Posted on 04/09/2020 3:56:46 PM PDT by Hojczyk
The coronavirus is adding stress to truckers delivering essential goods throughout the U.S. as they struggle to find bathrooms and rest stops to grab a bite to eat and take a nap.
“It’s been especially hard if you can’t find a place to park,” Angie Baum, who drives with her husband, Larry, told KTVI. “A lot of the truck stops are limiting the number of trucks that come in. “We’re out on the road a lot more,” Angie said. “We’re out about six days a week right now. We’re home for usually about a day, day and a half.”
Many truck stops are closed to anything except filling up for fuel, and signs hanging from locked doors say that “no coffee or water” or “no bathrooms” are available.
“A cup of coffee keeps me energized, and taking a shower makes me feel like a human out here instead of like a dog,” said Jim Allison of Ironton, Missouri, as he was driving out of Chicago.
Some people have stepped up to the plate to feed these truckers, like these volunteers in Danville, Virginia, who offered free food to truck drivers:
The Baums said they can keep going for a longer time than most truckers because they are a team, but they also said those rest stops are crucial for their safety, and it is only getting harder to find good places to pull over to take a break.
(Excerpt) Read more at breitbart.com ...
This country is run by a bunch of fools..
Most states seem to be. This is ridiculous.
The panic driven government assigned herd mentality is taking over. You can just imagine what the herd will allow the government to do.
Drivers will make their pickups, they politely ask the plant if they can use their bathroom and get told no. Then these same plants start bitching when the drivers are late or they won't stay open later to receive/load them.
NYS has not closed its rest stops on the Thruway, although they do not have showers in them.
VT has closed the two rest stops we usually use for bathroom breaks on our trips to NH. Very frustrating when you gotta go. And it’s not like they were terribly busy anyways. There were never many people at either one of them. They were both very lightly used.
In Washington and Oregon life on the road is a bit different than in the past - truck stop restaurant tables are not available, still can get showers. Not so many Canadian rigs running (silver lining), and Portland/Olympia/Tacoma/Seattle are a breeze to run thru regardless of time of day.
I run my 70 hours each week still, just not so much of it sitting in traffic.
I am surprised that the nation’s truck drivers haven’t yet grasped the tremendous amount of power and leverage they would have in these times if they got organized.
Stop all deliveries for one week or even a few days and we’ll see about truck drivers not having use of highway rest stops, not being allowed to use restrooms where they make deliveries or the type of harassment I’ve heard they have been getting from local law enforcement in New York City and elsewhere.
Then again, “Common Sense Isn’t Common Anymore.”
Bears repeating!
This was a huge problem is Massachusetts a few weeks ago... Last I heard, RINO MA Gov. Charlie Baker did reopen all or most rest stops in MA.
Truckers have always been looked down on, considered low class, rednecks, bums, etc..
Just like a lot of other blue collar jobs that keep this country rolling.
I just had to investigate the availability of rest stops today... got a call in the office the other day from a power plant who are desperate to have some one from our company on site. However, they’re 2,000 miles away and they have a 14 day mandatory quarantine if someone has travelled on a flight... not just international but domestic. So... off I go to investigate sending an engineer out on a 3 day drive. First question I wondered about was washrooms since I know that there are still gas stations, hotels and places where folks can still get takeout food. The issue of rest stops is a very real one.... was explaining to the potential candidate for the this trip what a ‘trucker bomb’ was....
Insane. I can use bathrooms in mini marts.
Strike
Carry your own.
I was a grain and livestock farmer until the age 47 (2001). Then became a commercial truck driver.
Many times I told my sons (who thought that farming was boring, hard work w/low pay), while pointing at the feedlot, pastures, and fields, that “if it doesn’t happen there, nothing happens anywhere else”.
After becoming a truck driver, I got to notice, much more intimately, how the modern farmer relies on the truck driver.
But some trucking jobs are completely non-essential. I remember hauling baseball mound clay a few times, thinking “this has got to be the least essential product I have ever hauled”.
Sports and ‘the arts’ are 100% entertainment. Life can go on without them.
Well if they have toilet paper, just park behind the truck stop out view, take a squat and let it go.
Speaking of toilet paper, can’t find a single roll anywhere.
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