Justia Transportation Law Opinion Summaries

Midwest sued the Department, seeking a declaration that South Dakota had a taxation scheme that violated a provision of the federal Railroad Revitalization and Regulatory Reform Act (4-R Act), 49 U.S.C. 11501(b)(4). The complaint alleged in part that the 4-R Act's bar on discriminatory taxes against rail carriers extended to Midwest. The district court denied Midwest's motion for summary judgment and granted the Department's, concluding that court precedent did not support extending the protections of the 4-R Act to Midwest. The court held that, in light of Midwest's bare assertions that South Dakota's tax had the effect of discriminating against rail carriers, the district court did not err in ruling as it did. Any ruling to the contrary would have required the district court to rely upon speculation with respect to whether South Dakota's taxes on railcar repair services performed by a privately owned, third-party service provider and any tangible personal property used therein impermissibly resulted in discriminatory treatment of a rail carrier. Accordingly, the judgment was affirmed. View "Midwest Railcar Repair, Inc. v. South Dakota Dept. of Revenue" on Justia Law

This case arose when the Port of Los Angeles prohibited motor carriers from operating drayage trucks on port property unless the motor carriers entered into concession agreements with the port. The concession agreements set forth fourteen specific requirements covering, among other things, truck driver employment, truck maintenance, parking, and port security. The agreements were adopted as part of the port's "Clean Truck Program," adopted in response to community opposition that had successfully stymied port growth. Plaintiff challenged the concession agreements, arguing that they were preempted by the Federal Aviation Administration Authorization Act (FAAA Act), 49 U.S.C. 14501 et seq. The court held that the district court meticulously identified and applied the governing law. The court affirmed the district court's holding that the financial capability, maintenance, off-street parking, and placard provisions were not preempted. The court reversed the district court's conclusion that the employee-driver provision was saved from preemption by the market participant doctrine, and remanded for further proceedings. View "American Trucking Ass'n v. The City of Los Angeles, et al." on Justia Law

Plaintiff, a freight railroad, owned a spur line connecting to a plastics plant, the only shipper located on the spur. Defendant, another railroad, bought the lines, including the spur. The sales contract allowed plaintiff to continue to run trains on the lines being sold and granted plaintiff an exclusive easement to use the spur to serve the plant. Several years later, the plant entered receivership. The receiver sold all assets, including the plant. The buyer continues to manufacture plastics in the plant. Contending that the change in ownership voided the exclusive easement, defendant contracted with the buyer to ship products over the spur, leaving plaintiff with diminished use of the spur. The district court ruled in favor of defendant, reasoning that the contract referred specifically to the plastics company in business at that time. The Seventh Circuit affirmed, based on the language of the contract in light of extrinsic evidence, and rejected a trespass claim. View "Dakota, MN & E. R.R. v. WI & S. R.R." on Justia Law

Following a 2007 train derailment and three-day fire that allegedly exposed a small Ohio town to cancer-causing agents, plaintiffs sought damages on behalf of a putative class. Plaintiffs' expert testified that the normal background level of dioxin is four parts per trillion and that the range within area homes was from 11.7 to 274 ppt. A doctor testified about increased risk of cancer. The district court granted summary judgment for the train company, finding that plaintiffs had not established general or specific causation and, as a matter of law, any increased risk of cancer or other diseases was too insignificant to warrant the court's ordering a lengthy period of medical monitoring. The Sixth Circuit affirmed, noting the absence of conclusive medical evidence that plaintiffs faced even a one-in-a-million increased risk of cancer. View "Hirsch v. CSX Transp., Inc." on Justia Law

Federal regulators limit the number of hours during which commercial truck drivers may operate their vehicles in a given day and over the course of a week, 49 C.F.R. 395.8(b) (2010). The traditional paper system for recording time is subject to manipulation and falsification. When the FMCSA considered requiring truckers to use electronic on-board records (EOBRs) instead of logbooks for documenting their records of duty status, it acknowledged that Congress contemplated rules mandating electronic monitoring, but also required the agency to ensure that any such device is not used to "harass vehicle operators." The 2010 final rule applied to motor carriers "that have demonstrated serious The Seventh Circuit held that the rule is invalid because the agency failed to consider an issue that it was statutorily required to address. View "Owner-Operator Indep. Drivers Ass'n v. Fed. Motor Carrier Safety Admin." on Justia Law

Petitioners challenged an order of the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) concerning the proposed construction by the Port of Portland of a new runway at Hillsboro Airport (HIO). On appeal, petitioners argued that the decision not to prepare an Environmental Impact Statement (EIS) was unreasonable for several reasons, chief among them the FAA's failure to consider the environmental impacts of any increased demand for HIO resulting from the addition of a runway. Petitioners also argued that the FAA did not afford them a public hearing within the meaning of 49 U.S.C. 47106. As a preliminary matter, the court addressed the Port's and the FAA's arguments that petitioners waived their claims because they failed to raise them during the public comment period. The court held, after finding that certain precedents did not apply here, that remand was necessary for the FAA to consider the environmental impact of increased demand resulting from the HIO expansion project, if any, pursuant to the National Environmental Protection Act of 1969 (NEPA), 40 C.F.R. 1508.8(b). The court also held that an EIS was not warranted based on petitioners' contention that the context and intensity of the project independently required an EIS. The court further held that petitioners' arguments regarding whether the FAA afforded them a public hearing was unpersuasive where the hearing afforded petitioners was a "public hearing" within the meaning of section 47106 and FAA Order 5050.4B. Accordingly, the court granted the petition for review and remanded with instructions to the FAA to consider the environmental impact of increased demand resulting from the HIO expansion project pursuant to section 1508.8(b). View "Barnes, et al. v. US Dept. of Transportation, et al." on Justia Law

This negligence suit under Georgia law stemmed from an injury plaintiff suffered as he unloaded freight from a railcar in July 2005. On appeal, plaintiff asserted that the district court erred by granting summary judgment to defendants because there were triable issues as to whether defendants were negligent in failing to regularly inspect or maintain the bulkhead door. The court held that the district court was correct in granting defendants summary judgment where plaintiff presented no evidence from which a jury could infer that defendants' omissions, even if negligent, were a proximate cause of his injury, an essential element of his negligence claim under Georgia law. Accordingly, the judgment of the district court was affirmed. View "Walker, et al. v. CSX Transportation, Inc., et al." on Justia Law

In 1993, the FAA decided to privatize all Level I air traffic control towers. About 1500 controllers were forced to leave the field, be trained to operate higher level towers, or secure employment with the private contractors. Office of Management and Budget Circular A-76 prohibits the federal government from performing an activity that could be performed for less cost by the private sector. Before privatizing a function, an agency must determine whether that function is inherently governmental or commercial. A governmental function must be performed by government employees. The district court first dismissed, but, on remand, instructed the FAA to undergo Circular A-76 analysis. The FAA continued to privatize towers and controllers again brought suit. The district court again remanded to the FAA for analysis, but refused to terminate private contracts already in place. The court later granted the FAA partial summary judgment, based on a 2003 amendment to 49 U.S.C. 47124, indicating that work in Level I towers is not an inherently governmental function, then dismissed remaining claims for lack of standing. The Sixth Circuit affirmed. Every tower privatized in the 1993 program fit within the section 47124(b)(3) mandate. View "Nat'l Air Traffic Controllers Ass'n v. Sec'y of the Dep't. of Transp." on Justia Law

These appeals involved two essentially identical actions filed in two different states by different groups of plaintiffs, each seeking to represent a class. The actions sought damages on the ground that plaintiffs' personal information was obtained by defendants in violation of the Driver's Privacy Protection Act (DPPA), 18 U.S.C. 2721-2725. Joining other courts which have dealt with similar claims, the court held that defendants' actions were not unlawful under the DPPA and affirmed the dismissal of the actions by the district courts. View "Howard, et al. v. Oregonian Publishing Co., et al.; Rodriquez et al. v. AMPCO Parking Sys., et al." on Justia Law

Appellants sued appellee under 49 U.S.C. 14103(a) for the reimbursement of fees associated with the loading and unloading of its trucks at appellee's facilities. Appellants subsequently appealed the district court's grant of summary judgment. The court concluded that the district court properly read section 14103(a) to preclude relief for unreimbursed "lumping" absent a plaintiff-trucker's affirmative showing that he or she was not reimbursed by either the shipper or the receiver. Therefore, the court affirmed the district court's order of summary judgment where appellants failed to identify any of its trucks whom a shipper had not already reimbursed. View "Owner-Operator Independent Drivers Assoc., et al. v. Supervalu, Inc." on Justia Law