"Safety is number one" at the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration (FMCSA), said the agency's deputy administrator, Bill Bronrott. Bronrott gave a talk titled "Fostering a Safety Culture in the Truck and Bus Industry" during a recent visit to Volpe, The National Transportation Systems Center.

In support of and collaboration with FMCSA, Volpe has made significant contributions to the Compliance, Safety, Accountability (CSA) program and developed the highly successful Safety Measurement System (SMS), which assesses individual motor carrier safety performance on the basis of violations found in roadside inspections and crashes. SMS has been critical in helping FMCSA target limited resources to the carriers and drivers most in need of attention.

"SMS gives us an unbiased picture of each carrier's safety performance," said Bronrott. "It tells us who we need to visit and helps us direct our resources towards higher-risk companies and drivers." The goal is to get high-risk actors to recognize where they need to improve, and it seems to be working: In the two years since CSA and SMS were launched, carrier violations are down 8 percent and driver violations are down 10 percent.

If bad actors don't improve, FMCSA wants to get them off the roads. In 2012, FMCSA ordered 48 carriers or drivers to cease and desist operations, as they presented an "imminent hazard" to public safety. The orders were widely reported in trucking magazines and web publications. "We think the media attention has been key in motivating other carriers to change their behavior," said Bronrott.

Imminent hazard orders are one tool for enforcing FMCSA's core mission to prevent truck and bus crashes and fatalities. Bronrott has pursued this goal for over 30 years: he helped launch the national campaign against drunk driving in 1980. "FMCSA advances their mission by raising the bar for entry into the industry, ensuring carriers and drivers meet all our standards, and enforcing those standards rigorously," explained Bronrott. "We got their attention when we shut down 26 carriers on I-95 one day."

Bronrott, whose role at FMCSA puts him in charge of education and outreach, has also encouraged development of user-friendly materials for both the industry and the public. "We have educational videos on our website to help drivers, including one on preventing cargo tank rollovers and another on entry-level commercial driver training. We even have a website to help people avoid fraud when they're moving," said Bronrott.