Most people don’t know this but windshield mount GPS and cell phones are illegal in California. Not totally illegal, but to comply with the law it’s unusable. It’s another one of those stupid laws by those who hate electronics and want to blame everything on gizmo owners.
You can only mount your GPS to the windshield on the driver’s side in the lower 5″ corner of the windshield, or the lower 7″ corner on the passenger side. The problem is that these are touch screen devices so on many modern cars you can’t reach the screen. My car’s windshield has such an extreme slope that the GPS would never fit there. And if it did the power cable would never reach.
Because you can’t mount it on the windshield if you use a GPS you have to take your eyes off the road to use the GPS which makes them far more dangerous than on the windshield.
So in their attempt to increase safety, it actually has the opposite effect.
You can however block a 5″x5″ section of your windshield for a toll transponder. When it comes to collecting money California says screw safety.
No shocker here. It’s typical liberal legislation.
Signed into law by a Republican governor? I suppose it depends on your definition of liberal.
yeah but remember the gov has been corrupted by surroundng himslf (not 2 mention being married) wt democrats/liberals,, which my definition of libs/dems is simple: IDIOTS! evry thinkng person knws “liberalism is a mental disorder”
U got that right!, the libs shld be put on their own island (alcatraz wld be good) & leave the rest of us alone!
I remember with delight and amusement when the California legislature decided to mandate that all street-legal motorcycles must have rear-view mirrors on them and had to go back to work and amend the law a few years later to clarify and specify, when it was noticed that many bikers with disdain for the law had been ‘complying’ with dentists mirrors (with a diameter of an inch or less).
A ridiculous rule. I place mine right under my rear view mirror. It is perfect and doesn’t impair vision and also reminds me to continually check my rear view mirror. It is as ridiculous as the hands free rule which encourages conversations which are the main distraction and cause of accidents not the hands actual phone.
I agree, this law is one more reason to leave California. Its also another example of California’s ‘in-your-face’ style of legislation. I have a sloped windshield (good for aerodynamics and gas mileage) and the safest, most practical location is to mount it in the drivers side corner. Of course it doesn’t fit in the 5″ square required by the CA law due to the slope. When mounted in this illegal location the only vision it obstructs is the sight of my engine hood! This law is precisely the kind of nonsense I’ve come to expect from California’s legislators. Pay them your tax dollors so they can run your life!
Perfect example where giving government too much power it becomes self serving. It’s all about revenue and has nothing to do with safety. Government can’t manage money, money corrupts government. California is very irresponsible to its people and also in debt
That picture of a gps attached to the windshield. It is legal to attach to the dashboard and put the gps in exactly the same spot, just mounted from the bottom instead of the back. Many mounts swivel and allow this.
This law is STUPID! And this is why libertarianism is increasing in popularity every day. To tell big brother to go away and stop trying to help until big brother has the intelligence to pass reasonable laws, instead of BS like this crap.
This law is one of the worst; directly under the rearview mirror was a great location, which didn’t obstruct one’s view any more than the mirror. Like many others, the design of my car would make it a physical impossibility to mount a gps in the legal area of the window, so to comply with the law I have it mounted in a sub-optimal location that requires me to look AWAY from my direction of travel to be able to see it…way more dangerous than having it under my rearview mirror.