SB 1345: Vehicles: off-highway vehicle recreation: County of Inyo.

Existing law authorizes an off-highway motor vehicle that has been issued a plate or device to be operated or driven upon a highway under certain circumstances. Existing law authorizes various public entities, and the Director of Parks and Recreation, to designate a highway, or portion thereof, for the combined use of regular vehicular traffic and off-highway motor vehicles if certain requirements are met. Existing law prohibits a highway from being designated for this combined use for a distance of more than 3 miles.

Existing law, until January 1, 2017, authorizes the County of Inyo to establish a pilot project that would exempt specified combined-use highways in the unincorporated area in the County of Inyo from this prohibition to link together existing roads in the unincorporated portion of the county to existing trails and trailheads on federal Bureau of Land Management or United States Forest Service lands in order to provide a unified linkage of trail systems for off-highway motor vehicles, as prescribed. Existing law requires the County of Inyo, in consultation with the Department of the California Highway Patrol, the Department of Transportation, and the Department of Parks and Recreation, to prepare and submit to the Legislature a report evaluating the effectiveness of the pilot project by January 1, 2016, as specified.

This bill would extend the operation of these provisions until January 1, 2020, and would extend the reporting deadline until January 1, 2019. For purposes of the pilot project described above, the bill would prohibit a combined-use highway road segment from exceeding 10 miles, except as specified.