FreightWaves

Zeta Driving School started with a 300-square-foot office, nine people squeezed inside and no resources.. And their first students trained in an abandoned parking lot 45 minutes away. On What The Truck?!?, Josh Kleyman shares how a call to veteran CDL instructor “Miss Connie” helped get the idea off the ground during the height of COVID. Years later, Kleyman says the Kansas City school has grown into the largest single-location CDL school in the country.

Texas–Mexico freight is booming—and border infrastructure is racing to keep up. Commercial traffic through Nuevo León’s Colombia-Solidarity International Bridge has surged from roughly 800 daily freight movements in 2022 to more than 10,000 today.

With trailer prices high and uncertainty surrounding capital spending heading into 2027, buying may not always be the best move for fleets. Ed Behnen of Premier Trailer Leasing explains on What The Truck?!? why renting or leasing can give carriers the flexibility to test the market, secure contracts and make sure utilization is there before committing to a major long-term purchase.

Arizona law enforcement pulled off a pair of stolen cargo recoveries just 20 minutes apart. Malcolm Harris and Michael Vincent break down how communication between agencies helped turn one stolen-load alert into two recoveries on What The Truck?!?

U.S. Customs and Border Protection officers at the Pharr International Bridge in Texas uncovered $10.75 million worth of suspected methamphetamine hidden inside a commercial shipment declared as leeks. Nearly 1,205 pounds of the drug were found concealed in 395 packages inside the trailer, which had crossed from Reynosa, Mexico. The case highlights how legitimate cargo descriptions can be used to mask serious criminal activity at the border. https://vist.ly/5gsqv

There’s friction between Motive and Highway, and it raises a much bigger question about the value of trucking data. The companies restored their ELD data connection after a dispute temporarily limited how frequently Highway could access information from Motive-connected carriers. Malcolm Harris and Michael Vincent break down the dispute on the latest What The Truck?!?

At this week's NADBank Summit in San Antonio, economists and border city leaders made a pointed case: North America needs to function as a unified economic region if it wants to compete with China as global trade fragments. From calls to modernize border infrastructure to reframing El Paso and Ciudad Juárez as a single market of 2.7 million people, the message was consistent — better integration, not just better trade deals, is the region's competitive advantage. https://vist.ly/5gsqa

California police are investigating two fraudulent cargo pickups at an Anheuser-Busch distribution center that together cost about $70,000 in missing beer shipments — and investigators believe the same broker may be behind both. A key detail: that broker had already been turned away from the same facility the week before. FreightWaves has the full story. https://vist.ly/5gspy

South Carolina Ports and the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers have agreed to study deepening the North Charleston Terminal to 52 feet, matching the rest of Charleston Harbor and allowing the port's full container terminal network to accommodate the world's largest ships at any tide. The feasibility study is backed by $500,000 in federal funding and will examine the engineering, environmental and economic case for the project. https://vist.ly/5gspv

A strong vetting process gives companies a way to identify risk before putting freight on the road. That means consistently reviewing carrier information, evaluating safety performance, and documenting the process — not simply checking a box and moving on. Josh Lovan, Business Advisor at J.J. Keller, shares why disciplined carrier vetting matters and how companies can take a more proactive approach to transportation safety.