DALLAS MORNING NEWS December 12, 2006
Many Truckers Skirting the Rules
Exclusive: Hazardous cargo banned from I-30 ‘canyon' but enforcement lax
By STEVE McGONIGLE / The Dallas Morning News
Every day, tractor-trailers hauling gasoline and other hazardous cargo pass through the congested, high-walled "canyon" of Interstate 30 in downtown Dallas .
The narrow, mile-long stretch has been off-limits to hazardous haulers since 1978 because of the difficulty rescuers would have reaching the area. But it is a city ordinance that Dallas police seldom enforce, and truckers know it.
Capt. Ted Padgett, head of the Dallas Fire-Rescue hazardous material response team, said he fears it's only a matter of time before there is a catastrophic event.
An estimated 132,000 people work downtown, and Capt. Padgett said tall buildings, wind currents and the area's warmer temperatures make it susceptible to a toxic plume.
"We've got ordinances for everything in the world, from height of grass to trash in people's yards. This is just one of those out of sight, out of mind," he said. "We don't worry about it until something big happens, and it's not enforced."
One reason for the lack of enforcement is that the Dallas Police Department dedicates only two full-time officers to truck inspections, the legacy of a decision made six years ago to reassign members of the truck-safety unit to other traffic duties.
The Texas Department of Public Safety says manpower limits require that it leave enforcement of truck safety laws in urban areas to local police. And DPS is not empowered to enforce city ordinances that designate routes for hazardous cargo.
Dallas is one of 29 cities and counties around the state that have commercial vehicle units. Others include Dallas and Tarrant counties and the cities of Fort Worth , DeSoto, Lancaster , Arlington , Plano , Irving and Richardson .
Houston has the largest truck unit with 28 officers. Those officers conducted almost 6,500 truck inspections last year, state records show.
Dallas ' full-time inspectors, assisted by three traffic officers, stopped a total of 351 trucks during the same period. That is less than half the number of inspections conducted by police in Lancaster , a suburb one-fortieth as populated than Dallas .
Dallas police acknowledge that the reduced level of enforcement has allowed a greater number of substandard trucks or drivers to operate inside the city.
"If you do less of that, ultimately, there are more vehicles out there that are unsafe," said Traffic Lt. John Branton. "So it has an impact, but it's hard to quantify."
From 2000 through 2005, DPS records show, Dallas reported 4,700 truck-related accidents, which killed 75 people and injured an additional 4,800. Only Houston , with nearly double Dallas ' population, reported more truck accidents, deaths and injuries.
There were 67 truck-related accidents in Dallas involving hazardous materials haulers during the same period. None caused a fatality, but 42 accidents did cause 102 injuries. At least 10 accidents occurred on some portion of Interstate 30, records show.
Capt. James Spencer, commander of the DPS' regional truck inspection unit, based in Garland , said Dallas ' accident statistics reflect a lack of safety officers.
"They don't have enough commercial vehicle enforcement there," he said.
It was at the urging of DPS that Dallas formed its truck safety unit in 1996, said Officer Ron Squyres, one of the original members. The unit began with six inspectors and a sergeant but was scaled back to four in 1998, he said.
The unit was disbanded in 2000 when then-Police Chief Terrell Bolton reassigned more than 120 police investigators to patrol duty. Two years later, Officer Squyres returned to full-time truck duty; a second officer joined him last year.
The only time there are enough police to establish truck checkpoints is when the other officers need inspections to keep their federal certification, Officer Squyres said.
"Basically, I just spend all day driving around looking for something that looks like it needs to be stopped and checked," he said.
Officer Squyres said he has only rarely stopped trucks he suspected of violating the rules regarding hazmat routes. Mostly, he said, he relies on voluntary compliance.
Confusing routes
Concerns over the release of toxic or flammable substances have led most major American cities to route hazardous material haulers to their periphery.
Long-haul trucks carrying hazardous materials through Dallas are required to use an outer belt formed by Interstate 635, Interstate 20 and Loop 12 on the west.
Hazmat trucks making local deliveries are permitted in the city center, but not on sunken and elevated portions of downtown freeways. Instead, trucks are supposed to take a serpentine path of marked city streets. Portions of one route cut through two congested entertainment areas: Fair Park and Deep Ellum.
Two Dallas Morning News reporters drove the routes and could not complete them using existing signs. Some highway exits are missing signs or provide directions that lead to dead ends. Lt. Robert Sanders, another traffic section supervisor, said the alternate routes are so poorly marked that his officers are unable to cite violators.
"You can't [enforce] the letter of the law when the letter of the law is obscured to some degree," he said. "It's not right. It's not fair. And we're not going to do it until the signs are fixed."
Lt. Sanders said he was unaware of problems with alternate route signs before The Dallas Morning News contacted him. He agreed the situation was potentially serious and vowed to make it a priority to keep hazmat trucks out of prohibited areas.
The 1978 ordinance was passed as a reaction to hazardous railroad spills in North Dallas . It has been a subject of controversy over enforceability since its adoption.
Fire officials supported the hazmat routing, but police officials doubted its viability. Police and fire officials issued a few citations in the early 1980s, but the effort fizzled. Fire officials said their department also lacks staff to enforce the ban.
Despite the fact that on any given day, fuel trucks sporting hazardous material placards can be seen driving the prohibited route through downtown, the only time fire officials write tickets today is after an accident.
That's what happened in May 2004 when a tanker truck overturned in the downtown mixmaster. Traffic was knotted for several hours, and 1,500 gallons of gasoline spilled. The truck driver suffered minor injuries.
A year later, in June 2005, a diesel truck overturned on Woodall Rodgers Freeway, shutting down Central Expressway for several hours. The accident occurred near the increasingly residential Uptown area north of downtown Dallas .
Evacuations
Evacuations have not been common, but they have occurred.
One of the biggest was in August 1989, when 6,000 people were forced from an area east of downtown after a truck hauling hazardous chemicals overturned near Woodall Rodgers. The truck driver was killed, but there were no other injuries.
Tim Raiter, an Arlington truck driver, said some hazmat haulers will continue to ignore the ban on downtown travel until officers go back on the road.
"When the word gets out that DPD is enforcing hazmat, it will stop," he said. "Within 24 hours, it will be coast to coast to coast and the northern border because the truckers will chat on the CBs and the trucking periodicals will pick it up, also."
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