Christmas Lights on Vehicles

Published by DriveSmartBC –
Miscellaneous
Q&A

Q&A ImageQuestion: I just wanted to confirm, but it seems to me that Christmas lights on your vehicle would be considered unauthorized lighting and illegal. I've known a few people to run them, never heard of anyone actually getting tickets for it.

image of car decorated with Christmas lights

Legal Christmas Lights on Your Vehicle

I suppose that there is one place that vehicles covered in Christmas lights are permitted and that is in the annual Christmas parades. Otherwise, these decorations would be considered as off road lights and subject to enforcement action if they were lit while the vehicle was on the road.

Vehicle Lighting

Vehicle lighting standards are set by federal regulations and enforced by provincial legislation. Colour, location, focus and brightness are carefully engineered to do the job of seeing and being seen. Lights also tell others what we are doing.

Anything that takes away the ability of your vehicle's lights to do this job is not a good thing and will be subject to enforcement action.

Distraction

Bright or flashing decorative lights can disorient and distract other drivers, increasing reaction time and the risk of collisions.

Off Road Lights

"off-road lamp" means a lamp designed for any use other than those specified in Division 4 of these regulations;

If you choose to install any off road lights, they must be covered by an opaque cover at all times when the vehicle is on the road. This applies if the vehicle is being driven or is parked.

Christmas lights would be considered to be off road lights.

Penalties

A traffic ticket issued under 4.02(1) MVAR will cost a driver $81.

Section 219(1) MVA may also be used. It costs $109 and will also result in an entry on your driving record for operating an improperly equipped vehicle.

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Comments

Published by Prudy (not verified) – 2016/11/04 - 10:54 | Permalink

Division 4 of the motor vehicle act regulations is kinda of a wierd section in the sense that the law usually tell you what you cannot do but this division says what you must do. So if it's not in Division 4 (lights) you cannot have it.

Because that section says you can only have red on the rear and white/amber on the front, any other colour like green/purple/blue and so on are in violation of the section.

It comes down to officer discretion if they feel like enforcing it or not just like most of the motor vehicle act.

Fine is $81.

Published by Soundy – 2016/11/04 - 10:57 | Permalink

There's also a fair bit of "may do" in there ("may" have fog lights, "may" have auxiliary driving lights, etc.).

Yes, because if it wasn't in the section, fog lights would be illegal technically. It even says that you may use fog lights instead of regular lights if road conditions dictates. The fun part is that on most vehicles if not just about all of them, it's actually impossible to turn your fog lights without having your headlights on so quasi useless section.

Published by Soundy – 2016/12/02 - 10:59 | Permalink

Is there such a thing as a ticket for "being a distraction"? I'm following a Facebook thread right now with several people saying this could be the charge (along with a seven-day impound) for driving around with Christmas lights on.

I've never heard of such a thing in BC driving law and don't know where the impound idea would come from.

Whenever I get into discussions like this I like to ask about section numbers and case law.

One quote: "Its not the color of light. DMV considers it a distract to drivers example vehicle under glow." "I have the 2016 cvse inspection book. Its quoted"

Another: "Yeah it's driver distraction same with underglow it could also get you a 7 day impound"

Sounds off to me, but I wanted to get the expert statement :-)

When I start seeing things like DMV tossed around I begin to think that either the discussion is based on US laws or the writers are not as in touch with the subject as they think that they are.

Same thing with quotes without quotes. If he has the manual, it's simple enough to copy and paste if it's the electronic version or do a bit of typing if it's on paper. No direct quote, much less faith in the quality of the information.