Bacon's Rebellion

Democracy Thrives in Sunlight

Keep the Inspections

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by

Dick Hall-Sizemore
in

Tucked into the Governor’s transportation package is a relatively little item that is shortsighted. He is proposing to eliminate the requirement for an annual vehicle inspection. This idea has been floated before, but defeated.

One justification offered is financial.  The argument seems to be that the elimination of this requirement will result in savings for drivers that will help offset the proposed increased increase in the gas tax.  The fee for the annual inspection cannot exceed $20, and inspection stations can charge less. A savings of $20 per year is not going to matter to many people.

The Governor also seeks to justify the elimination by pointing out that studies show no correlation between safety and inspections. I have heard this argument before and, while I have not seen the studies, I have no reason to doubt them, other than my own experience.

Years ago, when my finances were tight, I would often ride on bald tires. I probably would not have bought new tires until I had a blowout, endangering myself and others, if I had not had to do so in order to get my car passed so I could continue driving it legally. Worn brake shows or disc pads were another common problem.

Most people can tell when the tire treads are worn or their brakes are squeaky, but the annual inspections can detect more subtle problems that can pose just as much danger, such as worn ball joints and worn bushings in the steering mechanism.

Of course, there is no reason why car owners cannot take their cars voluntarily into their mechanics annually for such inspections, and I will do so, even if the annual inspection requirement is repealed. But, without being required to do so, most people, even those who are well-meaning, will put such chores off, sometimes indefinitely.

I understand that new cars likely do not need annual inspections right away and I could support exempting a brand new car from the annual inspection for two years after purchase. But, there are a lot of older vehicles on the highways (including mine). I like knowing that my car and truck have been deemed safe and especially knowing that vehicles I meet on the highway also have met minimum standards of safety. Twenty dollars per year is not too much to pay for this assurance.

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31 responses to “Keep the Inspections”

  1. Steve Haner Avatar
    Steve Haner

    And yet the claim was made that states with no such mandate do not see an erosion in safety results….So let’s see the data. It is not the money savings so much as the time savings.

    1. djrippert Avatar
      djrippert

      I have looked at a few articles on the topic. I found many that claim auto inspections do not significantly affect injuries or deaths and do not affect insurance rates. I have yet to find an article arguing that these inspections are justified. The NY Post article is succinct …

      “So why do states like New York continue to force motorists to jump through this hoop? Well, service stations that do the inspections lobby to keep the mandate.

      That sounds like Empire State lawmakers: putting a special interest above the needs of everyone else.

      It’s enough to drive you nuts.”

      https://nypost.com/2018/04/12/mandatory-car-safety-inspections-are-not-worth-the-trouble/

    2. djrippert Avatar
      djrippert

      A bit more detail:

      “Through analysis of traffic fatality data from the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, we investigate the impact of removing vehicle safety inspection requirements in New Jersey. Using both a synthetic controls approach and a traditional difference-in-differences analysis, we conclude that removing the requirements resulted in no significant increases in any of traffic fatalities per capita, traffic fatalities due specifically to car failure per capita, or the frequency of accidents due to car failure. Therefore, we conclude that vehicle safety inspections do not represent an efficient use of government funds, and do not appear to have any significantly mitigating effect on the role of car failure in traffic accidents.”

      https://www.thefreelibrary.com/IT%27S+NO+ACCIDENT%3A+EVALUATING+THE+EFFECTIVENESS+OF+VEHICLE+SAFETY…-a0557612186

      Note: WordPress is being difficult again – cut and paste the link above rather than just clicking on it. The article is there.

      1. Dick Hall-Sizemore Avatar
        Dick Hall-Sizemore

        I know what the studies say: no correlation between inspections and safety. And I know that I should be guided by the data, but, somehow that data does not give me the same warm and fuzzy feeling that I get from knowing that everyone is getting their vehicles inspected regularly. Whatever the result with the legislation, I will keep on taking my vehicles in for their annual safety inspections.

        1. djrippert Avatar
          djrippert

          You sound like a conservative discussing climate change. Damn the science, full speed ahead. Ha ha. I’d keep getting inspections too. Same reason I keep going to the dentist even though I haven’t had a cavity in years.

  2. LarrytheG Avatar
    LarrytheG

    I predict the repair shop lobby is going to positively be all over Richmond!

    I’m sorta split on it. I too in my younger life was bedeviled by used cars that I could afford then getting that dreaded rejection sticker that Deputies and state police always seemed to spot.

    Got my ticket, went to court – said I could not afford it – the Judge said “tough”, “pay the fine” and park the car until you can fix it. Of course I needed the car to get to my job – every day! Without that car, I had no job!

    I’d be curious to hear from those who say they are “libertarian” here.

    What’s the proper role of govt on this?

    1. djrippert Avatar
      djrippert

      The proper role of government is to demand inspections only if they positively affect driving deaths or injuries or insurance rates. There is no correlation between inspections and driving deaths, injuries or insurance rates. Only 17 states have inspections. This is just another “Virginia Way” scam to enrich rent seekers and crony capitalists.

      1. Steve Haner Avatar
        Steve Haner

        You mean, when the garage tries to talk me into some repair or a set of new tires because of some wear? 🙂 Larry is right, I can envision quite a lobbying frenzy on this one.

        1. djrippert Avatar
          djrippert

          The data are there. The mandatory inspections are worthless for enhancing safety. All they enhance is the profits of station owners. Several states have dropped mandatory inspections recently based on the data. Minnesota and New Jersey are two of these states. So, presumably corrupt New Jersey could overcome the crony capitalists in the repair shop lobby but Virginia has been unable to do this.

          BTW – What business was Tricky Dick Saslaw in?

          1. James A. Bacon Avatar
            James A. Bacon

            O my gosh, New Jersey dropped the mandatory inspection? So much for my argument that Virginia is becoming New Jersey!

          2. Reed Fawell 3rd Avatar
            Reed Fawell 3rd

            Reminds me about how Virginia drives and keeps its law and rule breakers, particular auto violators, misdemeanor specialists, and petty criminals, in chronic long term debt by the state’s constant string of billing scofflaws for state services, like court appearances, so poor folks and those down on their luck had to keep up their criminal behavior just to pay their mounting bills charged them by the state. What a class act!

          3. Dick Hall-Sizemore Avatar
            Dick Hall-Sizemore

            You know very well what business Saslaw was in (gas stations). Did the studies look at the effect on insurance rates? The passage you quoted did not include that effect.

          4. LarrytheG Avatar
            LarrytheG

            I’ve searched high and low for something that supports vehicle inspections and everything I find – says the opposite and in line with what DJ is saying.

            Still – it feels “wrong”… I can just see some fool without headlights or tailights at night or some clunker without doors or 4 bald tires.

  3. LarrytheG Avatar
    LarrytheG

    Dick mentioned the “insurance” word. If you have or cause an accident and it was due to the lack of a repair or maintenance – your responsibility – the insurance can refuse to cover.

    Take that one step further – to your average scofflaw who does not maintain their vehicle, he’s going to see insurance as another unnecessary cost. It’s probably TRUE that “only” 2% of all accidents are due to an owners fault but if you’re in that 2% and he’s uninsured.. it ain’t going to be fun.

  4. John Harvie Avatar
    John Harvie

    Be careful what you wish for. Since moving to the Palm Beach area I daily marvel at some of the junk passing for vehicles plying the roads down here. One of the most obvious issues is non functioning or broken brake lights. Second are those bald tires. Third are those bumper-less cars so banged up they probably hide some malicious defect not readily apparent.

    What’s amazing is I finally agree with Larry on something.

    A one hour visit to the inspection station once a year at The Beach was really no issue. Nor was the fee which amounted to the price of a decent 12-pack.

  5. LarrytheG Avatar
    LarrytheG

    This is one of those funny issues where you’d think Conservatives and LIbertarians would argue for less government regulation and more “freedom” from govt for citizens and to be able to keep more of their money, no?

    Liberals – want the govt to regulate this – no question….

    so what happened to the Conservatives and Libertarians? Aren’t they essentially regulation here just like liberals?

  6. LarrytheG Avatar
    LarrytheG

    o what happened to the Conservatives and Libertarians? Aren’t they essentially ADVOCATING FOR regulation here just like liberals?

  7. johnrandolphofroanoke Avatar
    johnrandolphofroanoke

    I have 3 antique vehicles. I inspect them once a month. Absolutely necessary or I will be left on the side of the road. There is so much the Virginia Inspection overlooks. You are better off paying your trusted local mechanic a few extra for a thorough check or learn how to do it yourself before you get the state inspection. I wonder what folks are going to say when Virginia taxes drivers by the number of miles driven per year? I think that one is right around the corner.

    1. Atlas Rand Avatar
      Atlas Rand

      I can only surmise that Dick does not watch the inspection performed. I’ve not seen a mechanic yet who inspects properly by the manual. A quick look at all the jalopies currently on the road also makes clear that most places are not performing adequate inspections. I for one support the Governor’s move, as the annual inspection amounts to little more than a headache and time loss each year for me. I lived near the Tennessee line for years with those uninspected vehicles running our roads.

      With regards to a VMT I think that it will be horribly unfair to those of us who live in rural areas. I drive 40 miles one way to work each day. It takes me about 43 minutes on a combination of rural secondaries, Route 460, and a rural 2 lane primary. None of these roads are at capacity, nor will they require expansion within the next 50 years. Basic maintenance and repaving is all that will be required. 1 mike of my driving does not have an equivalent impact or cost as 1 mile of driving in NOVA or Hampton Roads.

      1. Dick Hall-Sizemore Avatar
        Dick Hall-Sizemore

        No, I do not watch the inspection being performed. But, I am lucky that I have a auto repair shop that I have been going to for about 30 years and that I trust.

      2. djrippert Avatar
        djrippert

        Proper VMT would assess the charge based on the actual road being driven. Low usage, low maintenance roads with no need to reserve funds for expansion would be overall cheaper than roads that incur higher costs to maintain and expand. However, low usage roads would also have fewer miles driven so the cost/mile would be divided by a smaller denominator perhaps generating higher per mile pricing.

        1. LarrytheG Avatar
          LarrytheG

          VMT by road driven sounds totally not feasible. Between the bureaucracy and the intrusive technology needed – it would
          be hard to get support.

          If you’re going to do that, you might as well set up tolling and let the tolling decide how much the local cost should be.

      3. LarrytheG Avatar
        LarrytheG

        yeah, you make a case for driving outside urban areas… but are you really sure that your taxes are enough to pay for the maintenance of the roads you travel? Perception is that rural areas are subsidized and their taxes come no where near enough to pay for actual costs even though the roads were constructed long ago.

        The bigger cost of a road is not the initial construction but the maintenance and operations.

  8. TBill Avatar
    TBill

    I was thinking if we switch to miles driven gaso tax, we need the inspections to document miles driven (assuimg we do not have some kind of on-vehicle odometer reader).

    I know we do both mechanical and emissions inspections in NoVA, I was not sure what the rest of the state does.

  9. LarrytheG Avatar
    LarrytheG

    yeah, had forgotten about emission inspections.. and that’s not going to be done away with.. probably a Federal regulation – not state.

    On the miles tax – is there anything in this year’s General Assembly? I just don’t see it happening and the proposal to get rid of annual inspections pretty much says they’re not going to tax per mile because even if they thought not this year but in the near future – they’d not get rid of the annual inspections – only to re reinstitute them later.

    For me and annual inspections, I typically do the recommended maintenance in the owners manual also but not at the dealer unless I can opt out of the ridiculously expensive things that I can do myself like air and cabin filters, etc. And I’ll have independent shop do the other work if the dealer is too expensive but these days – most all repair shops charge what is known as “flat rate” and every single repair has a “code” with the amount of time needed to do the repair – the hourly rate may change but in my expense most legitimate repair shops charge the same hourly rate also.

    The other aspect – for NEW cars, is recalls which are fairly common these days and most of the time – it’s the dealer that does them – and that would be an opportunity for a voluntary inspection… Most dealers are keen to sell you parts and labor at their mark-up prices!

    Maybe they can do that for medical costs transparency – just put up the hourly rate on the ER wall and the number of hours per injury/illness!

    I agree with whoever said that we should fear the phone fiddlers more than the jalopy owners… between the phone fiddlers and aggressive drivers – they win hands down. I get tailgated even when I’m following a string of cars in front of me these days!

  10. warrenhollowbooks Avatar
    warrenhollowbooks

    “Reminds me about how Virginia drives and keeps its law and rule breakers, particular auto violators, misdemeanor specialists, and petty criminals, in chronic long term debt by the state’s constant string of billing scofflaws for state services, like court appearances”

    Hahahah. . . “like court appearances” . . . you mean
    like when people break the law and the mean ol’ state makes them actually come to court and actually pay their fines??

    1. Reed Fawell 3rd Avatar
      Reed Fawell 3rd

      No, I did not mean that. Dick Hall-Sizemore has details.

  11. CrazyJD Avatar
    CrazyJD

    There should be no inspections for the first three years after a new car purchase. Period. Nothing happens to a new car in that time, even if it’s driven 15-20K miles a year. Make it a requirement after x miles or x number of years. The exception may be something like what happened to Honda Accords in 2008. The rear brakes were no good and the discs wore out at 12K miles. But you knew it because the telltale prong on the disc started to howl.
    Cars are a much different animal than when inspections were first required. In those days, the headlights would go out of alignment, steering gears failed and the like. No longer. That’s why so many new cars have 100,000 mile warranties.

    Whoever commented on the auto repair lobby wanting to keep inspections was correct. My wife took her 2 year old car for an inspection at Firestone, and they gave a laundry list of B.S. that needed to be done, absolutely none of which was necessary, but would have cost just under $1000. If she didn’t have me, she would have done what they told her.

    I’m more worried about large truck inspections. They pose by far the greater danger, given their time on the road and the economic pressures on owner-operators, who operate on close margins.

    1. LarrytheG Avatar
      LarrytheG

      The main caveat to Crazy’s proposal is recalls of new cars… Right now, they are totally optional at the discretion of the owner.

      Of course, I have to say the shops that do State Inspections – at least the ones I’ve been at – do not tell you about recalls nor offer to do the work!

  12. Atlas Rand Avatar
    Atlas Rand

    Does the proposal also include no inspections on commercial vehicles or just personal? Also what about trailers?

    1. LarrytheG Avatar
      LarrytheG

      One thing to keep in mind – just because a vehicle does not have to be inspected does NOT mean that law enforcement will not continue to give tickets for things like inoperative tail lights and other maintenance issues.

      Also, your insurance company or the injured party insurance can get involved with a claim, and it turns out that your vehicle’s lack of repairs or maintenance contributed to the accident.

      Finally, no shortage of dealers and independent repair shops who will offer “free” safety checks. It does put the burden on you to decide – like Crazy did – as to what you really need versus what they want to sell you.

      Of course, after something actually breaks, it’s Katy bar the door and they got you by the short hairs………

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