No sooner did the California Highway Patrol attempt to demistify its rulebook for lane-splitting in the Golden State, then did California State Senate Bill 350 get drafted and put on the state’s voting docket. A piece of legislation put forth by Sen. Jim Beall (D-San Jose), S.B. 350 would have put greater restrictions on motorcyclists’ ability to lane-split on Californian highways.

Introduced on February 20th, Senator Beall’s proposed law would have made lane-splitting legal in only certain circumstances: on divided highways with three or more lanes of travel in the same direction, only when traffic is congested, and only at “a safe” speed.

Live outside the Golden State, and you realize that California is a special place, in virtually every sense of the word. As a sixth-generation inhabitant of the world’s ninth largest economy, regular readers of A&R will already have made note that I am somewhat militant about California, and one of the many reasons for this is the state’s pro-motorcycle culture.

Land of perpetual sunshine, abundant coastal and mountain roads, and the epicenter of the American motorcycle industry, California has another thing going for motorcyclists as well: you can lane-split here. You motorcyclists in the other 49 states of the Union don’t understand what you are missing with this simple act, and if there was one single law that the AMA/MIC should be pushing to pass in every state in order to help swell the ranks of motorcyclists on the road, it would be laws allowing lane-splitting (also known as lane-sharing, or lane-filtering).

What is driving in a safe and prudent manner though? A highly subjective and poorly defined bit of phrasing, the CHP and state legislature have done themselves a disservice in waiting so long to define exactly how they interpret this provision. After all, there is no provision in the CVC that outlaws steering a car with one’s feet, though one would think the California Highway Patrol (CHP) would certainly, and rightfully, ticket you back to the stone age for such an action.

Lane-splitting in California is no different, with no working definition on what was “safe and prudent” on a motorcycle, common practice and adoption have taken hold of the two-wheeled art of getting through traffic congestion. Thought originally to be a concession to the air-cooled machines of the time, lane-splitting catered well to motorcycle riders whose machines would quickly overheat while sitting in traffic.

Also a relic of a time when highway congestion of was considerably less of an issue than its current metropolitan pandemic, for lack of a better reason, California’s pro lane-splitting stance persists because the state has waited too long to act otherwise, and we are that much better for it.

However, what constitutes “safe and prudent” lane-splitting has always been a mystery box definition for motorcyclists, and when left to the subjective opinion of a CHP officer, the application of “the rules” can be varied, at best.

As a motorcyclists in California, we honestly don’t understand how the other 49 states get along without having lane splitting laws on the books, yet that is the case (for now at least). Although recently Texas and Arizona declined to adopt such provisions for their own motorcyclists, our cousins to the north in Oregon are contemplating allowing lane splitting.

Holding an open forum at 6:30 PM tonight in Portland, the Oregon Governor’s Advisory Committee for Motorcycle Safety is considering a recommendation for a lane splitting provision be included in the Oregonian Traffic Code, if public sentiment at the open forum favors such a move.

Arizona is considering a bill that would allow Arizonian motorcyclists to lane-split when traffic is stopped. The proposed bill should make motorcyclists happy and help relieve some traffic congestion; however all is not well in the Grand Canyon State. After the proposal of bill HB 2475, the local ABC affiliate went to the streets to ask citizens what they thought of the proposal, and the reaction they got was not a positive one.

Senator John Carona of Dallas, Texas has introduced Senate Bill 506 to the Texas State Senate that would allow motorcyclists to lane-split through traffic. This would make Texas the only other state besides California to allow lane-splitting.

The bill proposes some strict guidelines to balance the public safety and traffic flow advantages:

The operator and the passenger have to be wearing helmets. The operator has to operate the motorcycle not more than 5 miles-an-hour faster than the rest of traffic is going. Traffic can’t be going over 20 miles-an-hour and it can’t be done in a school crossing zone or somewhere where the speed limit is less than 20 miles-an-hour.

These regulations are more clear and precise than the California legislations which states that a motorcyclist must simply be riding prudently and safely (something that is often left to the discretion of the police officer). If you live and ride in Texas and have an opinion on this bill, now is the time to let your legislators know.

Source: The Kneeslidder; Photo: eschipul / Creative Commons – Attribution-ShareAlike 2.0 Generic