BILL ANALYSIS �
SENATE TRANSPORTATION & HOUSING COMMITTEE BILL NO: SB 1155
SENATOR MARK DESAULNIER, CHAIRMAN AUTHOR: CanNella
VERSION: 2/21/12
Analysis by: Carrie Cornwell FISCAL: yes
Hearing date: April 10, 2012 URGENCY: YES
SUBJECT:
Agricultural motor truck-trailer length exemption: San Benito
County
DESCRIPTION:
This bill creates, until January 1, 2018, an exemption from
current vehicle length limits for motor truck-trailer
combinations used for transporting agricultural products in San
Benito County.
ANALYSIS:
Motor trucks are vehicles designed and used primarily for
transporting goods in their rear cargo areas, and they are not
specifically designed to pull trailers. These vehicles have no
special coupling devices to prevent rollovers when a trailer's
load shifts, nor do they have additional power to facilitate
acceleration when pulling a load.
Truck tractors (or "big rigs") by contrast are designed and used
primarily for pulling trailers and only move goods by pulling a
trailer. Truck tractors have various safety features, such as
coupling devices or "fifth wheels," which enable them to pull
trailers in a safe manner.
Existing law prohibits any combination of vehicles coupled
together, including any attachments, from exceeding a total
length of 65 feet, with certain, specified exceptions, including
an exception that allows 75-foot long truck tractor-trailer
combinations, provided no trailer exceeds 28 feet 6 inches.
This bill :
1.Exempts until January 1, 2018 a combination of vehicles
operated in San Benito County from the length limitation and
authorizes the combination to have a total length of not more
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than 75 feet if:
The combination consists of a motor truck and
two trailers;
No trailer in the combination exceeds 28 feet,
6 inches in length;
The combination is used to transport
agricultural products from the field to the first
point of handling and return, and the total distance
of transport does not exceed 160 miles;
The combination is used to transport from the
first point of handling to a designated truck route,
and the total distance of transport does not exceed 30
miles;
The combination is not operated on a highway
that is designated as a national network route;
The combination of vehicles is driven at a
speed not exceeding 50 miles per hour;
The combination of vehicles successfully
completes a California Highway Patrol (CHP) inspection
on a quarterly basis;
Agricultural entities, in consultation with
CHP, develop safe routing techniques; and
The local jurisdiction (city council or board
of supervisors) has approved the use of these vehicle
combinations on its roads.
1.Requires CHP, in consultation with the Department of
Transportation (Caltrans), to study the effect of this
exemption on public safety and to report the results of its
study to the Legislature and Governor by April 1, 2014.
2.Is an urgency measure.
COMMENTS:
1. Purpose . The author states that CHP has been actively
ticketing motor truck-trailer combination vehicles in
excess of the 65 feet limit that drive on non-federal roads
to and from agricultural production centers in San Benito
County. Many farms and processing centers in San Benito
County are accessible only by these roads. San Benito
farmers do not own the trucks being ticketed but contract
with trucking companies that are frequently located
out-of-county and sometimes out-of-state. These farmers
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cannot control which trucks are sent to pick up their
crops, and due to the time-sensitive nature of the
agricultural industry, trucking companies often cannot wait
until the appropriate truck tractor-trailers become
available to send to these parts of the county. The author
reports that rather than face the costs of additional
ticketing, some trucking companies have stopped servicing
certain parts of San Benito County altogether.
The author asserts that San Benito's agricultural industry
cannot afford the losses caused by delayed crop delivery.
He introduced this bill to exempt trucks there from the
length limits in force in California in order to protect
San Benito County's $255 million annual agricultural
production.
2. Previous legislation . Beginning in 2002, Assemblymember
and later Senator Abel Maldonado authored a series of bills
that authorized extra-long motor truck-trailer combinations
for Santa Barbara and San Luis Obispo counties. Those
bills created an exemption that lasted from 2003 through
2009 and that was very similar to the exemption this bill
proposes for San Benito County. Senator Maldonado's final
bill to extend the sunset date on the exemption for those
two counties was SB 1228 of 2008. That bill failed in this
committee on a 4 - 4 vote on August 29, 2008. The next
day, however, the Senate withdrew SB 1228 from this
committee to the floor where it passed unanimously,
extending the sunset for the Santa Barbara and San Luis
Obispo exemptions until January 1, 2010. Since then, all
counties in the state have had the same length exemptions
in force.
3. CHP study required in previous legislation . One of
Senator Maldanado's bills, SB 1237, Chapter 450, Statutes
of 2006, required that CHP in consultation with Caltrans
report to the Legislature and Governor on the public safety
impacts of the exemption for Santa Barbara and San Luis
Obispo counties. CHP issued that report in 2008, with the
following conclusions:
The study consisted of only approximately 200
vehicles in a small geographical area of the state from
January 2006 to August 2007.
It found that four accidents had occurred involving
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these motor truck-trailer vehicle combinations. Of those
four accidents, all resulted in property damage only, and
three of the four appear to have been caused by the
exempted vehicle combinations and possibly because of the
configuration of using a motor truck to pull trailers. In
addition, the CHP conducted 865 inspections of these 200
vehicles and found 866 violations such as inoperable
lights, out-of-date vehicle registrations, and inadequate
vehicle couplings.
Caltrans' primary concern with authorizing longer
motor truck-trailer combinations was the inability of
those vehicle combinations to negotiate tight turns and
the type of coupling device utilized. One of the four
collisions further supported concern for stability as the
trailer did roll over during evasive action. Another
collision demonstrated the vehicles' inability to
negotiate a tight turn without driving outside of its
lane. The report notes that both state and federal
studies support its safety concerns.
1. What's different about San Benito County ? Many
California counties have significant farming operations,
but it is San Benito only that is seeking an exemption to
allow operation of these extra long motor truck-trailer
combinations. It is unclear why this exemption is needed
in San Benito County but not elsewhere. It would appear
that farmers elsewhere in the state have complied with the
California Vehicle Code restriction on length, either by
using truck tractors to pull their trailers safely or using
shorter (i.e., under 65 feet) combinations of motor trucks
and trailers.
2. Arguments in opposition . Writing in opposition, the
Teamsters and Amalgamated Transit Union both assert that
they are fundamentally opposed to increased truck weights
and size because such vehicles are dangerous to other
motorists, difficult to stop, and destroy the roads.
POSITIONS: (Communicated to the committee before noon on
Wednesday, April 4,
2012)
SUPPORT: Council of San Benito County Governments
Western Growers
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OPPOSED: Amalgamated Transit Union
Teamsters