Plan a Travel Rotation That Works for the Job and Home

Cooper, a project manager from Kansas City, was drinking a Miller Lite at Enoch's Pub in Monroe, Louisiana, when Tyler Bridges of The Advocate asked about life around Meta's Hyperion data center in Richland Parish. He would not give his last name. "I'm away from my wife," he says. "I see her every two weeks." His next line matters more to a scheduler. "Every flight out of Monroe is full."

Bridges found Leah Childers, a 23-year-old electrician from Paris, Texas, at a food truck park just off La. 183, opposite the site. She works 58 hours a week. With a 48-minute drive to work, she wakes at 4:30 a.m. every workday, according to the Aug. 21, 2026 story.

A days-on, days-off ratio shows none of that, so map the cycle by clock time.

One full cycle runs from the last task to the first task back

Take the published rotation and add the pieces it usually leaves out: shift end, the drive to lodging or the airport, each connection, arrival at home, the trip back, badging at the site entrance and the first toolbox talk after return. Use the route the worker will actually take.

Leaving a big site takes time. "There are 5,000 to 7,000 vehicles per day entering the site," Richland Parish Sheriff Neal Harwell says. The same story reports a $380 nightly quote at the Hampton Inn in Monroe.

Flights are the other weak spot. In the U.S. DOT Air Travel Consumer Report issued in February 2026, reporting operating carriers scheduled 7,001,619 domestic flights in 2025, and 76.34% of them arrived less than 15 minutes late, down from 77.91% in 2024. Another 102,876, or 1.47%, were cancelled. Three of the four regional operating carriers in the table below did worse than the all-carrier average; SkyWest did slightly better.

At Monroe Regional Airport, first-quarter passengers went from just over 22,000 in 2025 to just over 26,000 in 2026, KNOE reported. Airport director Charles Butcher says of the growth, "with all the construction going on, the meta project, we think that's attributed to that." American Airlines had started a Dallas Fort Worth flight a few months earlier, and Butcher expects "it's going to be even harder to get a seat here."

So draw two cycles, an ordinary one and a holiday one. On Nov. 30, 2025, the Sunday after Thanksgiving, TSA screened more than 3.1 million people, a record, on a day with over 1,000 cancellations and more than 13,000 delays nationwide by FlightAware's count, ABC News reported. If the return trip works only with a clean connection on a day like that, book the backup route now.

The travel day is often paid work time

A paid travel hour and a usable hour at home are two separate questions. The federal rule on the first one is 29 CFR 785.39, which says travel away from home "is clearly worktime when it cuts across the employee's workday," and that this covers the corresponding hours on nonworking days. The regulation's own example is a 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. worker, whose travel during those hours is worktime "on Saturday and Sunday as well." Riding as a passenger outside regular hours is not counted, as an enforcement policy (DOL Fact Sheet #22 says the same in plainer words).

The Labor Department applied this to a construction company in Opinion Letter FLSA2020-16 (Nov. 3, 2020). The remote site sat 1.5 to 4 hours from the company's base, and the company paid for a hotel plus a per diem meal stipend. The daily hotel-to-site drive was ordinary commuting. The laborers' trip out and back at the start and end of the job was paid if it fell in their normal work hours, even on a day off. State law or a bargaining agreement can add to that.

Driving is different again when the employer requires it. Under 29 CFR 785.41, the driver, or a required helper riding along, is working, and in that letter the foremen, who had to drive the company trucks to the site, were paid for that travel in every scenario. "We need to understand that driving is working," says Michael Hyland, then senior vice president of engineering services at the American Public Power Association, in a 2017 T&D World piece on traveling line crews. "In fact, more injuries can happen on the road getting to the mutual aid site than during the work itself," he says.

Per diem goes on its own line. Under 29 CFR 778.217(c)(2), a travel reimbursement at or below the federal travel regulation or IRS maximum is per se reasonable and stays out of the regular rate used to figure overtime, while a disproportionately large excess counts as pay. The GSA's FY2027 standard CONUS rate, for travel on or after Oct. 1, 2026, is $113 for lodging plus $68 for meals and incidentals, or $181 a day, with 295 locations set higher. On a single multi-year site, IRS Publication 463 says an assignment realistically expected to last more than 1 year is indefinite, and that location becomes the tax home. Our piece on writing a per diem policy covers the paperwork.

Where the employer does not provide housing, the alternative can be what Troy Schrenk, chief commercial officer at Target Hospitality, which builds workforce housing in Texas and Nevada, calls "Hotel F-250": sleeping in a vehicle and spending the per diem on food, as a Bloomberg story republished by Insurance Journal puts it. A night in a truck cab is poor rest before a shift or a long drive home, so plan lodging the crew can actually book.

Put a rest number on the schedule

OSHA's worker fatigue page puts 12-hour days at a 37% higher injury risk. It also cites a 2005 survey of 2,737 medical residents in which every extended shift scheduled in a month raised the monthly risk of a crash on the commute home by 16.2%. The AAA Foundation found that a driver with 4 to 5 hours of sleep in a 24-hour period had 4.3 times the crash risk of one with 7 or more.

"We'd rather have them go home, get eight hours of sleep and start in the morning," Hyland says.

The trucking rule is a usable benchmark. Under 49 CFR 395.3(a)(2), a driver of a property-carrying commercial vehicle may not drive after 14 consecutive hours on duty that follow 10 hours off. An electrician in a personal truck is not covered, but a 10-hour last shift plus a 5-hour drive home would put a trucker past that limit.

Nuclear outages already run on written numbers. 10 CFR 26.205(d) caps covered workers at 16 hours in any 24, 26 in any 48 and 72 in any 7 days, with a 10-hour break between work periods (8 when a crew is changing shift schedules) and a 34-hour break in any 9 days. In the first 60 days of an outage, maintenance workers still get at least 1 day off in any 7. Entergy's Grand Gulf refueling outage in February 2026 brought in more than 1,300 extra workers, many from outside the area.

A late relief costs the outgoing crew hours

The NRC rule says it directly. Under 10 CFR 26.205(b)(1), "shift holdovers to cover for late arrivals of incoming shift members" count toward the limits, and only the time needed to transfer information and responsibilities can be left out as turnover. When relief misses a flight, the holdover counts against the outgoing crew's limits.

Where a crew services plant machinery or equipment, the lockout handoff has a written minimum. 29 CFR 1910.147(f)(4) requires specific procedures at shift or personnel changes for "the orderly transfer of lockout or tagout device protection between off-going and oncoming employees." OSHA's staffing coordination guidance says "managers with decision-making authority" should be available for day-to-day coordination. Put that manager's name on the rotation as the first call when relief is late. Our post-outage handoff piece covers what changes hands.

Travel crews turn over most

Ace Electric, a Valdosta, Georgia, electrical contractor, runs some data center work with local teams and some with travel teams, human resources director Mindy Bates said at an AGC webinar. "The travel team data center work does have the highest turnover particularly in the field and the electricians and helpers level," she says, as Construction Dive reported.

The AGC and NCCER 2026 workforce survey, with 1,830 respondents, found 83% of firms report at least some turnover among new field employees in their first 90 days. The survey analysis lists travel or scheduling requirements among the reasons, after a mismatch with expectations and the physical demands of the job. Clayco revised its incentive programs for larger projects to include travel rotations, Construction Dive reported. "Nobody is going to win retention on compensation alone," says Katie Lane, Clayco's chief talent officer.

Ask each traveler what home time means to them. Nashville's IBEW Local 429 was "kind of a suitcase local," says vice president Laura Looch. "Some of them are only happy when they're on the road, but some really want to spend time back at their own house," she told The Electrical Worker in April 2026.

This article is general information, not tax or legal advice. Check your own situation with a CPA, an enrolled agent or a lawyer.

Sources

1. From RV camps to packed hotels, Meta data center project has LA parish bursting at the seams, Tyler Bridges, The Advocate, Aug. 21, 2026.
2. Air Travel Consumer Report, February 2026, U.S. Department of Transportation, Office of Aviation Consumer Protection, February 2026.
3. Monroe Airport sees increase in number of passengers flying out of Monroe, Elijah Mangum, KNOE, June 19, 2026.
4. TSA sets all-time record as 3.1 million travelers screened Sunday amid holiday flight cancellations, Ayesha Ali, ABC News, Dec. 1, 2025.
5. 29 CFR 785.39, Travel away from home community, eCFR, accessed Sept. 29, 2026.
6. Fact Sheet #22, Hours Worked Under the Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA), U.S. Department of Labor Wage and Hour Division, revised July 2008.
7. Opinion Letter FLSA2020-16, U.S. Department of Labor Wage and Hour Division, Nov. 3, 2020.
8. 29 CFR 785.41, Work performed while traveling, eCFR, accessed Sept. 29, 2026.
9. Tactical Tips for Utility Mutual Assistance, Amy Fischbach, T&D World, Aug. 30, 2017.
10. 29 CFR 778.217, Reimbursement for expenses, eCFR, accessed Sept. 29, 2026.
11. GSA Per Diem Bulletin FTR 27-01, U.S. General Services Administration, Aug. 18, 2026.
12. Publication 463 (2025), Travel, Gift, and Car Expenses, Internal Revenue Service, 2025 edition.
13. AI 'Man Camps' Offer Golf, Free Steaks to Lure Workers in Texas, Joe Lovinger, Brooke Sutherland and Riley Griffin (Bloomberg), Insurance Journal, March 6, 2026.
14. Long Work Hours, Extended or Irregular Shifts, and Worker Fatigue, Hazards, Occupational Safety and Health Administration, accessed Sept. 29, 2026.
15. Missing 1-2 Hours of Sleep Doubles Crash Risk, AAA Newsroom, Dec. 6, 2016.
16. 49 CFR 395.3, Maximum driving time for property-carrying vehicles, eCFR, accessed Sept. 29, 2026.
17. 10 CFR 26.205, Work hours, eCFR, accessed Sept. 29, 2026.
18. Grand Gulf begins scheduled refueling outage, Entergy, Feb. 16, 2026.
19. 29 CFR 1910.147, The control of hazardous energy (lockout/tagout), eCFR, accessed Sept. 29, 2026.
20. Communication and Coordination for Host Employers, Contractors, and Staffing Agencies, Occupational Safety and Health Administration, accessed Sept. 29, 2026.
21. Labor squeeze prompts revised construction workforce strategies, Sebastian Obando, Construction Dive, Sept. 14, 2026.
22. Construction Workforce Shortages Remain Acute Despite 'Soft' Market Conditions As Data Centers Strain Labor Supply, Survey Finds, Associated General Contractors of America, Sept. 3, 2026.
23. 2026 Workforce Survey Analysis, Associated General Contractors of America and NCCER, September 2026.
24. 'It's about taking care of people': How top contractors staff data center jobs, Sebastian Obando, Construction Dive, Sept. 2, 2026.
25. Tennessee Local Keeping Members at Home With Modular Jobs, The Electrical Worker (IBEW), April 1, 2026.

Featured image: Carol M. Highsmith, Library of Congress (public domain).