Challenging Driving Scenarios

Dear Truckers, I am a student and am working on a research program in truck driver assistant systems. Can you please advise following questions?

1. what are the most challenging scenarios for truck driving in the dark night and harsh weather? 2. Do you think the drowsy/distracted driver detection systems infringement your privacy?

Your feedback is highly appreciated. Best.

2. Do you think the drowsy/distracted driver detection systems infringement your privacy?

What is this system?

I think they are referring a driver facing camera.

what are the most challenging scenarios for truck driving in the dark night and harsh weather?

The biggest issue I have is headlights of other vehicles that are excessively bright. That could be using aftermarket lights (especially light bars), out of alignment, or just running with their brights on regardless of traffic. Harsh weather people driving without lights and the lines on the road being more difficult to see in some states.

Do you think the drowsy/distracted driver detection systems infringement your privacy?

The only drowsy / distracted system I can think of our trucks having is lane departure warning. It does not infringe on my privacy. I like being able to disable it in construction zones where it would otherwise pick up old lines. I also feel it's TOO easy to turn off though with the amount of traffic on the road that drives distracted.

1. While driving in winter weather is a challenge, it's much more difficult when the other motorists on the road aren't used to driving in ice and snow. While road conditions are worse in Wyoming in winter it's easier to drive there than in Mexico's Gay District where the other motorists aren't used to it. They are far more likely to make bad choices and either hit you or lose control as they pass the truck causing you to hit them. The impatience, lack of concern for or consideration of others and infinite sense of entitlement their residents are famous for compounds the problem.

2. Some drivers will put up with driver facing cameras, I won't. Employers are picky about hiring - wanting drivers with years of experience driving a CMV with no tickets/accidents or incidents then when they find one instead of valuing that driver's judgement and history of making good choices behind the wheel they treat them like a trainee who just got their driver's license and can't be trusted. In the same way Mr. Hand thought EVERYONE was on drugs they think ALL DRIVERS use their cell phones while driving. Doesn't matter if you keep your phone stored in a locked bag or use a flip phone or don't have a phone the MUST watch you 24/7 to make sure you're not using your phone. They'll swear it's only a minor inconvenience and necessary for safety but insist it's out of the question if you ask to install cameras in their office and bedroom. Funny how that works.

Ahhh the double speak from 1984. "Driver assistance systems" another tool created not to help drivers, but rather help carriers save money.

In essence, they are used to dodge the major systemic issue with drivers...a lack of training and driver development.

I, like the majority of drivers, will not choose to work for a carrier that has driver facing cameras. For many reasons, one of them being that it is rooted in group think and collectivism where everyone watches and is interconnected with their peers. A group or hive mentality prevalent with millennials and zoomers is also the antithesis of our nation.

If you really want to assist drivers, look into a nationalized uniform curriculum of teaching and training that eliminates personality issues. Develop milestones and a trade-based apprenticeship, journeyman, and master level of development and pay for drivers, and you'll fix the system.

Of course if drivers were paid to scale, consumer goods would cost ten times as much as they do, the carriers would have to charge appropriately to cover the skilled labor costs and so on and so forth.

PFG has driver facing cameras and although I was hesitant about it at first the job was just too good to pass up, it had everything I was looking for.

People make them sound worse than they are, at least imho. Nobody is sitting watching a live stream of you driving… even if your doing something you shouldn’t be you get a warning beep before it actually sends in a video clip for review. I’ve only set mine off a couple times, if you keep your eyes where they should be then it’s like it’s not even there 👍🏻

Playing devil's advocate here, can you really blame a company for thinking driver facing cameras are a good idea? Drivers have proven over they years that they can't be trusted. Seriously, how many times have you passed a driver holding a cell phone-it blows my mind. Talking about companies wanting experienced drivers, we had to fire a 30 year driver last year for a cell phone ticket-if a company can't trust him, what makes you think they'd trust any one else? I say make driver facing cameras mandatory, we can't seem to police ourselves, so maybe someone else should.

Playing devil's advocate here, can you really blame a company for thinking driver facing cameras are a good idea? Drivers have proven over they years that they can't be trusted. Seriously, how many times have you passed a driver holding a cell phone-it blows my mind. Talking about companies wanting experienced drivers, we had to fire a 30 year driver last year for a cell phone ticket-if a company can't trust him, what makes you think they'd trust any one else? I say make driver facing cameras mandatory, we can't seem to police ourselves, so maybe someone else should.

Yes, you make a valid argument. Cell phone usage is not the worst offense. I sometimes see a driver with a tablet propped up on the dash with a video or movie playing.

Driver facing cameras? I look at it that if I am not doing anything wrong, why should I worry?

Insurance companies and lawyers get bashed all the time. But the liability issue has actually made driving safer as companies implement practices to keep things as safe as possible. Are the requirements irritating at times? Yes they can be, but I appreciate anything that can make me a safer driver.

To chime in on the rabbit hole we’re going down about driver facing cameras…

I HATE driver facing cameras…but I have a different perspective on them at this point and have wondered if we should get them at my job.

I work for a small/medium size company with around 200 or so drivers and I am one of two lead drivers on a fleet/crew of about 15 drivers. I have personally road tested and/or trained the majority of the drivers on this fleet and have been here longer than all but one of them so I’m fairly well acquainted with most of them.

That said, being in a position where I have more awareness of the other drivers and their driving habits, I’m absolutely appalled by some drivers’ cell phone use. The company obviously does not condone it and safety has really started cracking down on it lately but it amazes me just how many of the drivers are more concerned with getting caught than they are with actually curbing their behavior.

The reason I’ve wondered if we should get driver facing cameras is the EXTENT to which I’ve personally seen or heard of drivers using their phones while driving. We had to let two drivers go recently for other reasons but both of them were the worst I’ve ever seen. One was actually a lead as well and would watch YouTube/TikTok/news while driving—mind you, we are local drivers driving in and around Denver all day so lots of cars around. I know this because (1) he did it right in front of multiple trainees and (2) he admitted it to me himself. He didn’t even see it as a problem and said he was one of the safest drivers on our fleet because he didn’t speed—I’m not making this up. He was recently fired for an at fault accident on the freeway. He insists he wasn’t on his phone at the time but there isn’t a single person I know that believes that.

The other driver we recently let go was just as bad. I rode with him one time because my truck was being repaired and his performance was lacking so my boss had me ride with him for a day to see if he needed any retraining. While he was driving he took a call and held the phone to his ear for around 20 minutes or so and barely checked his passenger side mirror the whole time (and he was speeding). And after that he kept texting and driving, like…a lot. I wasn’t a lead driver at this point but I did call him out for it regardless because I believe that’s our responsibility as professionals. He stopped doing it but still made sure to let me know he’d been driving for 10 years and never had any accidents or tickets.

There have been other drivers that asked me before coming on here or soon after being hired about our cell phone policy. Of course I tell them our policy is the same as the law—the company doesn’t care if you talk all day on the phone as long as you aren’t distracted and don’t break the law (holding the phone, reading/texting, watching movies, etc). Their next question and the more concerning one is when they ask how strict the company is and if they’re watching. I tell them the company is strict and so am I.

I understand know one including myself is perfect but there is a huge difference between “not perfect” and watching movies and texting while driving 75 mph in a loaded rig in traffic. It’s absolutely terrifying. I’ve asked safety what we’re doing to curb the cell phone use and they are able to gather some incriminating videos from the dash cams sometimes but unfortunately there just isn’t a helluva lot else they can do without driver facing cameras. I do think and hope that my bringing it up with my crew helps, and as far as I know the rest of the drivers are pretty good about it. But unfortunately most drivers don’t tend to do what they’re supposed to when no one is watching. Don’t even get me started on pretrips…

Again, personally, yeah I hate the inward facing cameras and I don’t want them but at the same time what other solution will adequately address the issues at hand?