BILL ANALYSIS
SENATE TRANSPORTATION & HOUSING COMMITTEE BILL NO: AB 213
SENATOR ALAN LOWENTHAL, CHAIRMAN AUTHOR: Lowenthal
VERSION: 3/25/09
Analysis by: Mark Stivers FISCAL: No
Hearing date: June 9, 2009
SUBJECT:
Left-side parking
DESCRIPTION:
This bill allows cities and counties, under specified
conditions, to permit parking on the left side of two-way local
residential streets that dead-end with no cul-de-sac or other
designated turnaround area.
ANALYSIS:
Under current law, drivers must generally park their vehicles in
the same direction as the flow of traffic (i.e., on the right
side of two-way roadways and on either side of one-way
roadways). The premise for this requirement is that it helps to
avoid head-on collisions with oncoming traffic that would be
risked when entering or exiting parking spaces that face the
flow of traffic.
Under current law, a driver may back a vehicle onto a street or
highway only when such a movement can be made with reasonable
safety.
This bill allows a city or county, by ordinance or resolution,
to permit drivers to park vehicles on the left-hand side of
residential streets that dead-end with no cul-de-sac or other
designated turnaround area, if the city or county makes a
finding supported by a professional engineering study that the
ordinance or resolution is justified by the need to facilitate
the safe and orderly movement of vehicles. A city or county may
limit application of the ordinance or resolution to certain
streets or portions of streets, and the ordinance or resolution
does not apply until the city or county erects proper signage.
AB 213 (B. LOWENTHAL) Page 2
COMMENTS:
1.Purpose of the bill . According to the author, the Peninsula
area of Long Beach has a significant number of narrow, parking
impacted, dead-end streets with no cul-de-sacs. It is very
difficult for drivers to turn around on these streets, and
when they do, the likelihood of a fender bender accident is
great. As a result, residents and visitors have long parked
their vehicles facing the wrong direction on the street, in
violation of the Vehicle Code. The city has issued parking
citations for these offenses, which has led to frustrated
residents who believe it is safer to park facing the wrong
direction than to turn around. This bill allows a city to
permit left-side parking on such streets provided that it
facilitates the safe and orderly movement of vehicles.
2.Backing out into traffic . The issue raised by this bill is
not left-side parking on dead-end streets but the fact that
drivers who do not turn around on the side streets are forced
to back into the adjacent arterial. In the case of the
Peninsula, this means backing into four-lane Ocean Boulevard.
Moreover, because Ocean Boulevard itself dead-ends at the end
of the Peninsula, residents entering Ocean Boulevard from the
south must either back across two-lanes of eastbound traffic
to access the westbound lanes that lead into town and to all
other destinations or back into the adjacent eastbound lanes
and make a u-turn to head west.
The author points out that Peninsula residents have been
backing into the immediately adjacent lanes and making later
u-turns for some time without any significant negative safety
impacts being observed and that neither the Long Beach police
nor the city's traffic engineer foresees any detrimental
impacts from the continued practice. Nonetheless, it is this
concern that prompted the author to accept the amendment to
require a city finding supported by a professional engineering
study that left-side parking is justified by the need to
facilitate the safe and orderly movement of vehicles.
Presumably, the city would still ticket drivers who back
across two lanes of traffic to reach the westbound lanes.
3.Arguments in opposition . The California Highway Patrol (CHP)
believes that parking concerns affecting a few small streets
in selected communities should be handled at the local level
without a change to state statutes. As an alternative, CHP
AB 213 (B. LOWENTHAL) Page 3
encourages the City of Long Beach to provide additional space
for vehicles to turn around on the one-way streets by
implementing a parking permit system or limiting parking to
one side of the street.
Assembly Votes:
Floor: 75-0
Trans: 14-0
POSITIONS: (Communicated to the Committee before noon on
Wednesday,
June 3, 2009)
SUPPORT: City of Long Beach (sponsor)
American Federation of State, County and
Municipal Employees
Peninsula Beach Preservation Group
OPPOSED: California Highway Patrol