‘School buses 7 times safer than private cars’

BY MOHAMMAD SHOEB

DOHA: School children transported by buses (driven by “competent commercial drivers”) are seven times safer than in private cars, said a senior road safety expert from the International Road Transport Union (IRU).

“Compared to other developing countries the GCC states, including Qatar, are doing better in terms of student transportation. However, a study conducted in Australia showed that a student travelling by school bus is seven times safer than the one travelling with parents by private car,” said Haydar Ozkan, General Delegate at IRU.

“The use of school buses and public transport system in Qatar will reduce number of vehicles and accidents significantly,” he said.

Ozkan, speaking to The Peninsula on the sidelines of a national seminar on road safety, said that the school buses are safer not only because they are big and stronger, it is largely because they are driven by professional drivers who hold “Certificate of Competence” in addition to commercial driver’s license.

The one-day seminar on “Harnessing Road Safety in Road Transport Professional Operations”, held under the patronage of the Minister of Transport, H E Jassem bin Saif Al Sulaiti, was organized by public transport company, Mowasalat (which was represented by Karwa Driving School), in collaboration with  IRU.

Ozkan highlighted that most motorists are not aware about the behaviour and patterns of heavy vehicle drivers. “Given the size of the trucks and trailers, if the driver intends to take a right turn, he will occupy the extreme left lane of the road. So such kind of things should be taught to other road users, and made part of the curriculum, including driving schools,” he said.

“Over 85 percent of the road accidents occur due to human behaviour, so merely having a driver’s licence is not enough. So there should be a mandatory professional competency test and certification, especially for the commercial drivers, under the ambit of the Ministry of Transport.”

He reiterated that commercial drivers, who are generally believed to be the main cause of the road safety problems in developing countries, can be turned into a source of inspiration for other motorists for good driving. This can be achieved through effective regulation system coupled with especial training provided to commercial drivers.

He suggested that for the commercial drivers to become an example for other motorists, the Ministry of Transport, in collaboration with other concerned authorities, like in developed countries, should take appropriate measures.

“Allowing anybody who only holds a drivers’ licence is not enough, rather there should be a mandatory professional training and competence certification for commercial driving to be provided by the Ministry of Transportation,” he said.

The seminar held panel discussions examining the ways and means of improving road safety in Qatar by understanding the main reasons of accidents. The IRU shared the findings of a comprehensive research and analysis made from 600 real road accidents based on 3,000 questions asked from each of the accidents, in six European countries.

International business a key growth driver for DMI

The Digital Marketing Institute has established reseller partnerships in 18 new markets and doubled its online education business since May of this year.

To cater for increasing student numbers globally the company has also signed a new agreement with Pearson VUE, the world’s largest global computer-based testing (CBT) provider, meaning DMI exams can now be taken in 180 countries worldwide.
Computer-based testing (CBT) allows candidates to book a test on-demand and sit it at a time of their choice at any one of over 5,200 Pearson VUE test centres around the world.
Education partnerships with universities, training companies and digital agencies now span 50 countries, up from 32 in May 2014.
The 18 new education partnerships will result in an additional 8,500 people qualifying with a DMI certification over the next three years in these markets.
This together with the projected 4,000 new students for its online courses solidifies the Irish company’s training as the largest single certification standard in digital marketing, according to founder and director Ian Dodson.
He said: “This year we’ve reached a series of significant milestones leading us to record our best year yet in terms of partner numbers, students and revenue. While the domestic market still presents some great opportunities for us, international business has been a key driver to growth.
“The partnership with Pearson VUE as well as this year’s licence partner wins will expand our reach to all corners of the globe, with many more in the pipeline.”
The 18 new countries/ markets are: Armenia, Australia, Azerbaijan, Denmark, Ecuador, France, Germany, Ghana, Malaysia, Netherlands, Norway, Philippines, Poland, Russia, Singapore, Spain, Sri Lanka and Ukraine.

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Northmor students get lesson in distracted driving

October 20 started the week of Teen Safety Week with JOG students and Youth Safety Council getting the Northmor student body involved.

JOG students drew chalk circles on the sidewalks at school to remind students to wear their safety belts while driving. The chalk circles are called SPOTS, which means, So Put On The Seatbelt. Youth Safety Council sold SPOTS and put the students names on the spots to support wearing seat belts. Sam Neer created a big seat belt for the SPOTS to go around it. The seat belt project is on display in the cafeteria.

On October 22nd, the seniors and juniors had an assembly with Trooper Nelson, showing the video about a student from Northridge who lost her life from distracted driving on October 20th, 2013. It was a very compelling video with parents, siblings, and passengers in the car talking about the accident.

On the same day, in the morning the Grim Reapers Mitchell Whisler and Kameron Smith went around the school tagging people with accident scenarios, and announcements being made at the end of each class period of the tragic accident.

JOG students and the Youth Safety Council will have several projects during the school year to involve the student body. We want to remind students that the biggest cause of teen accidents is distracted driving.

UPS to open driver training center in Portland

UPS (NYSE: UPS) officials said yesterday the shipping company will add one of three new driver training locations in Portland.
The city will host the Integrad center, which looks to provide "experiential training" for those driving UPS trucks. Other locations are opening in Dallas and Phoenix.
UPS already offers the training in suburbs of Chicago and Washington, D.C. The company didn't say whether the move will add jobs in the Portland area.
The Portland site is set to open before the end of the year.

"Experiential" driver training consists of teaching them the trade in a hands-on fashion.

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Schools may never learn of bus-driver arrests

Ohio school districts are supposed to be alerted whenever one of their bus drivers is charged with breaking the law — on the job or away from work.

The statewide system set up to make those notifications, however, doesn’t always function as intended, according to an analysis by WBNS-TV (Channel 10).

A review of the criminal and driving records of bus drivers in nine central Ohio school districts revealed that some charges went unreported for months. In a few cases, districts never found out that their drivers had been charged with offenses that should have triggered immediate suspensions.

Columbus City Schools, for example, never received word from the state that bus driver Kevin Cousar had been charged with assault, aggravated menacing and domestic violence this spring.

Cousar, whom the district had hired in July 2013, tried to pull the rings off his wife’s fingers during an argument and then pointed a gun at her head, according to court documents.

Cousar was arrested on April 27. On Sept. 8, as part of an agreement with prosecutors, Cousar pleaded guilty to aggravated menacing — a conviction that should have made him ineligible to drive a school bus in Ohio. The judge further ordered that Cousar’s guns be destroyed.

District officials said they knew nothing of Cousar’s arrest — or his guilty plea — until they received a media inquiry last week.

“When we became aware of it, through this investigation, we were able to move forward and start our (disciplinary) process,” spokesman Jeff Warner said.

Cousar, 54, resigned on Tuesday.

The Ohio Attorney General’s Office, which oversees the system that, in theory, should have flagged Cousar’s arrest seven months ago.

A spokeswoman for the office said they cannot comment on specifics for any one case, however there were a “few” cases were they were “technical malfunctions.” The office is conducting a review to discover all the reasons.

Some of the other cases reviewed by the TV station, however, point to an apparent weakness in the design of the system, which is known formally as Rapback.

When a district hires a bus driver, it sends the driver’s personal data — including fingerprints — to the Ohio Bureau of Criminal Investigation, which adds the information to a statewide database.

BCI continually compares the fingerprints in that database — Ohio has about 34,000 school-bus drivers — with fingerprints obtained from people arrested across the state. If there’s a match, the agency relays the information to the Ohio Department of Education, which, in turn, notifies the appropriate school district.

The district is responsible for following up with state officials to determine whether the offense with which the driver has been charged would make the driver ineligible for employment upon conviction. The offenses on that list include certain sex crimes, violent crimes, drug offenses, weapons offenses and some traffic violations, including operating a vehicle under the influence of alcohol or drugs.

Under state law, any school-bus driver “arrested, summoned, or indicted” on a charge related to one of those offenses is to be suspended pending the outcome of the criminal case.

The problem is, in some jurisdictions in Ohio, people summoned to court on misdemeanor charges aren’t fingerprinted during their initial appearances.

What’s more, some defendants are able to delay their court appearances for long periods, thereby dodging Rapback at least temporarily — even in jurisdictions that do fingerprint all defendants during their initial court appearances.

Last month, for example, Whitehall City Schools bus driver Christopher Litostansky was charged with assault, child endangering and unlawful restraint after school-bus video showed him hitting a 6-year-old girl with an umbrella handle and tying down an 11-year-old boy with disabilities.

Litostansky, 48, resigned after Columbus media outlets reported on the case, but because of the postponement of his initial court appearance, he has yet to be fingerprinted in connection with the charges, police said.

In an interview, Ohio Attorney General Mike DeWine acknowledged that without fingerprints to compare, Rapback is essentially worthless.

DeWine said the system’s “potential vulnerabilities” include inconsistencies — from one jurisdiction to the next — in the processing of defendants facing drunken-driving charges.

“Some (police) departments would take fingerprints, but some departments — they don’t take fingerprints. They just charge that person,” he said. “That’s not going to show up” in the system.

DeWine promised an overhaul of Rapback.

“In a couple of months, we’re going to have a better system,” he said.

Among other things, DeWine said, school districts no longer will have to contact state officials to determine whether the charges their bus drivers face involve offenses that could lead to firing. Instead, that information will accompany the initial notifications.

WBNS-10TV researcher Joel Chow contributed to this story.

nathan.baca@10tv.com

jodi.andes@10tv.com

Report: System to check Ohio school bus drivers flawed

COLUMBUS (AP) —A flawed notification system allows some school bus drivers charged with crimes to stay on the job without the districts or parents knowing, according to a central Ohio TV news report.

WBNS-TV in Columbus reported Thursday that the Ohio Department of Education has a notification system that automatically alerts school districts of bus driver charges and convictions.
But because the system is triggered when the drivers are fingerprinted, weeks or months can go by before the system is triggered. Some people charged with misdemeanors aren't fingerprinted by police at all.
Even when fingerprints are taken, the station found several instances when the system failed and notification was delayed. The station found bus drivers arrested after they were hired for crimes including theft, assault and domestic violence.
The Ohio attorney general's office said an improved system will be launched by the end of November.
One man who drives for Columbus city schools was accused in April of pointing a gun at his wife's head. He pleaded guilty to aggravated menacing but was still driving kids to school. The state notification system failed to notify Columbus City Schools of his record. He resigned Wednesday.
Another Columbus school bus driver was arrested for scratching and hitting her daughter, but it took nearly five months for the district to be told by the state, WBNS reported.
The fact that school districts don't know about these bus drivers concerned Kim Maloney, mother of a kindergartner in Columbus.
"They could be convicted a year or more down the line and a bus driver could be driving my sons to school and back," she said.
There are about 34,000 school bus drivers statewide, according to the Ohio Department of Education.

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Pittsgrove students learn life lesson from fatal drunk driving story

Once sitting in a jail cell for a decision that turned tragic, Matthew Maher stood before students of Arthur P. Schalick High School Monday to pass on the story of a shattering drunk driving accident that changed his life.
After getting behind the wheel drunk in 2009, Maher, then 25, crashed resulting in the death of a Philadelphia man.
After serving more than four years in state prison, Maher took his conviction upon his shoulders and made it his mission to help others make the right choice by learning from his mistake.
Maher, now 30, vulnerably spoke to the high school students Monday morning with the hope of guiding them down a different path and exposing the truth of his own fatal mistake.

"This was my reality — this was my nightmare, and I was wide awake," Maher said to the quiet and somber crowd.
I've heard often, that perception is real, but what if your perception is off, because mine was. Take my nightmare and use it as a stepping stone. So many of you may be thinking, 'this will never happen to me,' and that in itself, is not reality," the 30-year-old continued.
Maher relived that night, when he was driving down the Atlantic City Expressway, in the area of Hamilton Township, when he struck another vehicle that resulted in the partial ejection of the Philadelphia man who was pronounced dead on the scene.
Once a professional soccer player, and graduate of Middle Township High School, Maher attended Temple University on a full scholarship. But with one bad decision, he traded in all of his success for one heavy charge.
Maher was charged with first degree aggravated manslaughter, but much more came with it, he said.
"It brought pain to two innocent families — mine and the victim's — a life lost and immeasurable pain," Maher recalled. "It's a decision you can't take back."
Maher was released in August 2013 and has spent his time reaching out to youth in an effort to challenge their own decisions.

"One text message can affect a lifetime, one pull of a joint, or one sip of alcohol will take you. These decisions will lead you to a place you never though you'd be. I remember thinking how I saw them on the side of the road, believing they were okay, and then my heart dropped to my toes," he added.
Seniors Max Collins, 18, and Lia Stiles, 18, were taken back by the harsh and encouraging message.
"It's definitely inspirational and makes you think about your own future," Max said.
Lia and senior Zach Johnson, 18, reflected on how decisions impact others, and to be cautious.
"The decisions you make can affect all the people around you," Lia said.
Maher dared each student to put themselves in his shoes.a
"Suddenly, the face of a drunk driver just became your face. If you only see me as a murderer, that's fine too. See me as a bad decision you don't have to make. You have your whole life ahead of you," Maher said.
"Look at my face and remember it. Hold each other accountable by making the right decisions," he said.

For more information on Maher's story and his outreach, please visit www.themattmaherstory.com or Facebook.com/themattmaherstory.

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Crossing guards say bad driving, and tickets, on the rise near schools

On school day mornings and afternoons, you’ll find Greg Kopan on a Near West Side street corner, dressed warmly in two jackets, a neon vest and Green Bay Packers gloves.

Using a lighted stop sign, Kopan guides students from three nearby schools across four busy lanes of Monroe Street and two of Edgewood Avenue.

Like many of Madison’s crossing guards, Kopan also takes in an array of dangerous, distracted behavior from the city’s drivers — and writes them up for tickets when they put children at risk.

Kopan and his fellow crossing guards have referred a lot of tickets lately: Already, the number of citations for not yielding to guards is up 43 percent over last year’s total.

Officials say that’s partly because guards, who help children cross streets at 49 intersections around Madison, are better trained in how to record violations and vehicle information. But they say it’s also because the bad behavior they’re witnessing is getting worse.

Along with those who are texting and talking on cellphones, Kopan said, he has seen drivers working on laptops and putting on makeup.

Patti Knoche, who oversees crossing guards on the western half of the city, has even heard of drivers flossing their teeth and reading the newspaper.

“They are doing everything, in addition to driving,” Knoche said.

In a perfect world, she said, drivers would slow down once they reach school zones and keep an eye out for children. When they see a crossing guard, drivers would stop no less than 10 feet from the crosswalk, and stay stopped from the time a guard enters the intersection until he or she returns to the curb and drops the stop sign.

In the real world, on a recent weekday afternoon, Kopan held up his sign and started leading a young girl across Monroe street. A taxi driver, apparently late to see him, braked hard and came to a stop a few feet from Kopan, who gave the man a stern reminder about school-zone speed limits.

Minutes later, Kopan led a couple of teens across Edgewood Avenue when a woman started rolling through the stop sign to turn onto Monroe. After seeing him, the driver sheepishly backed out of the crosswalk.

Seconds after that, a Subaru turned from Monroe and drove through the crosswalk onto Edgewood, with Kopan still holding up his stop sign for the students.

“Just got a ticket,” he said before reaching into his coat to record the car’s license plate and description.

Guards, who are civilian police employees, received extra training before school began this year on what information they should take down about cars that violate crossing rules. The guards send that information on to their supervisors, who confirm the plate number matches the vehicle description and mail a citation to the driver.

A ticket — “failure to yield to an adult school crossing guard” — will cost you $98.80.

Guards are giving the citations out at more than twice the rate they did in years past — from 141 tickets in 2011 to 284 so far in 2014.

And while that figure may be high, Knoche said, guards still let a lot of bad behavior slide because they can afford to focus their attention only on the most dangerous drivers.

“We’re really just getting the worst of the offenders,” she said. “These numbers could really be far higher.”

Knoche and Kopan had the same advice for drivers: Slow down and stay alert in school zones, and obey the crossing guards’ stop signs.

Kopan pointed out it takes less than 30 seconds for him to get a child safely across Monroe Street — not a huge impact on someone’s daily commute.

“Give us the space we need,” Kopan said. “It’s very little time.”

Whatever happened to driver's ed in high schools?

Driver’s ed teacher Tom Milich knows a lot about driving.

Each day, he drives to four different high schools in the Saddleback Valley Unified High School District to teach one period on the subject, giving lessons to students in pursuit of their licenses.

Even though Milich’s students don’t get behind the wheel during the class, they are fortunate: Saddleback appears to offer the most extensive driver’s education program in Orange County high schools. Most offer far less.

Whatever happened to that high school rite of passage, with classroom instruction, simulators, and hitting the road with classmates and a teacher who sat in the passenger seat with a second foot brake?

Years ago, most districts canceled driver’s ed classes, a victim of budget cuts or because of an increased emphasis on college-entrance requirements. A few now offer online classes.

“There are so many things we do on behalf of our families,” said Diane Donnelly-Toscano, director of curriculum and instruction for Anaheim Union High School District. “Paying for their driving lessons is not one of them.”

State law lists driver’s education as a course that should be offered in grades seven through 12. But the rule is unenforced, as local school boards are charged with setting graduation requirements.

“It’s a local-control state, so we don’t do intense, microscopic, local management from the state level,” said Roxane Fidler, an education program consultant for the California Department of Education.

In Orange County, 162 students enrolled in driver’s ed at six public schools in 2012-13, the most recent numbers available. Just a decade earlier, 1,986 took the class at 33 schools.

Saddleback Valley officials have never seriously considered eliminating the class, said Laura Ott, the district’s director of secondary education. However, the number of class periods has dwindled as more students opt for private lessons.

“Any opportunity we have to educate students about the responsibilities associated with driving, we should,” Ott said in an email. “As long as students express interest and we have a qualified, credential teacher, we will continue to offer the course.”

Other districts cut the elective partly because it doesn’t satisfy college admissions requirements, officials said. The behind-the-wheel portion was eliminated mostly because of liability reasons.

Budget cuts prompted Irvine Unified School District to cancel its final driver’s ed classes over the past decade or so, said Ian Hanigan, a district spokesman. Plus, the district liked to have students take a quarter of driver’s ed and a quarter of health to form a neat semester schedule. Later, the health course was expanded to a semester.

“We also believe that students have become more focused on taking classes focusing on college admission,” Hanigan said.

In Santa Ana Unified, the county’s largest school district, officials were unsure when the classes were canceled, said Dawn Miller, assistant superintendent for secondary education. The issue hasn’t been brought up lately.

“I think, right now, we’re focusing on getting our kids ready for college and (careers),” Miller said. “I know it definitely would not qualify for our kids to be college-ready.”

Capistrano Unified and Fullerton Joint Union High offer an online driver’s ed course. Irvine Unified officials, too, are considering that option.

Fullerton Joint nixed its traditional driver’s ed program five years ago during budget cuts. This school year, 90 students have signed up so far for the online option with the district paying $12 per student, Superintendent George Giokaris said.

Statewide, behind-the-wheel lessons are rare in public schools, with just nine entities offering them in 2012-13. Most were charter schools.

Just because teenagers can’t take driver’s ed in school doesn’t mean they can get out of it.

If they want permits, starting at age 151/2, teens must be enrolled in a driver’s ed class. To get a license, these students must complete a 25-hour course, online or in the classroom, and six hours of behind-the-wheel training, as well as 50 hours of on-road practice supervised by a parent or other qualified adult. And then pass the DMV test, of course.

After a driver-to-be turns 18, no classes are required, only the DMV test, a route some take to avoid the instruction.

“They just don’t want to pay for driver’s ed or driver training, so they wait until they are 18,” said Jan Mendoza, a DMV spokeswoman.

The Auto Club Driving School opened in 2001 with about 25 students, partly because the organization noticed a need after public schools canceled classes, said Melissa Vega, manager for drivers services for the Automobile Club of Southern California.

The school now has 21 locations and plans to graduate 4,250 teens this year. Members pay $377 to $529 for instruction and on-the-road training.

Parent Shelie Porter of Yorba Linda had figured that her children’s school, El Dorado High, would offer driver’s education. When she realized the course wasn’t available, she sought out the Auto Club.

Although she wishes the course remained in public schools for convenience, she’s happy with the Auto Club’s lessons. Her 20-year-old daughter went through the program, and her 15-year-old son is in it.

“The price didn’t bother me too much,” Porter said. “It was worth it. My kids were worth it.”

Greg Ford, 16, a junior at El Toro High School in Lake Forest, said he put driver’s ed on the top of his class list to make sure he got it on his schedule. He is one of Milich’s students.

“It’s a cheaper way, and I heard it’s better than taking it online,” Ford said. “I told (my parents) I wanted to do this. They said it would be good, because it helps them save money.”

Milich said he’s seen changes over his 15 years of teaching the class. He once used simulators, but he returned to work after one summer and found they were gone.

“I tell the kids at the very start, ‘This is probably the most important class you are ever going to take,’” Milich said. “It’s important to me. I wish we would support it a little bit better.” 

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ATA lauds vets, seeks more aid for driver training

ARLINGTON, Va.  – On this Veterans Day, American Trucking Associations leaders thanked the millions of men and women who have served their country with distinction, and encouraged those returning from service to consider joining thousands of other veterans in the trucking industry.

 “Serving in our nation’s armed forces is one of the highest callings an American can have,” said ATA President and CEO Bill Graves. “Today, we thank all of them for their sacrifices.”

Graves also pointed to recent ATA-supported changes that have made it easier for returning vets to smoothly transition into civilian jobs as truck drivers.

“Fleets have found that veterans are good, dedicated employees who have demonstrated the skills necessary to safely drive large trucks,” he said. “And thanks to recent changes that allow veterans with experience driving in the service to waive the skills test for a commercial driver’s license and to take CDL tests where they are stationed, rather than in their home state, it is less complicated than ever before for veterans to get jobs in our industry.”

“One of trucking’s biggest challenges is finding enough qualified, safe drivers to move America’s goods,” said ATA Chairman Duane Long, chairman of Longistics, Raleigh, N.C., “and, thankfully, if there’s one thing our veterans have proven capable of, it is rising to meet a challenge.”

Long added that there was even more that the government could do to aid in the transition from soldier to driver.

“While veterans can use the GI Bill to pay for CDL school, other veterans educational grant programs from the Department of Education, Department of Labor or the VA are closed off to driving schools,” he said. “We should open those grant programs up to make it easier for veterans who want to learn to drive a truck to qualify.”

“I’m proud of my service to this country,” said Nate Wick, an America’s Road Team Captain and a professional driver with ABF Freight System, “but I am just as proud of my career as a safe, professional truck driver. This industry is a terrific one for veterans looking to continue serving their country by delivering our most essential goods.” 

More from former driver, military logistics pro on small fleet for driving vets

I spoke yesterday with Alexandria, Va.-based military logistics coordinator Rob Ahlers, pictured above “back when” — a younger Ahlers drove for FedEx Freight out of Ohio year ago, mostly local work, while in college working on a supply chain management degree — from around 2003, he says. In 2006, he “jumped over to FedEx Custom Critical,” one reason being the fleet’s “only office in the world was five miles from my house,” he says. Over three years there he “got to know everyone there pretty well.”

When he left in 2009 to take his federal job as a civilian managing logistics with the army, he “kept in touch with all the FedEx people.” They approached him several times, he says, about potentially managing a non-government small fleet “because I had access to military drivers. They come with security clearances” as a general rule, he says, and given the CDL skills-test waiver program in place for such haulers would be fairly simple to get onboard hauling freight for those that wanted such a career when they made the transition from active service.

Finally, earlier this year at Expedite Expo in Wilmington, Ohio, Ahlers and his two principle business partners began putting a plan in place to launch MSR Transport Services, which you can read more about in this story.

He says the skills-test-waiver program is a “huge benefit” to driving vets. “Our drivers are driving essentially civilian vehicles now,” he notes, most trucks with automated manual transmissions readily available in the market. “As long as they’ve driven for a year or a year and a half and have operated a Class 8 size vehicle,” he adds, “we go through and look at their driving record and are able to waive the road test and school portions, but they have to take the written test on the computer and any endorsement written test that may be associated.”

Ahlers and company have financed five tractors, Ahlers says, to get the program started.

All three of the company owners are military veterans — in addition to Ahlers, one’s a CDL driver who runs in the Akron, Ohio, area and remains in the National Guard and the other is an owner of an environmental water company in Toledo, Ohio. “Our goal, since none of us are going to quit our jobs,” Ahlers says, is to “put all of our money back into the company.” They’re leasing two of the initial five tractors, all 2015 Freightliner Cascadia Evolution models purchased through Fyda Freightliner with stock sleepers, to FedEx Custom Critical, two to Panther Expedited Services, and another as yet unspecified.

MSR will not be going out and getting authority to haul Pentagon freight — thus avoiding potential conflicts of interest given Ahlers’ continued work with the Department of Defense.

All that remains before launch is clearing drivers’ background checks with the Transportation Security Administration. “We’re hoping [to starting running freight] within the next two-three weeks,” Ahlers says. “We have two drivers that should be getting their TSA letters back” any day now. He’s worked with ”about 21-22 drivers in the pipeline” all told so far, so expect somewhat quick fleet growth if business goes well.

To former/current military drivers out there, he notes that “if they’ve never driven a tractor-trailer but did drive straight trucks, we can restrict them to a Class B CDL. Mass Fleet Services, our fleet management company, has straight trucks within other fleets they manage that we can send drivers over to. If they want to switch to a tractor, there’s a way to do that through a driver-training program they’ve got set up” as well.

Ultimately, Ahlers hopes MSR grows into a solid “opportunity to provide our guard soldiers and veterans jobs, and the trucking industry an opportunity to get hold of drivers they might not ordinarily have.”

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CLM supports Wilson James health and safety roadshow

 Fleet management company CLM has been providing driver safety support for security and logistics company Wilson James, in a national health, safety and wellbeing roadshow targeting 500 employees at various locations around the UK.

Last year, Wilson James outsourced the management of its UK fleet to CLM. The company operates across various sectors including construction and aviation where health and safety considerations are imperative.

“We wanted to do more to engage with our staff from a health, safety and wellbeing perspective,” said business performance director, Darren Ward, who has responsibility for the Wilson James fleet.

“We have a workforce of around 2,500 employees in the UK and, as they are scattered in several different locations and mainly based on sites, we decided to go on the road to them, rather than asking them to come to us.”

The result, under the slogan, ‘Time for Safety’, was a national roadshow, starting in Manchester and Aberdeen, then moving to Heathrow and on to central London at three different locations: the Victoria and Albert Museum, St Bartholomew’s Hospital and Fleet Street.

“We wanted to make our staff more aware of the health and safety issues that affect our business,” said Ward.

“At the same time, we wanted to raise awareness of wellbeing issues such as stress and the ‘silent dangers’ like high blood pressure that can affect us all.”

Accordingly, the roadshow focused on health and safety, manual handling, first aid, hazard spotting, occupational health and employee wellbeing, and occupational driving, including driving at work.

The driving stands were aimed at company drivers and those employees who use their own cars on company business or commute to work by car - around 500 employees in total.

“From a driving viewpoint, we wanted to raise awareness of safe driving skills in order to reduce and prevent accidents from happening.  We also wanted to get across the frequency and type of accidents we have, the places they occur and what we are doing to try and combat them in terms of risk assessments and driving training.

“We are keen for our people to understand they need to take responsibility over how they drive, and that accidents affect our business performance in terms of repairs, claims, time off the road, replacement vehicles and increased premiums.”

CLM provided a driving safely exhibition stand which looked at key aspects of at-work driving and risk assessment.

This included key driver safety topics such as driving under the influence of drink and drugs, driving for work, vehicle safety checks and inspections, and windscreen repair, including smart repair.

One of CLM’s preferred tyre suppliers, Michelin, was also invited to participate in a tyre safety workshop, to coincide with tyre safety month. This explained tyre pressures, tread depths and other tyre-related issues and looked at the benefits of keeping tyres correctly inflated.

CLM also asked its preferred driver training partner, AA DriveTech, to hold a driver safety workshop at the Heathrow roadshow, where half the Wilson James’ fleet is based.

This comprised six 30-minute sessions looking at key driver safety topics, including hazard awareness, speed awareness, winter and wet weather driving techniques, driver fatigue, mobile phone use on the move and parking and manoeuvring.

“We were delighted to be able to support Wilson James in what we thought was a very laudable and worthwhile project,” said Simon Cotton, general manager at CLM.

Helping drivers own a cab: Uber, Ola are going all out too woo drivers

Taxi app Uber is going all out to woo new drivers. First it offered LCD TVs and iPhones through lotteries to its cabbies along with bonus money per trip for plying in the festive week and now it has reportedly tied up with lenders to launch a vehicle financing program for  cab drivers in India so that taxi drivers can easily own a car within a couple of days.

Uber has partnered with lending companies including AU Financiers, Shriram Transport Finance and Toyota Financial Services, as well as automobile manufacturers like Mahindra, Maruti Suzuki-Tata Motors and Toyota for this initiative. Thanks to this interested drivers can purchase vehicles with a down payment of Rs 60,000 with subsidised interest rates and financing terms.

"Shriram Transport Finance is glad to join hands with Uber. We will provide loans to the partner drivers of Uber. The association will facilitate us to expand our passenger car financing business. The pact is a win-win deal for all the parties involved. Shriram Transport Finance and Uber encourages ‘Drivers cum Owner’ business model and the drivers get easy financing. Since, Uber ensures enough business to these drivers so that their vehicles are fully utilized thus assuring us of our EMI payments," said Umesh Revankar, MD & CEO, Shriram Transport Finance in a statement.

However, the drivers will need to be active partners on Uber's platform with no other clauses attached to the scheme.

Apart from this, Uber provides other incentives including minimum income guarantee for certain hours, reference bonus and incentive per trip to lure drivers to clock in more hours. But Uber will need to have to do more to up its ante since it is not the only one in the game providing incentives and aiding drivers with financing.

"With Vehicle Financing, Uber takes a large step forward in its endeavour to create  entrepreneurs in every section of society. We have now empowered individuals and have created an ecosystem that will enable hundreds of thousands of young Indians to become new business owners," Uber India said in a statement.

Ola Cabs — that leads the India cab market in terms of size with a network of 11,000 drivers across 9 cities --  and which recently received $210 million of funding from Japan's Softbank, empowers drivers to become entrepreneurs too.

Ola too has worked with leading financial institutions that provide loans to help prospective drivers buy their cars outright, and also offers training to ensure drivers are equipped to deliver a quality and safe experience for passengers, according to this Nextweb report.

In April, Ola tied up with auto maker Mahindra & Mahindra to offer cars to drivers and operators at discounted prices with suitable finance options and according to this Economic Times report,  Ola's drivers which got the best rating were recently awarded with LCD TVs and washing machines.

" In Mumbai, Olacabs is doling out Rs 1,000 to every Black-Yellow cab driver for the first week regardless of the number of rides they do. The caveat is that driver cannot refuse a ride whenever summoned," the report added.

And this war between cab service firms is going to get even more intense. The Financial Times reported that Uber is planning to raise at least $1 billion more in capital from its existing investors, which include Blackrock, TPG, Google Ventures (capital investment arm of Google ) and Menlo Ventures, and new funds from beyond Wall Street and Silicon Valley, especially in Asia.

The company still has $1 billion in the bank from its most recent round of funding. Flush with funds, Uber and Ola Cabs are likely to use the money not only for expansion but also to act as guarantors for the financing of vehicles to new drivers.

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