2020 Georgia Code
Title 40 - Motor Vehicles and Traffic
Chapter 6 - Uniform Rules of the Road
Article 10 - Stopping, Standing, and Parking
Part 1 - General Provisions
§ 40-6-202. Stopping, Standing, or Parking Outside of Business or Residential Districts

Outside of a business or residential district, no person shall stop, park, or leave standing any vehicle, whether attended or unattended, upon the roadway when it is practicable to stop, park, or so leave such vehicle off the roadway; but in every event, an unobstructed width of the highway opposite a standing vehicle shall be left for the free passage of other vehicles, and a clear view of the stopped vehicle shall be available from a distance of 200 feet in each direction upon the highway.

(Ga. L. 1953, Nov.-Dec. Sess., p. 556, § 90; Code 1933, § 68A-1001, enacted by Ga. L. 1974, p. 633, § 1; Ga. L. 1990, p. 2048, § 5.)

- For comment on Roberts v. Phillips, 35 Ga. App. 733, 134 S.E. 837 (1926), see 1 Ga. B.J. 49 (1927).

JUDICIAL DECISIONS

Applicability.

- Injured party was not entitled to a requested jury instruction under O.C.G.A. § 40-6-202 because that section did not apply to a momentary stopping of a motor vehicle on a highway as occurred in this case, but the statute instead applied to where stopping or parking impeded the safe flow of traffic. Cox v. Allen, 256 Ga. App. 53, 567 S.E.2d 363 (2002).

- Ga. L. 1953, Nov.-Dec. Sess., p. 556 is not applicable to school buses while being used for transportation of school children. Stroud v. Doolittle, 213 Ga. 32, 96 S.E.2d 876 (1957).

- Georgia Court of Appeals concludes that the parking restrictions in O.C.G.A. § 40-6-202 do not apply within a business district and because a business district is comprised of the territory contiguous to and including a highway, the parking restrictions in § 40-6-202 cannot be read to apply to roadways within areas meeting the criteria in O.C.G.A. § 40-1-1(8). Granger v. MST Transp., LLC, 329 Ga. App. 268, 764 S.E.2d 872 (2014).

- Defendant's conviction for improper stopping in violation of O.C.G.A. § 40-6-202 was based on sufficient evidence as the fact that the vehicle was blocking only one lane of traffic, rather than the entire street, was adequate because the vehicle was not legally parked for purposes of § 40-6-202; further, because the defendant was sitting in the driver's seat of the car with a suspended license, which the defendant clearly knew about because the defendant had received citations for driving with a suspended license previously, there was sufficient circumstantial evidence to convict the defendant of driving without a valid license in violation of O.C.G.A. § 40-5-121. Marsengill v. State, 275 Ga. App. 840, 622 S.E.2d 58 (2005).

- Evidence was insufficient to support a conviction for improper stopping, standing, or parking outside of a business or residential district because the state failed to adduce evidence that the defendant was parked outside of a business or residential district by merely presenting evidence that the defendant was parked within a residential or business area. Darwicki v. State, 291 Ga. App. 239, 661 S.E.2d 859 (2008).

- When a driver collided with a second driver's stalled truck, it was error for the trial court to instruct the jury on negligence per se in relation to O.C.G.A. § 40-6-202 as the charge was not supported by the evidence; the highway was in a rural area, the second driver had not been driving without lights, but lost illumination when the vehicle's engine failed, and there was no evidence that the second driver had "parked" the truck, but that the truck came to a stop of the truck's own volition. White v. Scott, 284 Ga. App. 87, 643 S.E.2d 356 (2007).

- Defendant truck driver's admission of violating O.C.G.A. § 40-6-202, that the defendant parked without using reflective triangles, allowed plaintiff car driver's Fed. R. Civ. P. 50 motion to be granted to instruct the jury that the truck driver was negligent; that the truck driver intentionally parked the driver's truck in violation of § 40-6-202 was sufficient for negligence per se. McPherson v. Rowe, F.3d (11th Cir. Feb. 16, 2010)(Unpublished).

- Trial court erroneously granted suppression of the evidence seized in a traffic stop involving two defendants in which an officer, after arresting the first defendant for obstruction, searched the car and found a substance which a field test showed to be cocaine as the stopping officer was authorized to make the stop based on a violation of O.C.G.A. § 40-6-202 and because the officer could search the passenger compartment of the car incident to the arrest of the first defendant. State v. Stafford, 288 Ga. App. 309, 653 S.E.2d 750 (2007), aff'd, 284 Ga. 773, 671 S.E.2d 484 (2008).

Cited in Wallace v. Ener, 521 F.2d 215 (5th Cir. 1975); Fabian v. Vincent, 155 Ga. App. 464, 270 S.E.2d 858 (1980); Blake v. Continental S.E. Lines, 161 Ga. App. 869, 289 S.E.2d 551 (1982); Reliance Ins. Co. v. Bridges, 168 Ga. App. 874, 311 S.E.2d 193 (1983); Chinnis v. State, 240 Ga. App. 518, 523 S.E.2d 924 (1999); Welch v. State, 263 Ga. App. 70, 587 S.E.2d 220 (2003).

OPINIONS OF THE ATTORNEY GENERAL

Officers removing vehicles personally liable for gross negligence.

- Peace officers who cause vehicles to be removed from the public roadway are personally liable for those acts which constitute gross negligence with respect to the vehicle. 1974 Op. Att'y Gen. No. 74-99.

RESEARCH REFERENCES

Am. Jur. 2d.

- 7A Am. Jur. 2d, Automobiles and Highway Traffic, § 305.

- 60A C.J.S., Motor Vehicles, §§ 751 et seq., 762 et seq.

- Validity of automobile parking ordinances or regulations, 108 A.L.R. 1152; 130 A.L.R. 316.

Construction and effect in civil actions of statute, ordinance, or regulation requiring vehicles to be stopped or parked parallel with, and within certain distance of, curb, 17 A.L.R.2d 582.