THUNDER BAY -- The number of unsafe transport trucks being hauled off the Trans-Canada Highway just east of Thunder Bay would likely ramp up if a new provincial inspection station on the route was in service more often, the area's MPP said.
"I have personally seen it open once or twice, but it's just not open enough," Lise Vaugeois (NDP – Thunder Bay-Superior North) said on Friday.
Vaugeois, who frequently passes the $30-million, Shuniah-based inspection station as she drives through her riding on Highway 11-17, noted the Ministry of Transportation (MTO) has still not made a decision to staff the facility full-time.
The ministry said earlier that MTO inspectors are to use the station on an "as-needed" basis.
Vaugeois says she has no doubt more unsafe trucks would be caught if the station was regularly staffed because even occasional inspection blitzes produce results.
"They pull off a lot of trucks," she said.
According to the NDP, MTO has less than 30 inspectors to patrol all of Northern Ontario's roads. The ministry didn't immediately respond on Friday to a request for comment regarding Vaugeois' claims.
Vaugeois said truck driver training remains inadequate in the province, with costs and training-quality ranging widely, although she allowed there are some "good" training schools out there.
"I'm not blaming the drivers," she said. "They are paying for training they are not getting."
Training costs can be as high as $40,000, according to Vaugeois, who has consulted with truck drivers.
In some cases, Vaugeois said, instructors may have valid trucking experience but have not been formally trained as teachers.
Based on her conversations with truckers, Vaugeois said she learned that some drivers have experienced docked wages and face unreasonable pressures to meet destination deadlines.
"They are told that they can't stop unless the highway is closed," Vaugeois said.
Earlier this year, a majority of 600 respondents in an Ontario Truckers Association survey suggested driving on Northern Ontario routes like highways 11 and 17 is often hair-raising for reasons other than mechanical defects.
Respondents highlighted unsafe passing by other vehicles, a shortage of rest areas for truckers and poor driving training as key factors that lead to collisions and fatalities in the North.
Potential solutions listed by truckers include adding more passing and climbing lanes and more oversight of unsafe trucking fleets.
The MTO recently opened major passing lanes on a hilly section of Highway 17 just west of Rossport.
Carl Clutchey is a Local Journalism Initiative reporter with the Chronicle-Journal
