Members of truckstop association NATSO were in Washington, D.C., this week to bend the ear of their representatives on issues important to the truckstop industry, including keeping truck parking a responsibility of private industry rather than government.

With a Federal Highway Administration study on truck parking due to be released in June, truck parking topped the association's list of governmental priorities this year. According to a press release from the organization, NATSO members found that congressional offices largely supported the truckstop industry's position.
"Members of Congress understood that even when Interstate rest areas are near capacity with parked trucks, this doesn't mean that there is a parking shortage in that area," said NATSO President and CEO W. Dewey Clower. "Lawmakers and their aides clearly agreed that it ought to be the private sector - not the government - addressing shortages," he continued.
NATSO representatives delivered their message that truckstops provide 10 times the number of spaces than the government is able to provide, and that number increases more than 6 percent each year.
The group also urged Members of Congress to enact legislation eliminating a phase-in of low-sulfur diesel fuel. The Environmental Protection Agency approved the gradual phase-in of an ultra-low sulfur diesel, which would result in the temporary manufacture, sale and use of two separate grades of highway diesel. Instead, NATSO would like to see a single fuel approach.
Travel plaza and truckstop representatives also told lawmakers that tax-free sales at duty-free shops are draining money from the federal highway trust fund. Last year, a federal court ruled that the U.S. Customs Agency could not prevent the tax-free sale of fuel at duty-free shops. One such shop in Michigan alone will cost the federal highway trust fund $6 million a year in lost revenue. (See "Truckstops Rally to Fight Duty-Free Fuel," 3/8/01)
"Nearly every Member of Congress we approached about this issue expressed disbelief believe that a loophole allows a business on U.S. soil to sell tax-free gasoline and diesel fuel," Clower said. "Given this overwhelming response, we are very confident that Congress will close this loophole in the very near future."
And if they didn't reach the hearts and minds of the Beltway crowd with their appeals, NATSO members appealed to their stomachs. They ended the conference by serving up a selection of pies from nearby NATSO member truckstops.