Citation Numbers: 65 Op. Att'y Gen. 45
Judges: BRONSON C. La FOLLETTE, Attorney General
Filed Date: 3/24/1976
Status: Precedential
Modified Date: 7/6/2016
JAMES WENDLAND, District Attorney Dunn County
You have asked whether a person must have a driver's license to drive a motor vehicle on a public parking lot. The answer to your question depends upon whether a free municipal parking lot is a highway as defined in sec.
Section
". . . no person shall operate a motor vehicle upon a highway in this state unless such person has a license issued to him by the division . . ."
Also sec.
"No person whose operating privilege has been duty revoked or suspended pursuant to the laws of this state shall operate a motor vehicle upon any highway in this state . . ."
Section
"`Highway' means all public ways and thoroughfares and bridges on the same. It includes the entire width between the boundary lines of every way open to the use of the public as a matter of right for the purposes of vehicular travel . . . ."
Within the meaning of this definition a public parking lot could be regarded as being a part of a public way. As such, a parking lot would be a highway.
If this conclusion were correct, the rules of the road, ch. 346, Stats., would be applicable to public parking lots. See sec.
Further and highly persuasive evidence of legislative intent that public parking lots are not highways for the purpose of enforcement of ch. 346, Stats., generally, is found in the committee note to sec.
"Most provisions of this chapter are applicable only upon highways. This section gives the sections relating to reckless and drunken driving somewhat broader applicability. They will apply in such areas as parking lots, filling stations and loading platforms." 40 Wis. Stats. Ann. 361, Legislative Committee Notes (1957) to sec.
346.61 , Stats.
Moreover, for many years it has been the position of the Division of Motor Vehicles that a driver's license is not necessary to drive a motor vehicle in a public parking lot. This practical, long-continued construction of the law by the administrators charged with the duty of applying it is entitled to great weight in determining the meaning of the statute.Trczyniewski v. Milwaukee (1961),
It is, therefore, my opinion that the legislature did not intend the word "highway," as used in secs.
BCL:AOH