BILL ANALYSIS
SB 535
Page 1
SENATE THIRD READING
SB 535 (Yee)
As Amended July 6, 2009
Majority vote
SENATE VOTE :29-5
TRANSPORTATION 9-2 APPROPRIATIONS 15-0
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|Ayes:|Eng, Blumenfield, Conway, |Ayes:|De Leon, Conway, Ammiano, |
| |Brownley, Galgiani, | | |
| |Bonnie Lowenthal, Miller, | |Charles Calderon, Coto, |
| |Solorio, Torlakson | |Davis, Duvall, Hall, |
| | | |Harkey, Miller, |
| | | |John A. Perez, Solorio, |
| | | |Audra Strickland, |
| | | |Torlakson, Hill |
|-----+--------------------------+-----+--------------------------|
|Nays:|Jeffries, Niello | | |
| | | | |
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SUMMARY : Allows certain highly fuel-efficient vehicles to
travel in high-occupancy vehicle (HOV) lanes without the
required number of passengers, beginning in 2011. Specifically,
this bill :
1)Requires the Department of Motor Vehicles (DMV), upon request
and payment of the required fee, to issue distinctive decals,
labels, and other identifiers (i.e., stickers) to the owners
of vehicles that meet the state's enhanced advanced technology
partial zero-emission vehicle (enhanced AT PZEV) standard and
have a 65 miles per gallon (mpg) or greater combined fuel
economy rating.
2)Allows vehicles displaying these stickers to travel in HOV
lanes, regardless of whether they meet the lanes' occupancy
requirements.
3)Provides that, notwithstanding provision #2 above,
stickered-vehicles are not exempt from toll charges when
traveling in high occupancy toll (HOT) lanes that are part of
a federally supported value-pricing and transit development
demonstration program on State Route 110 and Interstate 10 in
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Los Angeles County.
4)Limits the number of such stickers to a cumulative total of
65,000.
5)Allows DMV to additionally issue replacement stickers in the
instance where a vehicle with a sticker becomes nonrepairable
or a total salvage loss and the vehicle owner, within six
months, obtains another qualifying vehicle.
6)Makes the above provisions effective on January 1, 2011 and
sunsets them on January 1, 2015, or at any time that the
Secretary of State (SOS) receives notice from the California
Department of Transportation (Caltrans) that federal law does
not authorize HOV lane access for single-occupant vehicles
with such stickers.
7)Extends the January 1, 2011 sunset for current HOV lane
privileges for vehicles that meet the state's super ultra-low
emission vehicle (SULEV) standard for exhaust emissions and
the federal inherently low-emission vehicle (ILEV) evaporative
emission standard until such time as the SOS receives notice
from Caltrans that federal law does not authorize HOV lane
access for single-occupant vehicles that meet those standards.
EXISTING LAW :
1)Allows Caltrans and local authorities to reserve highway lanes
within their respective jurisdictions for the exclusive use of
HOVs.
2)Prohibits the operation of single occupant vehicles in HOV
lanes, with the exception of motorcycles and stickered Clean
Air vehicles.
3)Allows DMV to issue 85,000 Clean Air stickers to hybrid
vehicles that meet specified emission criteria and have a fuel
economy rating of at least 45 mpg.
4)Allows a vehicle that meets California's super ultra-low
emission vehicle standard for exhaust emissions and the
federal inherently low-emission vehicle evaporative emission
standard, or a vehicle that was produced during the 2004
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model-year or earlier and meets California ultra-low emission
vehicle standard for exhaust emissions and the federal
inherently low-emission vehicle evaporative emission standard,
to operate in an HOV lane without regard to occupancy levels.
(As a practical matter, this means electric and natural
gas-powered vehicles.)
5)Requires DMV to issue Clean Air stickers to vehicles meeting
those standards.
6)Allows single-occupant Clean Air vehicles to operate in HOV
lanes until such time as Caltrans determines that federal law
does not authorize the state to allow such vehicles to use
those lanes.
7)Requires Caltrans to submit a notice of such a determination
to SOS, at which time HOV lane access privileges for single
occupant Clean Air vehicles would be terminated.
8)Requires Caltrans to remove individual HOV lanes, or HOV lane
segments, during periods of peak congestion from these access
provisions if it finds that the lane or lane segment exceeds a
level of service C, and that the operation or projected
operation of Clean Air vehicles will significantly increase
HOV lane congestion.
9)Sunsets HOV lane access privileges for Clean Air vehicles when
the SOS receives Caltrans' notification of a federal ban, or
on January 1, 2011, whichever occurs first.
FISCAL EFFECT : According to the Assembly Appropriations
Committee, minor costs to DMV to issue permits and those costs
will be fully offset by fees charged to vehicle owners.
COMMENTS : An HOV lane, commonly referred to as a "carpool" or
"diamond" lane, is part of a traffic management strategy
designed to reduce the number of single occupancy vehicles
during peak periods of traffic congestion. These lanes are
intended to provide an incentive for commuters to form carpools
by offering reduced travel times. The declared legislative
intent in establishing these lanes is to relieve traffic
congestion, conserve fuel, and reduce vehicular emissions. Over
the years, advocates for many groups have suggested using HOV
lane access to reward certain behaviors or to ease the commute
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for one class of motorists or another. Historically, HOV lane
access has been proposed for doctors, seniors, veterans, the
disabled, and others. These proposals were rejected as being
inconsistent with the original intent of establishing the lanes,
which is to reduce congestion.
Subsequently, AB 71 (Cunneen), Chapter 330, Statutes of 1999,
extended to certain "Clean Air" vehicles the privilege of using
HOV lanes even when required occupancy levels are not met.
Vehicles meeting AB 71's standard are generally limited to
battery-powered vehicles and those operating on compressed
natural gas, neither of which is especially prevalent in
California's vehicle fleet. Proponents of AB 71 contended that
that this bill would induce the purchase and investment in clean
air vehicles, consistent with at least a part of the legislative
intent in authorizing HOV lanes. In light of the relatively
small number of these vehicles, it was felt that this bill's
exemption would have negligible impact on the timesaving benefit
of HOV lanes.
Hybrid vehicles, which have become a popular means by which
vehicle manufacturers may meet consumer demand for fuel
efficiency, did not meet the clean air standard established by
AB 71; consequently, their owners and advocates were dismayed
that they were not allowed into HOV lanes. In 2004, therefore,
the Legislature enacted AB 2628 (Pavley), Chapter 725, Statutes
of 2004, extending the Clean Air provisions of AB 71 to hybrid
vehicles that achieve 45 miles per gallon fuel economy. Since
allowing large numbers of hybrids into HOV lanes would reduce
the effectiveness of the lanes by compromising their ability to
offer a quicker commute than adjacent mixed-flow lanes, AB 2628
limited the aggregate number of stickers for hybrids to 75,000
and allowed Caltrans to suspend HOV lane privileges for hybrids
on any particular lane that reaches a specified level of
congestion. AB 2600 (Lieu), Chapter 614, Statutes of 2006,
increased the limit on hybrid stickers to 85,000 and extended AB
2628's 2008 sunset date to 2011. (DMV reached the 85,000
sticker cap for hybrids in February 2007 and is no longer
issuing new hybrid stickers.)
In June of 2007, the Federal Highway Administration (FHWA)
requested Caltrans to submit a plan to address "HOV lane
degradation" on California freeways. Caltrans' analysis had
indicated that 54% of its HOV lanes had experienced such
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degradation (i.e., the lane does not maintain 45 mph or greater
operating speed during peak commute hours for 90% or more of 180
consecutive workdays). Recognizing that one component of HOV
lane congestion may be the presence of hybrid vehicles, one of
the options that Caltrans has considered is banning hybrids in
certain HOV lanes, as it is already authorized to do.
Furthermore, absent action by Congress, the current federal
authorization for non-HOVs operating in HOV lanes with Clean Air
stickers is due to expire on September 30 of this year.
(Recently-introduced legislation would extend the expiration
date to 2015.)
This bill would allow DMV to issue up to 65,000 Clean Air
stickers to "enhanced AT-PZEV" vehicles that achieve a combined
fuel economy rating of 65 MPG upon the January 1, 2011 sunset of
the existing authorization for 85,000 fuel-efficient hybrids to
operate in HOV lanes.
According to the author, there are at least five new vehicles
poised to enter the market that will meet this bill's standard:
the Chevy Volt, Fisker Karma, and Chrysler ReEV "range extended
electric vehicles" and the Ford Escape and Toyota Prius plug-in
hybrids, although Toyota is not certain this is the case, given
that no methodology has yet been established to measure the fuel
economy of plug-ins. (Extended range electric vehicles
typically operate primarily on stored battery power for 40 to 50
miles and then use a gasoline engine to recharge the battery.
Plug-in hybrids also operate primarily on stored battery power
within a similar range, after which a gasoline engine provides
power to the drive-train.) Given the potential for such
vehicles to reduce oil dependency, reduce air pollution and
counter the emission of greenhouse gasses, the author believes
the granting of HOV lanes privileges is appropriate. "Due to
this being first generation of technology, vehicle costs will be
high but it is hoped that with federal tax incentives, potential
fuel savings, and state policies such as HOV lane access would
provide a value proposition to consumers to accept this first
generation of technology and the associated higher cost of the
vehicle."
The Metropolitan Transportation Commission (MTC), noting the
growing trend for the establishment of high occupancy toll (HOT)
lanes -- which sell excess HOV lane capacity to single-occupant
vehicles upon payment of a toll -- opposes this bill. MTC fears
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that continued HOV lane access for stickered vehicles will
foster lane congestion, present enforcement challenges, and
reduce the capacity of the lanes to accommodate toll-paying
vehicles.
Along those lines, as noted above, Caltrans is already
struggling to ameliorate HOV lane congestion. The 2011 sunset
of HOV lane access privileges for conventional gas-electric
hybrids will remove 85,000 vehicles from those lanes, thereby
making Caltrans' job significantly easier. Replacing those
85,000 conventional hybrids with as many as 65,000
second-generation hybrids will bring Caltrans almost completely
back to the current situation. This operational challenge must
be balanced against the clear environmental and economic benefit
of transitioning the state's vehicle fleet to one that achieves,
by historical standards, a stunning improvement in fuel
efficiency.
Additionally, the state's experience with hybrids would seem to
indicate that gasoline prices already provide a powerful
stimulus to the sale of fuel-efficient vehicles, even when those
vehicles are significantly more expensive than their
conventional counterparts. The Toyota Prius had a waiting list
for purchasers before they were granted HOV lane privileges and
well in advance of the 2008 run-up in gasoline prices to over $4
a gallon. At such time as the economy rebounds, it is likely
that gasoline prices will again reach that level, if not
substantially higher. A 65 mile per gallon vehicle should sell
quite well in such an environment.
Finally, as also noted above, this bill may be moot in the event
that federal authorization for HOV lane access by hybrids is
allowed to expire as scheduled only three months from now.
Related legislation: AB 1500 (Lieu) would extend, until January
1, 2016, the sunset date for the statute that allows SULEV,
ULEV, and ILEV vehicles to operate in HOV lanes, whether or not
they have the required number of occupants. That bill currently
resides in the Senate Appropriations Committee.
Analysis Prepared by : Howard Posner / TRANS. / (916) 319-2093
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