Mr. Traffic’s Bumpy Ride : Host of Cable TV Show Is Gridlocked in Drive for Wider Audience

Lyle Menendez didn’t lack for details when he described how he and his brother tried to cook up an alibi shortly after they shot their parents.

According to Lyle Menendez’s testimony in the ongoing murder trial, the brothers drove from the family’s Beverly Hills home to Century City, where they parked at a metered space and tried to buy movie tickets at the AMC theater.

Finding the movie sold out, Lyle testified, the brothers returned to their car and drove to a food festival in Santa Monica.

But wait. Something about the story didn’t square with Kenny Morse, the self-proclaimed “Mr. Traffic” of Los Angeles, who had been watching the proceedings on Court TV.

“For years we’ve discussed the parking situation in Century City,” said Morse, who hosts his own half-hour public access television show called “Ask Mr. Traffic.” “The fact is, there is no meter parking in Century City. There never was. That was one big lie he was telling.”

Morse passed on the information to the Los Angeles County district attorney’s office, which double-checked it and determined that Century Park West, the street Menendez had alluded to parking on, is one big red zone.

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Prosecutors wound up raising the point in rebuttal arguments last week, providing another small victory for Morse and his high-octane ego.

“I am the only person in America talking about the issues related to driving,” said Morse, who in another blast of self-promotion refers to himself as “the most visible public access host” in the nation.

Wayne and Garth might disagree, but give Morse his due. His weekly program was voted the Best Live Call-In Show by the Southern California Cable Assn., and excerpts of it have been shown on “Talk Soup,” a distillation of talk show highlights televised nationally on the E! Entertainment Network.

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Morse and his wacky set even received a fraction of a second of exposure on a recent MTV video montage.

Not bad for a low-budget operation that consists of Morse sitting beside a flashing replica of a traffic signal and answering phone-in questions from people on topics ranging from auto insurance premiums to whether it’s legal to have sex in a car. (It’s not a violation of the motor vehicle code, but it could get you arrested for lewd behavior, Morse advises.)

Yet for all his ham-it-up braggadocio and zippy one-liners, the 40-year-old Morse is deadly serious about his role.

“Frankly, I’m a zealot,” said Morse, a licensed traffic school instructor who ranks motoring as the No. 1 activity most likely to profoundly alter someone’s life.

“There are issues bigger than driving,” he said, “but how could a guy like you land in prison? The only way is by killing someone with your car in a negligent manner.”

Morse receives no compensation for the program, and says he does it as a public service.

“Why should you have to wait to get to one of my classes to get the most important information you need as an Angeleno?” he asked.

But catching his half-hour show on Century Cable (Channel 3 in most Westside communities) can be as tricky as catching the light at Wilshire and Westwood boulevards, the city’s busiest intersection, according to Morse.

Live shows are televised anytime between 11:30 a.m. and 3 p.m. on Saturdays, while taped “Best of Mr. Traffic” installments run Sunday nights between 9:30 and 11. A voracious reader of automotive literature who is fiendishly familiar with even the most obscure traffic laws, Morse snaps responses to traffic-related questions with the tutorial air of a man who has done his homework.

Which local community has the toughest parking enforcement officers? “West Hollywood,” he replies without hesitation. “Those people, they’ll ticket their own mothers.”

What’s the best way to avoid getting a speeding ticket? Stay out of the fast lane, said Morse, noting that 60% of all freeway citations occur there.

What’s the most unfair traffic law on the books? Assembly Bill 1297, Morse said. It requires motorists who attend traffic school to pay the state a fee equal to the amount of the original fine--even though attendance at traffic school technically voids the violation.

“If your case is being dismissed, why should you be paying a fine?” Morse said. “Because the state is broke.”

Some of his tips smack of common sense: He advises against wearing blue jeans and sneakers to traffic court and advocates treating police respectfully no matter how strenuously you may disagree with them.

But some of the flotsam Morse skims from his reservoir of knowledge can surprise even veteran motorists. For example, imagine that you pull up to a parking meter and happily note that there’s still 20 minutes of time remaining from the previous occupant. You lock up your car, and run off to do a quick errand, figuring you can park for free.

Technically, Morse said, you can be cited for a parking violation because municipalities generally require that each new occupant feed the meter.

Mr. Traffic contends that a huge market exists for such information, but the road to recognition has been bumpy.

His first public display as a traffic curmudgeon came in 1990, when he called up KFI-AM to correct host Bill Handel on an aspect of the drunk driving law. Handel was so irritated--and impressed, according to Morse--that he invited Morse back on the show several times as a resident expert.

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But neither KFI nor any of the local television news shows seem willing to make a larger commitment to Morse.

“I’ve been trying to get a (permanent) spot on local news for years,” Morse said. “They call me at sweeps time when they want to do something about fighting tickets or carjacking, but they don’t want to discuss issues of driving on a regular basis.”

It was that ambivalence by the mainstream media that inspired Morse to launch “Ask Mr. Traffic.”

“I said, ‘The hell with you guys. I’m going to do it myself.’ ”

That was three years and more than 100 shows ago. And it’s light-years from the days when Morse used to drive fast Corvettes and take risks on the road. Now he drives a 1993 Honda Civic, and his last speeding ticket was eight years ago, well before he became Mr. Traffic.

“I’ve seen the evil of my ways,” he said. “I grew up. . . . That was God’s way of saving my life, making me teach traffic school.”