A seemingly random question popped into my head when I was running this morning and a nice UPS man waved me through an intersection. Why in the world do the trucks not have doors? Do they really save time by not having to open the doors? Is it safe for the drivers? Does not having a door lower a vehicle’s crash safety? Does this do anything to their insurance? It seems so strange to me…
They do have doors. Sliding doors.
Why do they drive with them open?
Where I live, mid-Missouri, they have the doors shut in inclemant or cold weather. Open in the Spring through Fall. No Air Conditioning in those things you know. Much nicer with a breeze blowing through.
They have to jump in and out of the truck all day long. Opening and closing the door each time would get to be a pain in the ass.
Actually, I think the pain would be in the arms, shoulders and back.
It keeps them cool too. You know how hot it gets in a step vans, my goodness it’s outrageous in there? The engine is in there with you and the only thing seperating it with you is a metal box cover with some high temp insulation.
UPS drivers are expected to trim every possible second from each delivery, and most of them take pride in that. Each driver has a massive number of stops to make, and they have to rush, rush, rush to make them all in one shift. They don’t have time to chat, either. That’s why Mr. or Ms. Brown is often on the way back to the truck by the time you get your door open.
That and they are brown and made mostly of aluminum as well. Just about the worst color (except for black of course) and material combination for trying to keep cool. I worked for a company that made UPS trucks and we tried to get them to use a white fiberglass roof. The UPS execs said no way, they were proud of being “Brown”, driver comfort be damned. 
I thought UPS trucks have translucent fiberglass roofs to let light in?
They didn’t back in 95 when I worked on them. Some of the newer models may have finally gotten them but it’s hard to keep up to date since they keep those things forever. FedEx and Airbourne (now DHL) have had white/translucent fiberglass roofs at leat since the early 90’s.
They had fiberglass roofs in '84 when I shipped by UPS. I would often toss the packages into the back of the truck and saw the roof from the inside.
One of the other reasons is wear and tear on the door. Opening and closing a door that many times in one day is going to wear it out fast. Then the truck is out of service while the door is fixed. Instead leave it open as much as possible. I know the garbage company here is constantly fixing the doors on their trucks because of wear and tear.
-Otanx
That’s kind of a shame. Every time I see a UPS truck, I can’t help but think how much fun it’d be to buy one of those and turn it into an RV.
I would also hazard a guess that, being sliding doors, the windows on them don’t open…
There are plenty of used panel trucks out there, just a matter of tracking one down.
They are very dangerous doors.
I drove one for a while.
If the door is not positively latched open it can slam shut when you put on the brakes,
knocking or breaking your steering elbow.
Dunno about UPS, but I’m on good terms with the FedEx guy who works my place of employment. Keeping cool is definitely an issue. As has been said, there’s no A/C in those trucks. He wears shorts (FedEx has uniform shorts as well as long pants) from early spring to late fall. He probably starts wearing shorts a month earlier than everyone else, and stops wearing them a month later than everyone else. Keeping the door open is another cooling strategy.
When I drove for them (77-81) they had a translucent panel in the center of the roof, but the most of the top was the brown fiberglas. I wonder if there were regional differences between the trucks?
As to the door, egress/ingress were the main reasons for keeping it open. Except for long drives to/from my delivery area, I kept mine open even when it was snowing. It’s fairly safe because the driver is belted into the seat. I know this because I had a wreck* and rolled mine onto its side (while all the doors were open), and I was unscathed.
*This helped start my brand new career on oil platforms :rolleyes:
I had a summer job in a warehouse in St Louis around this time, and we had a UPS truck at our dock twice a day (delivery in the morning, pickup in the afternoon). I definitely remember the trucks having translucent roofs.