Even Covered, Pickup Bed Is No Place for Hauling People

Dear Street Smart:

What’s the official rule on how many people can sit in the bed of a pickup truck with a camper shell on it? The other day I counted 10 people (many of them children), and I know for sure that, if they had an accident, the children might have been thrown out.

Mario Luna

Anaheim

Except in certain instances, no passengers are allowed to ride in the back of a pickup--with or without a camper shell. The danger of riding under a camper shell was tragically dramatized last week when a family driving home to Los Angeles from a weekend in San Francisco found its three young children dead at the end of the trip. The children, sleeping under blankets in the camper shell of the family’s pickup, were apparently overcome by carbon monoxide fumes.

It was to prevent tragedies in the cargo beds of pickups that state lawmakers enacted one of the toughest laws of its kind in the country in 1993 prohibiting people from riding in them under most circumstances. Previously, children younger than 12 were not allowed to ride in back unless an adult was with them. Now, two laws apply. The new law prohibits anyone from riding in the back of an uncovered pickup, and passengers cannot ride in a camper shell unless they are wearing seat belts.

“It’s the same violation for having any unrestrained person anywhere in your vehicle,” said Steve Kohler, a spokesman for the California Highway Patrol.

Some dangers of riding in camper shells are obvious, according to Diane Winn, associate director of UCI’s Pediatric Injury Prevention Research Group, which documents the dangers of hauling passengers as cargo. For one thing, she said, camper shells frequently fall off during accidents, providing little protection for anyone inside.

“They don’t have the same interior integrity as the passenger cabin,” Winn said.

Another problem is the frequent ejection of passengers, especially children, through the open back window when the truck hits a bump or turns a corner too fast.

And finally, she said, comes the not-so-uncommon tragedy that killed those three children: exhaust fumes entering the bed of the truck either by being sucked in through an open window or due to a faulty exhaust system.

The new law has cut fatalities. While 57 Californians died as a result of riding in pickup cargo beds in 1993, Winn said, the number dropped to 22 by last year.

Still, she said, her agency considers the situation dangerous enough to have created a bumper sticker warning people against it.

Its slogan: “Human Cargo . . . A Deadly Way To Go.”

Dear Street Smart:

How can we get “no parking” signs along the park on Newport Ridge Drive East? I have been informed by our homeowners association that it is a county road. Families park along the two-lane road, and I know it is an accident waiting to happen. Small children and dogs run into the road, and people drive fast along there. There is a parking lot for the park with lots of parking.

Diana Thompson

Newport Coast

The way you get “no parking” signs posted, says Ignacio Ochoa, the county’s traffic engineer, is to send a letter to the Orange County Traffic Committee, P.O. Box 4048, Santa Ana, CA 92702-4048. Staff members will call you to verify the information, then investigate whether such signs are deemed necessary. In most cases, Ochoa said, a decision will be made within two weeks.

Ochoa said he will begin looking into the situation on Newport Ridge Drive East immediately.

“This is the first time I’ve heard of this,” he said.

The British government has banned drivers from using cellular telephones in their cars. The action follows the sentencing of a 35-year-old bank executive to six months in prison for causing a fatal accident while talking on his car phone.

The decision came two months after researchers at the University of Toronto published a study concluding that making a phone call from a car can be as risky as driving while intoxicated.

Great Britain joins Brazil, Israel, Switzerland and two states of Australia, which have passed similar laws.

One former legislator, however, said he fails to see any similarity between talking on a cellular telephone and drinking while driving. “You can always put the cell phone down,” said former Assemblyman Richard Katz, once head of the Assembly Transportation Committee. On the other hand, Katz said, “You can’t stop being drunk in a second.”

Street Smart appears Mondays in The Times Orange County Edition. Readers are invited to submit comments and questions about traffic, commuting and what makes it difficult to get around in Orange County. Include simple sketches if helpful. Letters may be published in upcoming columns. Please write to David Haldane, c/o Street Smart, The Times Orange County Edition, P.O. Box 2008, Costa Mesa, CA 92626, send faxes to (714) 966-7711 or e-mail him at David.H[email protected]. Include your full name, address, and day and evening phone numbers. Letters may be edited, and no anonymous letters will be accepted.