Let's look at the new Lighting Regs
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A single document now contains all the laws and new terms include 'position lamps' rather than side lights
THE Road Vehicle Lighting Regulations 1984, which came into effect on August 1, 1984, make changes and incorporate all the laws dealing with lights on vehicles, previously contained in several Acts and Regulations, into one single document.
Could not the law have been simplified without this consolidation and up-dating? Apparently not. A writer in the Police Review describes the current Regulations as "extremely complex and indigestible''. The Regulations document has 103 pages, 24 regulations and 20 schedules and is available, price £6.40 from HMSO.
The Regulations deal with all types of vehicles, a machine, implement or vehicle of any kind, drawn or propelled along a road by hand, horse or mechanical power comes within its scope. I propose to deal only with the parts of interest to the operator of commercial vehicles.
All the offences which may be committed under the regulations commence "No person shall use, or cause or permit to be used on a road . . ." A driver, quite obviously, is using
a vehicle but if he is driving his employer's vehicle the employer is also "using" it and is equally responsible.
Although the Regulations are aimed at ensuring vehicles have proper lights at night or in conditions of reduced visibility, only three of the several offences listed can only be committed during the hours of darkness, all the rest can be committed at any time. In practice this means that at all times vehicles must be in such condition that they can be legally used at night.
Several changes have been made in the terms used. For example, we have to get used to calling side and rear lights "position lamps" instead of obligatory lamps; obligatory reflectors become "rear reflex reflectors" and a public service vehicle a "large passenger carrying vehicle".
Regulation 6 makes alterations to the law when trailers or semi-trailers are being drawn:
a An exemption from the requirement for vehicles to be fitted with rear direction indicators and fog lamps is provided for most existing vehicles when drawing a trailer. This will not apply to future vehicles as vehicles first used after April 1, 1985, will require these lights and also stop lamps, rear position lamps and reflectors.
b Trailers manufactured after October 1, 1985, and towed by passenger car, dual-purpose vehicle will require front position lamps.
c A new exemption from the requirement to fit front position lamps (formally called "front marker lamps") is provided for existing trailers towed by passenger or dualpurpose vehicles where the overall combination exceeds 12.2 metres. This will not apply to trailers manufactured after October 1, 1985.
d A requirement is introduced for stop lamps, rear fog lamps and rear direction indicators to be fitted to trailers manufactured after October 1, 1985, even if the towing vehicle is not so equipped.
e Broken down vehicles being towed need not be fitted with rear fog lamps. They need not be fitted with rear position lamp, reflector or marking but during the hours of darkness must have rear position lamps and reflectors. It should be noted that im mediately a trailer or semi trailer is detached from the towing vehicle, all the lights on the towing vehicle must be fitted and in working order.
Provision is made for a red and white chequered domed lamp and red and white segmented mast-mounted flashing beacon to be fitted to a fire service control vehicle intended for use at the scene of an emergency. There is a similar provision for the police service — they may fit a special blue and white chequered domed lamp to a police control vehicle.
"Blue Warning Beacons", defined as lamps capable of emitting a flashing or rotating beam of light throu hout 360 degrees in the hori ontal plane, and blue "speci I warning lights" {lamps cape le of emitting blue flashing light and not any other kind of light are permitted on emergency v hicles.
The folio mg are listed as emergency v hicles:
motor vehicl s used for fire brigade or polic purposes; ambulances; fire salvage vehicles; Forestry C immission firefighting vehicles; bomb-disposal vehicles; vehicles owned by the Naval E ergency Monitoring Organis tion for the purpose of a nuclear accident; Royal Air Fo ce Mountain Rescue Servic vehicles; Blood Transfusio vehicles; those used by H Coastguards; National Co I Board vehicles used for re cue operations at mines; Roya National Lifeboat Institution ehicles used for launching lifeboats; and vehicles pri arily used for the purpose o conveying any human tissu for transplanting or similar pu poses.
Some ne organisations are now permitted to use the amber flashi g beacon. The full list now reads: road clearan collection v vehicles; v maximum s 25mph; ve overall wid metres; v testing, cleaning, maintaining, improving o watering roads or in connecti n with apparatus which is in, n, under or over a road; vehicles being used under the Aut orisation of Special Typres Ord :r (generally abnormal loads) and their escorts; and vehicle used by Her Majesty's Cust ms and Excise for the purpose of testing fuel.
There is till a general prohi e vehicles; refuse hides; breakdown hides having a eed not exceeding icles having an h exceeding 2.9 hides used for • bition in Regulation 12(1) on lamps or reflectors capable of being moved by swivelling or deflecting, but there is now a provision in paragraph (2) (b) of the same regulation which permits a headlamp capable of adjustment to compensate for the effect of the load on a vehicle and one in Regulation 1 2(2)(d) which permits a headlight or front fog lamp to be wholly or partially retracted or concealed.
Projecting loads must now be fitted with position lamps during conditions of seriously reduced visibility in daytime as well as during the hours of darkness. Side marker lamps must also now be used when visibility is poor as well as at night.
Provisions for the lighting of loads projecting to the rear are amended so that projections are measured from the rear of the vehicle instead of from the rear of the lamp; for agricultural vehicles and vehicles carrying a fire escape projections more than two metres are to be lit and other vehicles projections more than one metre are to be lit.
New regulations are introduced concerning parked vehicles at night. Goods vehicles not exceeding 1,525 kilograms and passenger vehicles other than large passenger carrying vehicles may still park without lights on roads where a 30mph speed limit is in force, on either side of a one-way street or on the nearside of other roads, but the distance from a road junction within which the vehicle must not park is reduced from 15 yards to 10 metres. Any vehicle may now be parked on any road, not just those in built-up areas, provided that the area on which the vehicle is parked is outlined by lamps or traffic signs so as to prevent the presence of the vehicle, its load or equipment, being a danger to persons using the road.
The old regulations permitted a breakdown lorry to be fitted with special lights to illuminate the scene of accidents or breakdowns. This lamp is now called a "work lamp" and it can be used without the simultaneous use of an amber flashing beacon as was previously required.
The requirement that rear fog lamps should be wired so that they could be illuminated only when the headlamps, front fog or side-lamps were switched on has been dropped, but they still must not be connected into the stop light circuit.
Vehicles first used after April 1, 1987, must be fitted with a dim-dip device. Schedule 3 of the Regulations states: Every dim dipped device shall whenever the obligatory front lamps of the vehicle are switched on and either — (i) the engine is running, or (ii) the key or device which controls the starting or stopping of the engine are in the normal position for driving the vehicle, automatically supply sufficient current to be emitted, in the case of a halogen filament lamp 10 per cent of the normal intensity of a dipped beam, or in the case of other types of filament lamps 15 per cent of the normal intensity of the dipped beam.
In practice this will mean that there will be three types of light emitted from headlamps, dim dipped, dipped and main beam.
The illumination of rear number plates used to be dealt with under the Road Vehicles (Registration and Lighting) Regulations but now feature in the new Lighting Regulations. As a result of this change failure to illuminate a rear number plate becomes a "traffic offence" for the purpose of breath testing a person who has committed a traffic offence while his vehicle is in motion.
The Regulations lay down the exact positions in which the various lamps must be fitted and here little change has been made in the law. Vehicle manufacturers can be relied on to fit the lamps as required by the regulations and there seems little point in quoting, in detail, these requirements here.
• by Les Oldridge