文档介绍：DEPARTMENT OF TRANSPORTATION
National Highway Traffic Safety Administration
49 CFR Part 571
[Docket No. NHTSA 98-3949]
RIN 2127-AG58
Federal Motor Vehicle Safety Standards
 
AGENCY: National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA), DOT.
ACTION: Final rule
SUMMARY: This final rule responds to a growing public interest in using golf cars(1) and other similar-sized, 4-wheeled vehicles to make short trips for shopping, social and recreational purposes primarily within retirement or other munities with golf courses. These passenger-carrying vehicles, although low-speed, offer a variety of advantages, paratively low-cost and energy-efficient mobility. Further, many of these vehicles are electric-powered. The use of these vehicles, instead of larger, gasoline-powered vehicles like passenger cars, provides quieter transportation that does not pollute the air of munities in which they are operated.
Currently, there is a growing conflict between state and local laws, on the one hand, and Federal law, on the other, in the treatment of these small vehicles. That conflict unnecessarily restricts the ability of vehicle manufacturers to produce and sell, and the ability of consumers to purchase, these vehicles. In recent years, a growing number of states from California to Florida have passed legislation authorizing their local jurisdictions to permit general on-road use of "golf carts," subject to speed and/or operational limitations. A majority of those states condition such broad use upon the vehicles' having specified safety equipment. Further, some of these states have opened the way for the use of vehicles that are faster than almost all golf cars. Most conventional golf cars, as originally manufactured, have a top speed of less than 15 miles per hour. These states have either redefined "golf carts" to include vehicles designed to achieve up to 25 miles per hour or have established a new class of vehicles, "neighborhood electric vehicles," also defined as c