Two Person/Two Seater in CarPool Lane
Bob Flaminio
It is said that if you have a two-seat car (such as a Honda CRX) with two
people riding in it that you are allowed to use carpool lanes usually
reserved for vehicles with three or more occupants. A reference to this law
was in Sunday's SF Examiner (available at
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/examiner/article.cgi?year=1997&month=03&day=02
&article=NEWS5827.dtl ), quoted below:
>>>
BUT OFFICER . . .
The Highway Patrol says it repeatedly hears the same excuses from drivers
who illegally work their way into car-pool lanes. The top 10:
* 1. "I didn't know it was a car-pool lane." By far the most popular.
* 5. "But this is a one-seater car." After a state law passed in 1995
allowing people with two-seat cars to use three-person car-pool lanes, some
drivers removed their car's passenger seats and tried to tell the CHP that
they qualified to drive alone in the car-pool lane. The law only pertains
to the number of seats installed when the vehicle was manufactured.
<<<
Can anyone out there confirm/deny this? I rode in a bunch of carpool lanes
today in my CRX with my wife, drove past lots of police, and then got
nailed for carpool violation by a young, militant CHP. The Vehicle Code at
http://www.leginfo.ca.gov/calaw.html doesn't mention this law (as far as I
can tell; their search mechanism is fairly primitive), but it's a rather
new law, and the website could be out of date.
TIA for any help anyone can provide,
-Bob Flaminio
b...@flaminio.com
Chuck
I'd sue the newspaper for publishing the wrong facts! You could try
going to court and blame the newspaper, but I doubt the judge will have
a sense of humor.
BTW, if it says the carpool is 3, you better have 3 in the car, and
being pregnant doesn't count as 2.
--
Chuck.....
"SPAMMERS must be rooted out and killed"
Spam Safeguard: To reply to this message, e-mail to:
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antho...@aol.com
In article <01bc2910$066aa840$f8ea56ce@flaminio>, "Bob Flaminio" <b...@flaminio.com> writes:
>* 5. "But this is a one-seater car." After a state law passed in 1995
>allowing people with two-seat cars to use three-person car-pool lanes, some
>drivers removed their car's passenger seats and tried to tell the CHP that
>they qualified to drive alone in the car-pool lane. The law only pertains
>to the number of seats installed when the vehicle was manufactured.
I heard this was passed after a (peninsula?) legislator with a two-seater
got ticketed/stuck in Bay Bridge traffic. My question: I have a small Toyota
pickup truck. It has a floor-mounted stickshift and a bench seat. Is it a
two-seater or a three-seater? If I remove the middle seat belt, is it a two-seater?
(I would expect that few cops will check under the seat for traces of a removed
seat-belt.) I cross the Bay Bridge regularly, and am occasionally with passenger
during car-pool lane hours.
Anthony Argyriou
Larry McMahan
antho...@aol.com writes:
: In article <01bc2910$066aa840$f8ea56ce@flaminio>, "Bob Flaminio" <b...@flaminio.com> writes:
: My question: I have a small Toyota
: pickup truck. It has a floor-mounted stickshift and a bench seat. Is it a
: two-seater or a three-seater? If I remove the middle seat belt, is it a two-seater?
: (I would expect that few cops will check under the seat for traces of a removed
: seat-belt.) I cross the Bay Bridge regularly, and am occasionally with passenger
: during car-pool lane hours.
If it has three seat belts, it's a three seater. If you remove one, its is still a
three seater. It is as manufactured, not current condition.
: Anthony Argyriou