Truck Parking Crisis: Defining the Problem, Measuring the Impact, Driving Solutions

Picture this: a female professional truck driver, after 10-plus grueling hours on the road, pulls off the interstate in search of a safe place to rest. Instead of finding an open spot, she’s met with rows of full lots, “No Parking” signs, and the glow of hazard lights from other drivers squeezed onto highway shoulders and exit ramps.

This isn’t an isolated inconvenience—it’s a daily reality for thousands of long-haul drivers across the country. The shortage of truck parking has become one of the industry’s most pressing challenges, threatening not only the well-being of drivers but also the efficiency of the supply chain and the safety of America’s highways.

Lack of Truck Parking Impacts Safety, Productivity

The lack of safe, adequate truck parking has been ranked as a top critical issue in the trucking industry by truck drivers in recent years – particularly for women. Many industry associations like Women In Trucking (WIT) claim the nationwide shortage of truck parking has plagued America’s motor carriers and professional truck drivers for decades, with a wide range of consequences for highway safety, driver health and well-being, supply chain efficiency, and the environment.

In fact, WIT conducted a study of 436 female professional truck drivers a few years ago and found that approximately 43% of participants say they are forced to make a stope where they don’t feel safe. WIT continues to champion efforts to tackle the nation’s truck parking shortage and advocate for practical solutions.

Along with safety, there are additional problems driven by a lack of large truck parking. For example, there can be legal implications, according to some respondents to the WIT survey. When truck drivers cannot find parking and are confronting driving limitations due to Hours of Service rules (HOS), they find themselves in a “no win” situation because they are forced to either park in unsafe or illegal locations or violate federal HOS regulations by continuing to search for safer, legal alternatives. In fact, some industry statistics cite that 70% of professional drivers have “been forced” to violate HOS rules due to a lack of truck parking.

The shortage of truck parking also creates a decrease in productivity and has economic implications. Professional drivers need to “surrender” valuable, available drive time per day, as they’re parking earlier than they need to because they’ve found available truck parking and they don’t want to pass up on the opportunity. The economic impacts of the inefficient use of the driver’s time are profound and the practical impact of productivity losses create issues through North American supply chains.

Of course, when there are few places for drivers to safely and legally park their trucks, professional drivers will find places to park that may not necessarily comply with federal requirements. This can make professional drivers a target of crime – with women being particularly vulnerable.

The significant economic impact of siphoned diesel fuel, and theft of equipment and cargo when it is hijacked in unsafe, unsecured parking locations also is of major concern.

Truck Parking Club (TPC), a WIT Corporate member, recently collaborated with transportation economist Noel Perry to define the severity of the problem. The study found that the shortage of suitable truck parking is costing the industry more than $100 billion annually in extra expenses and lost revenue. Drivers often settle for less-than-ideal spaces, while solutions are emerging, broader investment from shippers, carriers, and fleets is still needed.

Truck Parking Problem 101: Quantifying the Problem

It’s no secret that tractor-trailer trucks are big – and TPC’s research puts it into perspective that’s easy to understand. A typical tractor-trailer combination typically is 70' long by 9' wide or 630 square feet. When parking such a vehicle, the truck driver needs to add space around the combination for clearance from other trucks and maneuvering. The minimums then expand to 75 feet by 14 feet or 1,050 square feet.

Those dimensions are no small factor because there are 6.6 million of those vehicles. Visualize this: If they were to be parked simultaneously on the interstate highway system, they would fill a majority of right-hand lanes—96% of the system's 48.9 thousand miles. Stored trailers would fill more than a second lane. This becomes a powerful visual.

Fortunately, only 64% of those trucks are normally in use, and they average only slightly less than seven hours per day moving and use Interstate roadways 49% of the time. Yet that still equates to about 8.2 trucks per minute in each direction. It is no surprise that trucks often outnumber passenger vehicles on the intercity sections of the system. On the entire system, including residential streets, private vehicles dominate. It is on the intercity system where trucks are most noticeable.

If indeed there are 4.2 million truck drivers actively hauling loads every workday, they clearly require many parking spaces. Since drivers on average take three sanitary breaks per day (or more), the 4.2 million converts to 12.6 million parking slots required per day. When considering many factors that can reduce these breaks, the TPC research estimates 4.4 million slots per day needed plus other spots for meals, rest, and waiting, totaling 14.5 million parking slots.

These numbers give the WIT community and industry at-large good context about the demand for truck parking. And this accounting attempts to cover the entire market, because all trucks need parking spaces, usually more than one per day.

Potential Solutions to the Parking Problem

Why is it so critical to find solutions to this issue? Undoubtedly, if more large truck parking is available, professional truck drivers will be safer and healthier, for-hire and private fleets will be more productive, the driver workforce will be more resilient, and tractor/trailers will reduce their fuel needs and emit fewer emissions into the environment.

What are the solutions? For the past several years, WIT has supported these solutions through education, industry and driver awareness, and research (including its WIT Truck Parking Solutions Guide published last year and Assessing and Addressing the Lack of Truck Parking whitepaper, which is part of WIT’s Safety & Harassment Whitepaper Series).

Here are some of the recommended solutions that have surfaced through conversations among the WIT community:

1. Build more parking spaces. A handful of WIT Corporate members have been leveraging this as part of their business model (see WIT Corporate members identified below).
2. Allow and/or create more legal parking spaces, such as diners, stores, carrier operating centers, and especially buy using spaces provided by customers.
3. Provide real-time information about the availability of legal parking spaces. Some companies have leveraged technology to help provide visibility and even manage reservations to accomplish this.
4. Improve decision-making among carriers and shippers (beneficial owners of freight) about the importance of using the right legal parking spaces.
5. Coordinate supply chain timing to reduce truck waiting time. Many WIT Corporate members that are either for-hire motor carriers or private fleets in particular have incorporated this into their strategies of becoming “shippers of choice.”

WIT also encourages members to educate your local and state partners, agencies and lawmakers. With trillions of dollars passed in recent legislation for infrastructure, it’s shocking that there is little momentum to set aside financial investment to address the lack of large truck parking. Trucking industry stakeholders can educate state and local partners about the eligibility of allocated money for transportation projects in the infrastructure law that could include parking. Encourage state and local partners, agencies and law-makers to prioritize funding for grants that would increase truck parking capacity and include truck parking in their plans.

It’s important for metropolitan planning organizations (MPOs) to understand this issue so they’re not leaving money on the table. There are funds from both federal and state. If you see an opportunity to influence local or state agencies or law-makers, build a case on how detention can impact the local community and their constituency. Sign petitions, write letters, make phone calls, and visit those with decision-making authority who can make a difference.

In addition, several companies with core competencies focused on truck parking solutions have actively engaged with WIT as Corporate members, including Truck Parking Club, Trux Parking, Truck Park Management, and TravelCenters of America.

WIT published this exclusive Truck Parking Solutions Guide last year – complete with perspectives that help to define the issues and challenges created by the lack of truck parking, as well as potential solutions. Download your free copy now.

Related Articles:

• We’ve Got A National Truck Parking Crisis. Now What?
• The Trucking Industry’s Growing Headache: Finding Parking
• Quality of Life Themes Dominate ATRI’s Recent List of Critical Trucking Issues
• Top Trucking Concerns: The Economy, Truck Parking, BEVs
• No Truck Parking: A National Safety Concern
• Park It: Lack of Truck Parking Causes Major Headaches for Drivers

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