Summary

About 5,000 people die each year in the United States in accidents involving commercial motor vehicles--large trucks, commercial buses, and hazardous materials vehicles. Federal and state initiatives, along with measures taken by trucking firms to improve the safety of trucks and their drivers, appear to be important factors behind the 42-percent reduction in the fatal accident rate for large trucks from 1983 through 1995. Roadside inspections increased from 25,000 performed by federal inspectors in 1983 to 2.1 million performed primarily by state inspectors in 1996. Compliance reviews also increased from about 6,200 in 1989 to nearly 9,000 in 1996. However, the Office of Motor Carriers within the Federal Highway Administration could better target motor carriers with poor safety performance for compliance reviews. Although the Office's new SafeStat system is designed to better identify problem carriers by using on-the-road performance data, it depends on the states to submit complete, accurate, and timely data on reportable accidents and the results of roadside inspections and compliance reviews. Some states now lack adequate data, particularly for accidents. Substantial gaps in the reported data can change a carrier's score, thus affecting SafeStat's reliability. Also, 14 states do not use the Inspection Selection System for choosing vehicles for roadside inspections, and small motor carriers may get no ranking by SafeStat if few roadside inspections are done on their vehicles and drivers.

GAO noted that: (1) federal, state, and industry officials told GAO that federal and state initiatives to improve the safety of commercial vehicles and actions taken by trucking firms to improve the safety of their trucks and drivers were the most important factors behind the 42-percent reduction in the fatal accident rate for large trucks from 1983 to 1995; (2) effective in fiscal year (FY) 1998, the Office revised the criteria for awarding funding from the Motor Carrier Safety Assistance Program to provide each state with more flexibility in choosing the combination of programs--including roadside inspections and compliance reviews--that would best reduce accidents involving commercial vehicles; (3) in April 1997, consistent with the Government Performance and Results Act of 1993, the Office began using performance-based data through its Safety Status Measurement System to identify carriers with the worst highway safety records; (4) while many states have improved the completeness and timeliness of their data submissions in recent years, the Office found that: (a) the states, overall, reported only about 74 percent of the recordable accidents in 1995; and (b) during FY 1997, five states submitted accident data more than 6 months, on average, after the accidents occurred; (5) without these data, the Office and the states cannot effectively target their limited compliance review resources on the motor carriers with safety problems; (6) the Office is in the early stages of revising its criteria for assessing and rating a commercial motor carrier's safety fitness; (7) the Office rates carriers on the basis of compliance reviews that examine a carrier's: (a) compliance with federal motor carrier safety regulations (primarily those related to financial responsibility, drivers' qualifications and operations, including hours-of-service, vehicle inspection and maintenance, and any hazardous materials handling); and (b) recordable, preventable accident rate; (8) while compliance reviews will continue to be an important element of the federal motor carrier safety program, the Office plans to publish an advance notice of proposed rulemaking to solicit public comments on alternatives for rating motor carriers' safety fitness; and (9) one option under consideration is to rely on accident date, roadside inspections, and other performance-based data for safety fitness ratings.