OCEAN CITY — Ocean City Council approved an amended ordinance blocking trailers and commercial vehicles from parking near playgrounds and playing fields.
Introduced at the May 21 meeting, ordinance 26-07 was approved on first reading to ensure clearer supervision of children.
It prevents commercial vehicles, trailers (including boat trailers) and construction vehicles from parking adjacent to areas frequented by children, specifically playgrounds and recreation fields.
The ordinance reads that it is being done because “maintaining maximum visibility in these areas is critical for the safety and supervision of children and ensure that law enforcement and the public can clearly monitor activity within these recreation zones.”
The amendment adds the commercial vehicles such as buses, city solicitor Dorothy McCrosson told council at the June 11 meeting.
For people interested in what this applies to, the ordinance spells that out.
The ordinance defines recreation zone as “any municipal playground, park, athletic field, or recreational facility owned or operated by the City of Ocean City or Ocean City School District.”
Trailers are defined as “any vehicle without an engine for power source assigned to be transported by attachment to a motor vehicle, including but not limited to utility trailers, landscaping trailers, commercial trailers and boat trailers.”
Construction vehicle/equipment “includes, but is not limited to, backhoes, bulldozers, mixers, chippers, dump trucks with a gross vehicle weight exceeding 7,000 pounds, and any vehicle primarily designed or used for construction or demolition.”
Commercial vehicles include, but aren’t limited to “any motor vehicle, trailer or semi-trailer designed, used or maintained primarily for the transportation of property, goods, or passengers for financial compensation, or as part of a commercial enterprise.”
It “explicitly includes” vehicles with gross weight rating over 10,000 pounds, that are designed to transport more than eight passengers, including the driver, for compensation, vehicles displaying commercial advertising, logs or USDOT registration numbers; and delivery vans, box trucks, tow trucks, semi-tractors, trailers and heavy construction equipment.”
None of that can be parked within 50 feet of the property line of a recreation zone.
Exemptions include emergency vehicles responding to an emergency, city and school vehicles actively engaged in official duties and commercial or construction vehicles “actively engaged in the expedited loading or unloading of passengers or materials” to a property in the prohibited zone.
– By DAVID NAHAN/Sentinel staff