Seniors, Feds on Golf-Cart Collision Course

If you’re riding with Ray Rubin, hold on.

Peering from under his straw hat, the whiskered retiree gasses his golf cart up to 30 mph, five miles above the speed limit. He grinds through a hard right, then juts left, not slowing down until he’s home.

He says he really doesn’t see the point of wearing seat belts. What if they trap you in your cart?

“If they hit this cart very hard, it’s going to turn over and it’s going to mash up,” he says.

For now, seat belts come optional in new golf carts that are used on the street. But that’s changing.

In January 1997, the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration announced plans to require not only seat belts, but turn signals, a windshield, mirrors and other safety features on all vehicles designed to drive on streets between 15 to 25 mph. It didn’t say when the rules would take effect and acknowledged that many of the features are already standard on new carts.

The rules would have a big impact in communities catering to senior citizens, who often use golf carts instead of cars for trips to the store or the recreation center. And with some seniors, a seat-belt law goes over about as well as talking up helmet laws in a biker bar.

“That’s just government intervention into people’s lives, and most of the things they do are asinine,” said Charles Jackson, 90, who doesn’t drive a golf cart anymore, but still opposes the regulations on principle. “Do they want to put metal bumpers all around the golf carts too?”

The regulations are a response to a booming number of seniors driving golf carts through retirement havens in Arizona, California and Florida with occasionally tragic results. As you might expect, the laws of physics don’t favor golf carts in collisions with automobiles.

Although no one keeps track of the number of golf-cart accident fatalities nationwide, Sun City, a retirement community northwest of Phoenix, has had four since 1995. The last person killed was an 86-year-old woman sent flying last year when a sedan rammed her cart.

Federal officials are so weary of the gibes at their proposals that it’s hard to get them to acknowledge the regulations will affect golf carts.

In an interview, NHTSA spokesman Phil Frame drew a careful distinction between golf carts and small road vehicles like electric cars--apparently overlooking retirees who use carts outside of golf courses.

“We are not in the business of regulating golf carts,” Frame said. “We are in the business of regulating vehicles that are driven on roads.”

However, he acknowledged after considerable effort that those vehicles include golf carts that take to the street.