California Has Issued All Hybrid Passes for HOV Lanes
03 February 2007
The California state Department of Motor Vehicles announced Friday that it has issued all of the 85,000 car pool lane stickers available to hybrid drivers.
The stickers, which expire in 2010, allow drivers of hybrids that get at least 45 miles per gallon to drive in high occupancy freeway lanes (car pool lanes), even if they are alone in the vehicle. Only three vehicles qualified: the Toyota Prius, the Honda Insight and the hybrid Honda Civic.
The number of hybrid vehicles registered in California has doubled in the last year, to 135,000.
well, now the people claiming that hybrids are causing "overcrowding" in the HOV lanes can finally shut up.
Posted by: lensovet | 03 February 2007 at 11:23 PM
One of the promotional tactics for hybrids which does not cost money to local government. Another one is employed in Vancouver, Canada: Prius taxi (and we have tons of them) are the first to pick-up customers at airport (the most profitable spot for taxis).
Posted by: Andrey | 04 February 2007 at 02:16 AM
Excellent point Andrey. Anytime a government encourages environmentally friendly actions without having to spend money, it sets an enormously positive example to other governments.
The fact that the number of hybrids registered in California doubled last year is also great to see and I suspect we'll continue to see that number grow exponentially.
http://ecotalityblog.com
Posted by: Doug Snodgrass | 04 February 2007 at 03:51 AM
In a city in Connecticut (Hartford? New Haven? I don't remember...) doesn't require that hybrid drivers feed the parking meters. They have to have a sticker in their windshield, thereby ensuring that only local hybrid owners have the privilege.
Posted by: stomv | 04 February 2007 at 01:23 PM
Nice to see New Haven acting sensibly.
Posted by: gr | 07 February 2007 at 11:26 AM