California Drivers requirements and Lenght Laws

[Dennis]

Marv,

Thanks again for all your help; you are truely both a great resource and very much appreciated.

My RV mechanics seem to be very good at what they do so I will pass this information on to them and let you know how it turns out.

BTW, I had an interesting conversation this morning here at the RV park with the owner of a 45 coach. He was telling me how the California CHP are ticketing over 40 foot coaches for driving on under 40 foot roads; road in California are designated. I know California has new requirments for driving an over 40 foot coach, you need a non-commercial class C license which among other things requires an annual medical, but I did not know that you could only drive on certain roads. He told me the CHP not only tickets the drivers but requires that they have the Coach towed to a over 40 road; they will not let them drive it. Makes me appreciate the M380 that much more.

Dennis

[peteaeonix]

California requires a "non commercial class B" driver's license for drivers of motorhomes over 40' in length. The license requires a doctor-signed one page medical questionnaire be submitted to the DMV every two years.

This CA.gov page discusses the restrictions on over-length motorhomes. These rules apply to commercial busses as well. (Of course trucks have various similar restrictions as well, depending on length.)
http://www.dot.ca.gov/hq/traffops/tr...motorhomes.htm

This is the list of restricted routes. As indicated on the above-referenced page, almost all of these have a "kingpin to rear axle" restriction sign (for trucks), so there is a warning on the route.
http://www.dot.ca.gov/hq/traffops/tr...s-restrict.htm

Oddly, the restrictions on several routes through the coast range (between US 101 and CA 1) leave sections of CA 1 where there is no restriction, but no legal way to get to the unrestricted segment.

The only major road with a restriction was US 101 through the Redwoods near Richardson Grove, but that one was lifted in April of 2007. Most of the rest of the roads with restrictions are very curvy, secondary highways -- but they may be the only practical route in or out of a particular area.

I've driven a couple of the restricted routes: CA 20 between Willits and Ft. Bragg -- extremely curvy. I averaged about 20 miles per hour for the 20 mile length of this road. I also drove the restricted portion of CA 4. The warning sign was located at a point where there was no alternative route to turn onto -- and there was no practical place to turn around. Eventually, I came upon the reason for the restriction -- the road was on top of a levee with a 90 degree turn onto a bridge across the channel followed by a second 90 degree turn back onto the levee top road on the opposite side of the channel (in the delta region of the Sacramento River). The 90 degree turns required taking both lanes of the road to negotiate -- and the narrow bridge required driving down the center -- pretty obvious why large vehicles were discouraged.

I've been fortunate to avoid these restricted routes -- and I've been doubly fortunate to not encounter a CHP officer while on them.

I imagine that other states might have similar restrictions on various routes due to potential safety issues, but I will observe that CA seems to have a rather unenlightened view toward their traffic laws.