Safe driving and emergencies
Your friends want to ride in the open bed of your pickup truck for a short trip. When is that allowed?
- Only if the truck has secure seats and seat belts for them. Correct answer
- Only on streets posted at 25 mph or less.
- Whenever the tailgate is closed and latched.
Why
A pickup bed is not a passenger seat. Passengers may ride in the cargo area of a pickup or any other truck only when it has secure seats and seat belts, and the handbook makes no exception for short trips, slow streets or a closed tailgate. Animals follow a parallel rule: they may ride back there only if properly secured, so they cannot fall, jump or be thrown from the truck. Two more items from the same list apply inside the cab. You may not smoke while a minor is in the vehicle, and a video monitor the driver can see may only show vehicle information, navigation, a media player or the radio.
Where this comes from
California Driver's Handbook, June 2025 edition. The correct answer is Only if the truck has secure seats and seat belts for them.
The rule behind this one
Safe driving and emergencies in California goes through the whole topic, with the page of the California Driver's Handbook behind every rule.
More on safe driving and emergencies
- How does the handbook tell you to check your blind spots?
- At night, a vehicle showing only one headlight is coming toward you. What should you do?
- Your car has four-wheel antilock brakes (ABS) and goes into a locked wheel skid. What should you do with the brake pedal?
- You have just driven through water and your brakes are wet. How does the handbook tell you to dry them?