BILL ANALYSIS Ó
AB 198
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ASSEMBLY THIRD READING
AB
198 (Frazier)
As Introduced January 28, 2015
Majority vote
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|Committee |Votes |Ayes |Noes |
| | | | |
| | | | |
|----------------+------+--------------------+--------------------|
|Transportation |15-0 |Frazier, Achadjian, | |
| | |Baker, Campos, Chu, | |
| | |Daly, Dodd, Eduardo | |
| | |Garcia, Gomez, Kim, | |
| | |Linder, Medina, | |
| | |Melendez, Nazarian, | |
| | |O'Donnell | |
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SUMMARY: Enables an authorized tow truck operator to use the
center median or right shoulder of a highway in the event of an
emergency that requires the immediate removal of traffic
impediments, if specific conditions are met.
EXISTING LAW:
1)Prohibits a person who has full control of a vehicle from
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stopping, parking, or leave standing the vehicle upon a freeway,
as specified.
2)Exempts tow truck operators authorized by the California Highway
Patrol (CHP) from the abovementioned prohibitions for purposes
of rapid removal of impediments to freeway traffic.
FISCAL EFFECT: Unknown. This bill is keyed non-fiscal by the
Legislative Counsel.
COMMENTS: Extensive research has found traffic congestion to have
negative economic and social impacts on motorists including,
productivity loss, tardiness (employment, meetings, business
appointments), vehicle wear and tear, motorist road rage, and loss
of fuel. For example, the federal Department of Transportation
has reported that motorists burn more than 2.8 billion gallons of
gasoline every year while stuck in traffic. In California,
highway traffic congestion and travel delays are an everyday
occurrence for motorists. A report released by the Federal
Highway Administration (FHWA) found California's highways to be
the busiest in the country. Overall, along with Interstates 10
and 110 ranking in the top 10, the study found Interstate 5 to be
the busiest interstate in the country and additionally found the
Los Angeles section of Interstate 405 to be the busiest interstate
in any American city.
While traffic congestion is caused by a variety of factors, one of
the most frequent causes is vehicle impediments such as vehicle
break downs, abandoned vehicles, and vehicle collisions. Many
times, these types of impediments may partially block a highway or
require lane closures for vehicle removal resulting in significant
travel delays. In one study, the National Highway Traffic Safety
Administration (2014) concluded that traffic congestion tied to
vehicle collisions cost motorists $28 billion annually.
Additional studies have shown that every one minute of delay
caused by a traffic incident results in four minutes of congestion
delay. In California, accident data reports that in 2012,
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approximately 69,000 vehicle injury collisions occurred during
peak commute times.
In response, FHWA developed the Traffic Incident Management
Program (TIM) in collaboration with a number of state and local
stakeholders involved in highway incident response and traffic
management. Housed under FHWA's Office of Transportation
Operations, TIM consists of a planned and coordinated
multi-disciplinary process to detect, respond to, and clear
traffic incidents so that traffic flow may be restored as safely
and quickly as possible. TIM's end goal is to reduce the duration
and impacts of traffic incidents and improve the safety of
motorists, crash victims, and emergency responders.
This bill adopts one of TIM's policy recommendations aimed at
reducing the period a vehicle is impeding highway traffic by
allowing a peace officer to authorize a tow truck operator to
travel on a highway's center median or right shoulder in order to
remove disabled vehicles in a timely manner. Currently, law
enforcement officers responding to a traffic incident cannot grant
this authority to tow operators, in turn causing extended traffic
delays in many circumstances. As a result, the author asserts,
"as one TIM's identified best practices, this bill provides law
enforcement with the flexibility to determine the most effective
approach in removing disabled vehicles impeding highway traffic
and causing significant delays."
Analysis Prepared by:
Manny Leon / TRANS. / (916) 319-2093 FN: 0000073
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