Drivers who park in East Bay bus lanes or block bus stops will keep getting ticketed by camera. Gov. Gavin Newsom has signed Assembly Bill 1837, which renews the state authorization that lets transit agencies including AC Transit use forward-facing bus cameras to cite those violations. The existing permission was set to lapse on Jan. 1, 2027.
According to the bill text, the new law extends the authority to Jan. 1, 2034. Agencies that start enforcing a type of violation by camera for the first time must issue warnings for 60 days before sending tickets. The law also limits use of the footage to local agencies enforcing parking rules and bars its use for general law enforcement or by federal authorities.
What the cameras have done
AC Transit put the cameras on the full Tempo bus rapid transit corridor in June 2024 and expanded to 100 buses that August, each with two small windshield-mounted cameras, Mass Transit magazine reports. Before that, operators flagged violations by pressing a button on board. Data the agency compiled with camera maker Hayden AI shows bus-only lane citations fell from 1,241 in the second quarter of 2025 to 631 in the same quarter of 2026, and bus stop citations fell from 5,207 to 4,068.
"Vehicles illegally stopped in bus-only lanes or blocking bus stops create more than an inconvenience," AC Transit General Manager Salvador Llamas said in the agency's announcement, noting the risks for riders with disabilities. The bill was written by Assemblymember Mark Gonzalez of Los Angeles, with Oakland state Sen. Jesse Arreguín as principal co-author. AC Transit says it serves more than 3 million riders a month.
Housing for South Bay transit workers
A second new law, AB 2263 by Assemblymember Ash Kalra of San Jose, lets the Santa Clara Valley Transportation Authority set aside affordable housing for its own employees. VTA says many of its workers have been priced out of the area and commute one to two hours each way. Kalra, a former VTA board chair, said the units would come from transit-oriented developments the agency is already pursuing. That law takes effect Jan. 1, 2027.