Cars and trucks idling in Edmonds can feel safe. For now.
A proposed ordinance which could have fined drivers as much as $1,000 if they idled for more than three consecutive minutes in a one-hour period was derailed in a committee meeting Tuesday, April 8.
The city is not ready to start fining drivers, urged Councilmember Deanna Dawson, who heads the city’s public safety committee.
Councilmember Steve Bernheim, who proposed the measure, ultimately agreed. Instead, Bernheim will explore education possibilities to encourage people to stop idling.
Vehicles line up at the Edmonds ferry dock — one of Washington’s busiest — all hours during the day. Many of them idle.
That leaves an opportunity for improvement, Bernheim said.
“Any wasted energy has to be stopped,” he said recently from his office. “A lot of people leave their engines on unconsciously all the time.”
A similar anti-idling measure was proposed in Mukilteo last year. It garnered media attention, but also died in committee, Mukilteo city clerk Chris Boughman said.
The environment will benefit if Edmonds stops idling, but so will the country — less idling is a way to lessen dependence on foreign oil, Bernheim said.
There is data to back up the greenhouse gas claim. Over a nine minute span, an idling car will emit double the pollutants of a car that is turned off and restarted, according to data from the U.S. EPA National Vehicle and Fuel Emissions Laboratory and the California Air Resources Board.
Anecdotally, at least, Edmonds is a popular place to idle.
In addition to ferry lanes, Edmonds has dozens of schools where parents wait to pick up students, and numerous hilltop vistas.
Many cities and states around the country have versions of anti-idling bills, including states like California and Hawaii and cities like Denver, according to the American Transportation Research Institute.
Anti-idling proposals are not universally popular, however.
Enforcement issues were a major concern in Mukilteo, Mukilteo Mayor Joe Marine said.
“We always had a question of how it would be implemented,” Marine told the Enterprise. “Trying to get people to turn off their cars is hard.”
There are similar concerns in Edmonds, said Mayor Gary Haakenson, who called the law well-intended but said police don’t have time to enforce it.
Still, Bernheim suggested that even if the police don’t have time, citizens could make attempts on their own.
“This should give anybody just a little bit more authority just to tap on a window and ask somebody to turn off their engine,” Bernheim said.
Haakenson said that isn’t a good idea, either. There are liability concerns, he said.
“We do not deputize citizens,” Haakenson said. “We don’t encourage citizens to do any ordinance work of the city of Edmonds.”
And if police don’t have the time to enforce it, and it isn’t a critical priority, then the City Council shouldn’t pass any legislation, Councilmember Deanna Dawson said.
“I do not like to implement ordinances unless we intend to enforce them,” Dawson said.
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