WASHINGTON Buried in the new federal highway and public transportation reauthorization law that was adopted by Congress this past summer are Congressional mandates for new regulations, requirements, programs and studies that will impact the motorcoach industry for years to come.

Now that the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration appears to have gotten the revised driver hours-of-service rules for truckers out of the way, the agencys bureaucrats and those elsewhere at the USDOT are beginning to make preparations to crank out several new regulations and conduct numerous studies called for in the new highway spending act.

At the top of the FMCSA priority list is a mandate to modernize the commercial driver licensing program. In the coming months, the agency must propose a series of initiatives to improve both federal and state CDL procedures.

At the federal level, the FMCSA has been ordered to look at all aspects of how drivers of commercial vehicles are licensed and update the Commercial Drivers License Information System that contains driver information and links to all 50 state licensing bureaus.

The FMCSA is required to begin the CDL upgrades no later than 120 days after the law was enacted.

The new law even spells out what some aspects of the improved CDL system should look like. For example, it must provide for the electronic exchange of information, including the posting of convictions; have self-auditing features to assure data are being posted correctly and consistently by the states, and integrate the CDL and the medical certificate.

Organizations like the United Motorcoach Association and others have been advocating integration of the CDL and medical certificate for years. Now it looks like it is finally going to happen.

Included in the legislation is $100 million earmarked for grants to be used by states to make improvements to their licensing programs. Another $28 million will go to states to upgrade their CDL information systems.

A CDL Task Force is being set up to examine a range of issues, including state CDL-related enforcement practices, operational procedures to detect and deter CDL fraud, assuring adequate proof of citizenship, and updating technology and improvements for data sharing between state and federal agencies. The task force must submit its recommendations and findings to Congress in two years.

The FMCSA has even less time to begin loosening CDL-licensing restrictions on individuals who use insulin to treat diabetes. The law requires the FMCSA to come up with new rules within 90 days of enactment of the law.

Among the studies the FMCSA and USDOT must conduct are several that likely will affect the motorcoach industry. A sampling:

· A review to determine the degree to which Canadian and Mexican commercial vehicles currently operating or expected to operate in the United States comply with federal motor vehicle safety standards.

· A field test in conjunction with the University of Iowa on "an approach to assessing highway-use fees based on actual mileage driven by a specific vehicle on specific types of highways by use of an onboard computer . . . linked to satellites to calculate highway mileage (and compute) the appropriate highway use fee for each of the federal, state and local governments as the vehicle makes use of the highways.

· A nascent movement in the U.S. to do away with fuel taxes as the primary method of paying for highway construction and maintenance. This hydra-headed issue has its basis in the declining rate of growth of revenue from fuel taxes. The advent of hybrid and alternative fuel vehicles that use little -- or sometimes no -- gasoline or diesel fuel and the greater fuel efficiency of autos generally is reducing fuel tax revenues at a time of increasing congestion and enormous highway construction requirements.

· A study of how new technologies might be used to enhance the collection of the excise tax on diesel fuel.

· A study to identify the issues related to the protection of the rights of individuals whose motor vehicles are towed and to identify potential remedies for those issues. This is an increasingly important issue because of the growing prevalence of electronic-data-recording devices, or black boxes, on all vehicles, including buses.

· A study of highway toll-collection facilities, including toll booths, to determine their safety.