The American Trucking Associations' Technology & Maintenance Council is working with the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration on a new marketing program aimed at boosting the adoption of safety technology by North American truck fleets.

The program, dubbed “Tech-Celerate,” was unveiled at a press conference ahead of the 2020 TMC Annual Meeting in Atlanta, Georgia, by Ross Froat, director of engineering and information technology for ATA. Froat noted that fleets have a difficult time gathering information on quickly evolving safety technology and that the Tech-Celerate website will service as single-source guide to help them with their decision making process when it comes to spec’ing this technology.

“The website will be used as a resource, as a single, commercial, neutral zone for fleets to go and learn more about these technologies,” Froat said. “Also it will be an area to link them to what providers are out there and where they’re at and how they can get involved if they chose to go that way.”

At the moment, Froat added, Tech-Celerate is focused on gathering and disseminating information on advanced vehicle safety systems such as lane departure assist, anti-collision mitigation systems, adaptive cruise control and active braking systems. These systems are expensive to purchase, Froat noted. So a major goal of the Tech-Celerate program will be educating fleets on the long-term return on investment and other cost savings.

As part of its first organizational meeting tomorrow at TMC’s meeting in Atlanta, industry stakeholders will begin plans to develop technical materials and outreach programs aimed at educating trucking industry professionals on the merits of early adoption of ADAS technologies.

“TMC will support the U.S. DOT’s Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration’s Tech-Celerate Now Program by developing recommended practices, videos and other technical materials that support the implementation of ADAS technologies in commercial vehicle fleets,” added TMC Executive Director Robert Braswell. “We are very pleased to join this industry coalition to help improve vehicle safety and equipment operation and maintenance.”

Interested fleets can visit the Tech-Celerate Now website for additional information and educational materials.