Pacific Ready-Mix, Inc. v. City of Palo Alto

SHOEMAKER, P. J. Plaintiff Pacific Ready-Mix, Inc. appeals from a judgment refusing to enjoin defendants City of Palo Alto, its city manager, mayor, chief of police and city council, from enforcing against plaintiff an amended truck ordinance barring the use of the Oregon Avenue Expressway to vehicles exceeding a maximum gross weight of 7 tons.

Plaintiff asserts that a municipal ordinance which closes certain streets to vehicles over a specific weight is valid only if it meets two tests: (1) -the city has authority to enact the ordinance in question, and (2) the ordinance is reasonable. However, plaintiff has elected not to challenge the trial court’s determination that Ordinance No. 2282 was reasonable and has devoted its brief exclusively to the contention that the City of Palo Alto lacked the power or authority to enact an ordinance limiting the use of a county expressway which, according to plaintiff, cannot be deemed within the exclusive jurisdiction of the city.

Plaintiff points out that in the absence of express statutory authorization to do so, a city may not enact an ordinance establishing maximum weight limits upon its streets because the field is one pre-empted by the state. (Atlas Mixed Mortar Co. v. City of Burbank (1927) 202 Cal. 660 [262 P. 334] ; Biber Elec. Co. v. City of San Carlos (1960) 181 Cal.App.2d 342, 344 [5 Cal.Rptr. 261].) Although plaintiff concedes that Vehicle Code, sections 35701 and 35702, do furnish cities with express statutory authorization to set maximum weight limits under certain specified circumstances, plaintiff denies that Ordinance No. 2282 falls within the purview of said sections. This contention cannot be sustained.

Vehicle Code, section 35701, provides in pertinent part that “ (a) Any city may by ordinance prohibit the use of a street to be described in the ordinance by any commercial vehicle or by any vehicle exceeding a maximum gross weight limit to be specified in the ordinance, ...”

Vehicle Code, section 35702, provides in part that “No [359]ordinance proposed under Section 35701 is effective with respect to any highway which is not under the exclusive jurisdiction of the local authority enacting the ordinance, or, in the case of any state highway, until the ordinance has been submitted by the governing body of the local authority to, and approved in writing by, the Department of Public Works. In submitting a proposed ordinance to the department for approval, the governing body of the local authority shall designate therein, an alternate route for the use of vehicles, which route shall remain unrestricted by any local regulation as to weight limits or types of vehicles so long as the ordinance proposed shall remain in effect. . . .”