If you've been following the ongoing roof strength regulation saga, this will likely come as no surprise. Transportation Secretary Mary Peters has again asked for an extension to rewrite the government's vehicle roof strength rule. We've been reporting on this for more than three years, and the delays never seem to end (of course, we can assume the big cheese in Washington have more pressing issues on their plates these days). Rewriting the legislation set back in the 1970s isn't as simple as specifying stronger roof pillars. Beefing up the roof will add weight - potentially making a vehicle more top heavy and likely increasing the possibility of a rollover. The new rules will need to address these concerns, and take into account new safety technologies (curtain airbags, stability control, etc...) that are on our current-generation models. While each previous request for an extension included new deadline dates, this latest appeal didn't. A wise move considering the administration's track record on this issue.

[Source: Automotive News - sub. req'd]

Bush administration needs more time for new roof strength rule originally appeared on Autoblog on Fri, 03 Oct 2008 09:30:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

There's a new blog in cyberspace, and it's hosted by the U.S. Secretary of Transportation, Mary E. Peters. According to Secretary Peters, she's pushing twenty-first century proposals, so she decided that she'd better communicate in a twenty-first century way. The all-new site is called Fast Lane, and at first glance, it is an interesting approach (for a government job, that is).

As the site is in its infancy, a tour only takes about five minutes. There are a dozen or so links to other DOT agencies, a who's-who list of notable contributors, and an e-mail link directly to the Secretary's inbox (yeah, right). It appears that much of their content will be from "guest" bloggers (aka other politicians). Today's guest was the the Mayor of Chicago announcing a new Bus Rapid Transit system.

While we don't see the new site competing with our own (we looked everywhere, and didn't find any reference to the Nissan GT-R or Dodge Challenger SRT8), the innovation of the site appears to be the speed at which information will make it to the public, and the interaction (via comments) that the public is welcome to partake. Don't expect to use the site to vent your frustrations towards the agency - as a dot.gov site, you can expect that all submitted comments on Fast Lane will be moderator approved.

[Source: Detroit News]

U.S. Transportation Secretary drives new blog originally appeared on Autoblog on Wed, 30 Apr 2008 07:56:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.