Reporter Chris Lawrence has produced a segment for CNN's American Morning about independent drivers forced by economic need to stay on the road long after safety, or common sense would allow. It seems the buzz continues to grow around the story first published in the LA times about threats to public safety and public health from the underground port trucking economy. And what stretch of highway did CNN choose for the story's back drop? The 710 - 405 interchange; heart of the truck transit corridor running through the two cities able to adopt a program that could fix this mess.

While one long-serving port commissioner has dismissed the question of the driving work force as a "collateral issue," the CNN story makes it seem more like a source of collateral damage and a threat to public safety.[1]

Let us know what you think.

[1]See video record of January 22, 2008 Long Beach Harbor Commission meeting, comments of Commissioner James Hankla at 01:20:00.