It’s all going to be on a case-by-case basis, so if you’re totally freaked out and you just don’t want to drive your car no mo, then maybe your dealership can send somebody to come around your place to pick up your car, fix it and return it as good as new. Or you can get a loaner if your repairs go into extra innings.

Read the news, below.

Brown Forges Deal with Toyota to Help Consumers While Recalled Vehicles are Repaired

Attorney General Edmund G. Brown Jr. today announced that his office has reached an agreement with Toyota Motor Sales USA, Inc. to provide California Toyota owners with at-home pickup and vehicle return and cost-free alternative transportation while their recalled vehicles are being repaired.

“This agreement goes a long way towards easing the burden caused by Toyota’s massive recall,” Brown said. “It will now be much easier for Toyota owners to get to work and take their kids to school while critical safety repairs are made on their cars.”

Under the terms of today’s agreement, Toyota will provide owners of recalled vehicles the following services:

- Pick-up and return of vehicles by the dealership;
- Transportation to the dealership and/or to the owner’s place of work;
- Alternative transportation, such as a rental car, loaner vehicle or taxi reimbursement for a reasonable period that the customer is unable or unwilling to use his or her car; and
- Expedited scheduling for repair services.

These services will be provided by Toyota through the dealers at no cost to either the owners or the dealer.

The following Toyota vehicle recalls are covered by today’s agreement:
- September 29, 2009 for floormat entrapment;
- January 21, 2010 for sticking accelerator pedals;
- February 8, 2010 for anti-lock brake system issues; and
- February 12, 2010 for drive-shaft failure.

The following vehicles are involved in the recent Toyota and Lexus vehicle recalls: 2005-2010 Avalon, 2007-2010 Camry, 2009-2010 Corolla, 2007-2010 ES 350, 2008-2010 Highlander, 2006-2010 IS 250 and IS350, 2009-2010 Matrix, 2004-2009 Prius, 2010 Prius, 2009-2010 RAV4, 2008-2010 Sequoia, 2005-2010 Tacoma, 2007-2010 Tundra, 2009-2010 VENZA, and 2010 HS 250h.

More information on the specific vehicles affected by the recalls can be found at www.nhtsa.dot.gov and www.toyota.com/recall.

Californians are encouraged to contact their local Toyota and Lexus dealers if they believe they are eligible for these accommodations. Consumers can also contact Toyota’s customer service center at 1-800-331-4331 or Lexus at 1-800-255-3987.

This agreement will remain in place until all Toyota vehicles subject to the recall have been repaired. If additional safety recalls arise, an extension of this agreement or other appropriate provisions will be pursued.

Toyota Motor Sales USA, Inc. is based in Torrance, CA.

That’s good for Prius drivers but bad for the govmints. This chart from a big new report (free .pdf) out of California’s own RAND Corportation think tank ’splains it all. See? You people are out there clogging up the roads and tearing up the streets 100% more than you were in 1980, but you’re only buying 50% more fuel:

You drivers are paying more in tax but not as much as if you would be paying if you were taxed by the mile. (That makes you a deadbeat in the eyes of the Powers That Be.)

And things are only going to get “worse” when Tesla Motors’ mainstream Model S hits the streets in 2009, 2010, 2011, 2012, “late 2012,” right? Electric car drivers pay no gas tax at all, so how are we going to make sure that they pay their fair share to repave our streets ‘n stuff**?

The RANDian eggheads looked at these issues and, out of 15 ideas, decided that these three would be the most practicable: 

What if the authorities put a GPS unit in your car or motorcycle? Not the regular kind of GPS receiver, the good kind, the ones that use differentials or whatever to pinpoint your whereabouts down to a couple yards on a 24-7 basis. 

You don’t like that? Well how about a cell phone in your car next to the engine that would call the government on a regular basis to rat out how miles you’ve driven the past week?

You don’t like that neither? Well how about a system that ID’s your car when you buy gas and then computes your Miles Driven by looking at your particular model’s EPA rating?

And let’s say this all gets implemented in five years. 

Or instead, our electeds could simply raise gas taxes a bit, but that’s not something that they like talking about doing.

Of course they could make this new VMT proposal “revenue neutral” by getting rid of or lowering per-gallon fuel taxes that you pay today. Once a system like this is in place, taxes would correlate more directly with miles driven – it’s up to you if you like that or not.

Welcome to The Future.

Speaking of 1980:

My uncle has a country place
That no one knows about.
He says it used to be a farm
Before the Motor Law.
And on Sundays I elude the Eyes,
And hop the Turbine Freight
To far outside the Wire
Where my white-haired uncle waits.

See how this libertarian, Canadian Power Rock Trio story ends after the jump.

*Not so much this past year or two, but you’ll be out there in force again soon enough.

**And maybe that’s the way it should be. I know all the arguments you’re thinking about - this is a political question, of course.

Jump to the ground
As the Turbo slows to cross the borderline.
Run like the wind
As excitement shivers up and down my spine.
Down in his barn
My uncle preserved for me an old machine
For fifty-odd years.
To keep it as new has been his dearest dream.

I strip away the old debris
That hides a shining car:
A brilliant red Barchetta
From a better vanished time.
We fire up the willing engine
Responding with a roar.
Tires spitting gravel,
I commit my weekly crime.

Wind
In my hair
Shifting and drifting
Mechanical music
Adrenaline surge…

Well-weathered leather,
Hot metal and oil,
The scented country air.
Sunlight on chrome,
The blur of the landscape,
Every nerve aware.

Suddenly ahead of me
Across the mountainside
A gleaming alloy air-car
Shoots towards me, two lanes wide.
I spin around with shrieking tires
To run the deadly race
Go screaming through the valley
As another joins the chase.

Drive like the wind
Straining the limits of machine and man.
Laughing out loud with fear and hope
I’ve got a desperate plan.
At the one-lane bridge
I leave the giants stranded at the riverside.
Race back to the farm
To dream with my uncle at the fireside.

And how about nice warm bowl of alphabet soup?

LIST OF ACRONYMS AND ABBREVIATIONS

BEES Board on Energy and Environmental Systems

BOE Board of Equalization

BTH Business, Housing, and Transportation

CAFE Corporate Average Fuel Economy Standards

CBD Central Business District

CSS Citizen Services System

DMV Department of Motor Vehicles

DVS Driver and Vehicle Services

DOT Department of Transportation

DSRC Dedicated Short Range Communications

EIA Energy Information Agency

FTB Franchise Tax Board

GAO Government Accountability Office

GPS (Satellite-based) Global Positioning System

HPMS Highway Performance Monitoring System

HTF Federal Highway Trust Fund

HVUT Heavy Vehicle Use Tax

IFTA International Fuel Tax Agreement

IRP International Registration Plan

IRS Internal Revenue Service

MVA Motor Vehicle Administration

NCHRP National Highway Cooperative Research Program

NEMS National Energy Modeling System

NHTSA National Highway Traffic Safety Administration

OBD II On-Board Diagnostics port, second generation (post-1996)

OBU On-Board Unit

PAYD Pay-As-You-Drive

PSRC Puget Sound Regional Council

RFID Radio Frequency Identification

RPC Regional Processing Center

TIMA Truth in Mileage Act

TRB Transportation Research Board

VIN Vehicle Identification Number

VMT Vehicle Miles of Travel

VTR Vehicle Titles and Registration

VTrans Vermont Agency of Transportation

“I pledge 60 MPH max to save U.S. gas $“

Fair enough. Not sure how this would work on the nascent Trans-Texas Corridor where they’ll have an 85mph limit, or for that matter Montana where teen-aged girls on narrow highways will pass you in their tiny three-cylinder cars going 90+, but oh well.

Click to expand

The Sierra Club has/had a similar campaign – “I Can Drive 55 (or whatever the limit is).”

Pledgers should keep to the right (avoiding those carpool lane-stickered Toyota Priuseses going 80+ on the I-80) and they’ll be fine.

Pledge on.

(These kinds of pledges probably will have a higher success rate than those chastity pledges that don’t seem to work.)

What’s the deal with you all? You drive as if you’re the only people on Earth. So, if there are a lot of streetlamps on at night, don’t bother turning on your headlights cause how does it benefit you, right? And if you want to cross town, just drive through the Sunset Tunnel – no hills and no red lights! And if you want to park, just do it the way you feel, you dig? You’re entitled.

As here, where a hastily parked Prius turns busy Stockton Street into a slolom course. I mean, its rear is more in the traffic lane than not. But for a bad San Francisco Prius driver, that’s a parking job well done, now let’s find that Starbucks: 

Click to expand

Now don’t be talking about confirmation bias. Oh no. Just check it out for yourself, on the streets.

So, Volvo drivers are the ones who don’t know that you’re thereand Prius drivers are the ones who know that you’re there, but they just don’t care.

(And someday somebody will explain to me how the EPA mileage estimates are lower for the 2010 model than they were for the 2004 model, even though the roomier 2010 model is better in many ways and, in real life, gets better fuel economy. Did somebody mislead us about fuel economy, back in the day?)

All right Prius driver, enjoy your rolling triggerfish, but try remember that you’re not the only person in the world.

Glub glub.

Click to expand:

Courtesy of damianspain of the San Francisco Bay area. Thanks Damian!

Turns out that the Googler got ticketed, but not for a moving violation. Apparently, Google didn’t feel the need to secure a permit to photograph this National Park for commercial purposes, even after discussing the issue with the Presidio Trust. So, somebody called the federales and Google got an expensive citation.

Rich Google can afford to plant 800 pound “pins” all over town for the promotion of Google’s My Favorite Places, but it can’t see its way to clear to get a necessary permit to operate on federal land? Mmmm. 

Now, go here to see the hot pursuit by this United States Park Police Officer. Scroll around and keep clicking- you’ll see the whole chase all the way up Montgomery Street.

Pull over, Google! The feds want to chat:

“I’m in Hot Pursuit! Choo choo!  Kik-kik-kyah, I love it! I love it!” Or kyew kyew, either way.

But if Google can afford $7000 Japanese toilets for all its bathroom stalls, then it can probably afford the occasional citation.

Keep up the good work, Googoo!

“It bullies, it meanders, it stops in the middle of the street so its occupant can have a long conversation with someone standing on the sidewalk. I have done my best to provide loving correction; I have been met only with denial.”

That’s a fair beef, and so are these. In fact, some in the U.K. actually want authorities to prosecute Volvo drivers.

Here’s a typical example – the driver here in Laurel Heights slowly intrudes into the crosswalk and then tentatively creeps forward past two red lights into cross traffic. Hello-ooo! The S40 (S60, S80?) can be seen here backing up in order to let southbound traffic through:

Click to expand.

Now of course, lately, Toyota Prius hybrid drivers have been going to great lengths to keep up with the bottom quintile of Volvo drivers. With these Priuseses around town, if they’re not provoking others, they’re getting Denver booted, and when they’re not getting pulled over, they’re being used for remedial driving lessons.

So yes, some Prius drivers have issues (specifically driving around at night with the lights off, no daytime running lights, no nothing, why Prius, why?) but Volvo drivers take the cake, because they keep coming up with new ways of disappointing you.

Like entering MUNI train tunnels and then driving along like there’s nothing wrong. There’s no video of that incident available but it must have looked something like this.  

So, read Jon Carroll’s columns above for nuance and then come to the conclusion that, on the streets of the San Francisco Bay Area, the refrain of motorists, cyclists and pedestrians alike is:

“It’s always a Volvo” (unless it’s a Prius).

Bank on it.

Get one for yourself if you want. A 2009 model can be had for a couple thousand off of MSRP these days (thanks to the $1000 rebate), and the 2010 models will be coming out soon as well. Zoom zoom.

As seen on the streets of San Francisco.

But now, add to that list of hybrids this small black Toyota Prius limousine from PLANETTRAN (888 756-876) complete with California Transportation Charter Party License number (0020961) and LIVERY license plates.  

Click to expand.

It’s new, it’s you.

The first lesson for Prius drivers in the Bay Area is how to turn the headlights on at night. An amazing number of drivers of these cars just don’t seem to be aware that their lights aren’t on. No headlights, daytime running lights, turn signals, tailights – no nothing except the brake lights occasionally.  

Click to expand:

All you can do is yell “headlights!” when they drive past.

So the photo below shows how the magic of Google Street View happens – you can see their method all laid out. In this case, Google is using a brand-spanking-new Toyota Prius gas-electric hybrid (wouldn’t a 50-state VW Jetta TDI diesel get better mileage?) and a rather tall metal mast with mad cameras, GPSes and SICK laser range finders. Click to expand:

Courtesy of damianspain of the San Francisco Bay area. Thanks Damian! Check out his flickrstream for lots of great shots of San Francisco, including a rare blue sky at the North Beach Festival.

(Normally, the Presidio is a quiet place, except for people feuding over the location of the new CAMP museum and the occasional coyote attack. And Hooverball - the kids these days make all sorts of noise throwing their old school medicine balls around.)

Keep up the good work, Google Street View drivers. Just make sure to watch out for The Man (as well as all those sexy pedestrians trying to catch your attention).

[Update: National Park Service employee and Commenter #67 Motorcop_2000 disputes any account that has the Googler getting a ticket. MC_2K indicates that this driver merely got lost and was trying to get "back to the Avenues" (meaning the Richmond or the Sunset districts). Bad driving and Toyota Priuseses seem to go together, so this story rings true.]