Costa Mesa auto accident and product injury legal blog

Since the 1990s when the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration developed its five-star car safety rating system, there have undoubtedly been improvements in the automotive industry. Automakers have been prompted to build safer vehicles so as to attain a four- or five-star rating from the federal government. However, California residents should know about a report that argues that there is room for improvement in the rating system.

The report, written by a former leader in the NHTSA's crash testing program and published in October 2019, states that the U.S. is lagging behind Europe, Asia and Latin America with regards to its testing. Europe, for instance, performs four times as many crash tests as the U.S. does before rating its vehicles.

Every year, the Commercial Vehicle Safety Alliance conducts the International Roadcheck, a 72-hour inspection spree of commercial motor vehicles that's meant to enforce federal CMV safety regulations. Truckers in California should know that the 2020 roadcheck has been set for May 5 to 7: a full month earlier than in previous years. The reason has to do with achieving favorable weather conditions for certain jurisdictions.

Apart from the earlier date, there will be nothing too different in the 2020 spree. Most inspections will be Level I inspections, which are 37-point inspections and the most comprehensive type. For the truck inspection, inspectors will check the braking system, fuel system, tires, suspension, steering, lights and more.

California big rig drivers should know that the number of fatal crashes in their industry has gone up over the years. There was a 52.6% increase in fatal large-truck crashes from 2009 to 2018 with the latter year seeing a total of 4,415 such incidents. Various factors explain this rise, and the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration is planning to conduct a study on them. It made the formal proposal in January 2020.

The FMCSA sent Congress the results of its last large-truck crash causation study in 2006, so an update is clearly necessary. Researchers will be looking into the impact that phone use, especially calling and texting, has had on truckers. Driver behavior has also been influenced by the presence of in-cab navigation systems and fleet management systems.

Bicyclists in California are allowed to travel straight from a right or left-turn lane, thanks to a bill that was signed by Gov. Gavin Newsom on Sept. 4. AB 1266 was aimed at helping bicyclists stay safer at busy intersections by allowing them to proceed straight without the need to change lanes.

Bicyclists traveling in busy areas sometimes encounter bike lanes that end right before an intersection and become a right- or left-turn lane. Before AB 1266, bicyclists that wanted to go straight through these intersections had to change lanes to enter the go-straight lane. Once they were through the intersection, they then had to change lanes again in order to get back into the bike lane.