Big rigs are logging more miles on America's highways than they were a decade ago, but fewer of those trucks are getting pulled over for safety checks. A new analysis found that nationwide truck traffic increased 14% over the last decade, and the same review linked companies that went without inspections to deadly crashes.
The findings come from a CBS News New York report. CBS News New York correspondent Lisa Rozner dug into the numbers specifically for the New York area, according to the report, though the nationwide figure on traffic growth is the headline takeaway so far.
The core of the analysis is straightforward: more trucks are on the road, and fewer of them are being checked for compliance with safety rules. That gap is where the report says the danger lies, pointing to companies that were not inspected as having been linked to deadly crashes. The report describes companies that were not inspected in connection with deadly crashes.
Why Fewer Trucks Are Getting Checked
The analysis describes a decline in inspections as truck volume rises. It also describes companies that went without inspections in connection with deadly crashes. The report describes a nationwide pattern: traffic up, oversight down, and at least some companies that went without inspections turning up in the aftermath of fatal wrecks.
Truck volume is part of a broader trend in American driving. The Federal Highway Administration's Traffic Volume Trends report tracks hourly traffic counts submitted monthly by states, offering a running national picture of how much driving is happening on U.S. roads. Separately, the U.S. Department of Energy's Alternative Fuels Data Center maintains a chart of total vehicle miles traveled nationwide going back to 1971, tracked as a rolling 12-month count through 2025.
What Federal Safety Data Shows
Truck safety oversight itself runs through the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration, whose Compliance, Safety, Accountability program lets carriers log in to review their own safety and performance records. The CSA site provides CSA and SMS resources for motor carriers.
The agency's crash-data portal, meanwhile, provides current crash totals and crash-query tools. According to the FMCSA's Analysis and Information online resource, the site includes those resources.
That caveat matters for anyone trying to draw a straight line from fewer inspections to more fatal crashes. The analysis reported by CBS News links companies that went without inspections to deadly wrecks. For now, the topline figures stand as a warning sign for anyone sharing the road with more trucks and less oversight of them.
