A Guide To Route Planning For CDL Drivers

Well you have made it through new driver orientation and the time spent with a trainer is over so its time to hit the open road. Now hopefully the trainer gave you some useful tips on how to route plan or trip plan however if they did not then here are some tips that will help you out

Overview Of Route Planning

Now you are finally in your own truck and the company sends you a load that is going from point A to point B. There may be an exact time that they want to deliver for or it may just be an open drop. What the company wants to know this minute is if there are any issues with this load and when you are going to be available for your next load

Basically the biggest question for the first part is will you deliver on time. In order to answer that question you need to be able to route plan (some companies refer to this as trip planning). By doing a proper trip plan you will know if you are able to deliver on time and when you are going to be available for another load which will cut down on the time you spend waiting

Factors To Take Into Consideration

Most people just look at the distance and divide the speed of the vehicle to get an idea of the number of hours it will take to reach the destination however this does not really work for CDL drivers with longer loads. When you are figuring out your estimated time of arrival there are factors that need to be considered in order for proper route planning

1. Weather – It seems pretty obvious but the worse off the weather is the slower you are going to go. It is essential that you look at the upcoming weather for every area of the route. Sure it may be nice and clear in Indiana but New York State has a blizzard that is about to hit that may shut down roads for commercial vehicles
2. Area – There are parts of the United States with speed limits as high as 75 miles per hour however there are also parts of the country that are full of mountains that take forever to climb in a commercial vehicle. I remember driving in Pennsylvania with an older truck and there were times I was climbing a hill at thirty miles per hour
3. Hours Of Service – A ton of new drivers do their route planning and forget about their hours of service regulations. In your route plan did you remember to take your thirty minute break, do you have enough hours on your clock to complete the load and did you plan your stop for the night early enough to ensure you do not violate your eleven hour driving clock? These questions need to be answered in order to complete your route plan
4. Fuel And Stopping For the Night – Now some companies will tell you where you have to stop in order to get fuel and sometimes these stops are in the middle of nowhere. You will need to leave the interstate, drive through some sketchy area and then proceed to wait for the jackass in front of you at the fuel island to finish his thirty minute break. Stopping for fuel takes up more time than most people think. Another consideration is where you are going to stop for the night. Hopefully the place you picked has room but what happens if they are all full up and if so do you have the time on your clock to find another location
5. Construction – Construction is a royal pain in the butt for spring, summer and fall. It can take a normally fast road and turn it into stop and go traffic
6. Time Of Year – With the summer months and especially long weekends there are a lot more vehicle on the road which means travel is going to be much slower than normal. If you want to see crazy traffic just try to cross the border on the Friday of a long weekend

Average Speed For Route Planning

There are a ton of companies out there whose trucks are governed at sixty five miles per hour so the new CDL driver assumes this is the average speed they will use in the formula MILES Divided By AVERAGE SPEED Equals Hours Needed however this is not even close to the real number

If you are traveling all day on a nice flat Interstate your average speed is going to be on the higher end however if you are traveling through cities and through certain parts of the country your average speed is going to fall quickly. Hit Toronto or Chicago during rush hour traffic and it could be a couple of hours of stop and go traffic

Until you get experience going to certain places and traveling through certain parts of the country it is better to use a lower number for average speed

Next Available Time

Next Available Time is what Schneider National called the time you are available for your next load but no matter what you want to call it there are a couple of factors that need to be considered.

1. Type Of Load – Now is this a live load/unload where you will have to wait for your trailer to be loaded or unloaded or is this a drop and hook. The first one could take hours and the second one is really fast for the most part.
2. Hours Left On Your Clock – If you have reached your destination and by the time you are unloaded you only have an hour left on your clock. It makes no sense saying you are available that day and instead just push out your availability to the next morning.

I have found it is better overall to say your Next Available Time is a little later than a little early

Well there is a brief overview of route planning and what should be taken into consideration. A ton of new CDL drivers run into problems by arriving at their destination late as they did not route plan properly. Not only does this upset their dispatcher it also makes the shippers/receivers unhappy. With some companies if you are late a certain amount of times you could be searching for a new CDL job.

Helpful Links

If you are driving in Ontario Canada the most helpful website is 511.on.ca which gives you road conditions, construction and which roads may be shut down. Most States and provinces will have a similar site