged for posting freight loads or searching loads Free LoadPosting and Free Load Searching. 4 TruckLoads Offers trucking industry resources that cater toOwnerOperators such as load finder services, weather and roadconditions, truckers radio stations, and job boards for truckingjobs. A1 Loads DirectFreight Load Finders LoadsFreightTrucks NetTrans The FreightBoard The NewInternet Truckstop TruckersEdge TRUCKit Webhauler 123Loads RedBookTransportation Brokers Directory. Brokers and dispatchers can easily book theirempty trucks and equipment. Freightrelated companies can increase profit by using the internet to findtruck loads nationwide. The internet is also valuable resourcewhen attempting to balance the high of fuel, insurance, anddriver wages.