THE QUEEN v. KWONG WING KEI

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H E A D N O T E

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CROSSING DOUBLE WHITE LINES - NO DEFENCE WHERE DRIVER REVERSES ONTO PAVEMENT AND THEN TURNS RIGHT.

IN THE SUPREME COURT OF HONG KONG

(Appellate Jurisdiction)

MAGISTRACY CRIMINAL APPEAL NO. 189 OF 1989

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J U D G M E N T

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1. The appellant was convicted Mr Hill at Central Magistrates Court of crossing continuous double white lines, contrary to Regulation 11(1) of the Road Traffic (Traffic Control) Regulations, Cap. 374.

2. The magistrate found that the appellant had stopped his car in Harbour Road outside the Wanchai Law Courts, reversed into a gap in the footpath, from which access to the carpark is gained, and then turned right across the white lines in the direction whence he had come.

Regulation 11(3) provides:-

"(3) Where continuous double white lines or a continuous white line with a broken white line is placed on a carriageway the driver of a vehicle may permit his vehicle to be on or over or across the continuous double white lines or continuous white line with a broken white line if it is necessary to do so in order -

(a) …...

(b) .......

(c) subject to paragraph (4), to make a right turn into or out of any road, premises or place adjacent to the carriageway."

3. In The Attorney General v. Cheung Man Woon MA 920/88, Hooper J. held that no offence was committed when, after the respondent's vehicle was driven completely off the road into adjacent premises, it was within ten seconds driven back onto the carriageway in a right turn across the white lines. This was because, as he put it:-

"… the Law in Hong Kong specifically permits a driver to cross continuous double white lines if it is necessary to do so in order to make a right turn out of any premises or place adjacent to the carriageway. It doesn't provide any distinction between the person who has temporarily placed himself on premises adjacent to the carriageway or a person who has been there for some duration. It doesn't qualify at all the purpose for which the driver entered the premises adjacent to the carriageway."

4. Mr Thong, for the appellant, takes the argument a stage, further. He submits that, while the footpath may be part of the road, it is not part of the carriageway and is therefore "a place adjacent to, the carriageway". Accordingly, he says, when his client's car returned to the carriageway he was making a right turn as permitted by Regulation 11(3)(c).

5. It is an ingenious argument, but I cannot accept that this was contemplated or intended by the legislature. If Mr Thong is right; there would be nothing to prevent a driver wishing to make a U-turn from pulling up onto the pavement on his left and then turning across the traffic and the white lines. Clearly the exemption given by the regulation cannot have been intended to apply to such a dangerous manoeuvre.

6. The appeal is dismissed.