Trucks Get Through Tough Spots Quicker as Traffic Thinned by COVID-19

By Al Muskewitz
 
TLD Logisitics independent contractor Buddy White told Wright Media two weeks ago how breezy his usual bumper-to-bumper morning rush-hour commute into downtown Seattle had become as he delivered during the early stages of America’s COVID-19 response.
 
One had to figure truckers were having similar experience in other big-city bottlenecks as the country reacted to the crisis, and now statistics bear it out.
 
The American Transportation Research Institute, the entity that releases an annual Top 100 truck bottlenecks in America and turned out this year’s report last month, released new data Tuesday showing trucks are continuing to move goods through the crisis and, in many cases, faster than usual.
 
Real-time GPS data from more than million trucks nationwide indicates March has experienced “an unprecedented level of truck movement,” ATRI president Rebecca Brewster said.
 
Atlanta’s Spaghetti Junction, the intersection of I-85 and I-285, is typical of the findings. The nation’s No. 2 bottleneck typically has afternoon rush-hour speeds of less than 15 mph due to congestion. Last week, trucks went through it at an average of 53 mph.
 
Researchers said the data for the No. 1 bottleneck at Ft. Lee, N.J., was an anomaly because the George Washington Bridge was not accepting cash toll payments and some vehicles may be seeking alternate routes and vehicles carrying construction equipment were being escorted across the bridge slowing their speeds.

But in New York, along I-495 in Queens (No. 29 on the bottleneck list), the average afternoon rush-hour speed of trucks is 16 mph. During the crisis, speeds have averaged 38 mph.
 
In Los Angeles, at the intersection of I-710 and I-105 (No. 10), truck speeds have gone from less than 25 mph to 53 mph in the morning.
 
And at the Byrne Interchange in Chicago, where I-290 intersects with I-90/I-94 (No. 6), morning rush-hour truck speeds are now averaging 43 mph where they had been crawling at 20.

On White’s Seattle run, the average morning rush-hour speeds at the time of day he was hitting town two weeks ago were less than 20 mph two years ago, less than 25 last year and close to 50 this year. 
 
According to ATRI, the results can be explained by several COVID-19 related factors – reduction in commuter traffic that allows trucks to operate at increased speed and continuous 24/7 truck operations.
 
“Normally, ATRI’s bottleneck data is used to show us where the problems are on our highway system,” American Trucking Associations president Chris Spear said in a news release, “but during the period of extreme uncertainty, the data is showing us where the solution is – in the back of America’s trucks as professional drivers continue to quickly and safety deliver life-sustaining medical supplies, food, fuel and other essentials to Americans when they need it most.”

Al Muskewitz is Editor of Wright Media. He can be reached at musky@wrightmediacorp.com