Pretty soon, citizens of Fairfax, California could be jailed for the heinous crime of washing their car. Fairfax is one of a number of cities the Wall Street Journal says is looking at drastically restricting or outright banning car washing at home or by charities. Santa Monica, California has already drafted a plan to ban car washes as fund raisers, stating they are "one of the biggest water wasters and pollution-generating events of this type." There isn't much concern over commercial car washes because some recycle water and others use the municipal sewer system to handle runoff. The Journal neglects to mention how much water the commercial car washes use, but then again, people who want to wash their own cars don't have an industry behind them lobbying to keep the focus off of them.
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This cannot be true! What bright spark thought that one up?! Washing cars is “one of the biggest water wasters and pollution-generating events of this type”? Car washing isn’t just asthetically important, it is also important to the well being of the car. Without washing, salt deposits and other nasties corrode and eat away at the car’s body. Over time, rust and holes will appear.
What’s next? Banning air freshners in car because “it plays havoc with one’s sinuses”?!
Idiots!
Leave it California to regulate minute details of its residents’ lives.
This is reason #115 on my list entitled “Reasons Why I will NEVER live in Kalifornia.”
I live in central VA and due to ongoing drought conditions, we’ve not been allowed to wash our cars since about August (except for commercial facilities). Our drought isn’t anywhere near as bad as Georgia’s, but we’ve not had much rain in the last several months.
My understanding is that commercial facilities recycle their water, plus the high-pressure nozzles mean that less water is used in the first place (like today’s low-flow shower heads in your bathroom).
Just drive a beater. Then it doesn’t matter if you can wash your car or not.
Or install a drain in your garage floor.
Only in Commyfornia. I swear, if that entire state just fell into the ocean, I don’t think I would even blink.
# Virtual Insanity :
December 5th, 2007 at 1:07 pm
“Only in Commyfornia. I swear, if that entire state just fell into the ocean, I don’t think I would even blink.”
and you know what, 49 stars would be very easy to arrange on a flag
“and you know what, 49 stars would be very easy to arrange on a flag”
Or we can just take over Canada and keep our flag the same :)
They can have my hose when they pry it from my cold, dead hands!
Don’t people pay for water? After that, isn’t it legally theirs to do whatever they want with it?
@Von:
That would actually kill two birds with one stone, Canada’s got plenty of water! Most of it is in snow form right now however.
Apparently the previous posters have never heard the word “drought”.
Certainly SoCal (although Fairfax is by San Francisco) depends on water brought from far away, and in the grand scheme of things washing cars is less important than, say, drinking or irrigating crops.
Australia has banned car washing in broad areas due to a crippling level of drought. And yet, pistonheads survive somehow. Atlanta, GA might be next if they get their heads out of the sand and realize what a water crisis they have on their hands.
Virtual Insanity :
Only in Commyfornia. I swear, if that entire state just fell into the ocean, I don’t think I would even blink.
No, Florida is the truly dispensable state :)
Actually, washing your car on the street has been prohibited here in Germany for something like the last ten years. It’s the same in most European countries.
(Certified) car washes have waste-water filters that prevent all that toxic grease and brake dust from going down the drain, where it makes water re-purification more difficult.
Sure it used to be a German ritual to spend every Saturday morning washing the darn car. The neighbors looked down on you if you didn’t. Good riddance to a tiresome habit, I say — life is too short.
I like handwashing my car. Its good thinking time for me, lets me clear my mind and such. Some people sit in a corner and chant, I wash my car.
Sure it used to be a German ritual to spend every Saturday morning washing the darn car. The neighbors looked down on you if you didn’t. Good riddance to a tiresome habit, I say — life is too short.
I do lament the loss of that fine German tradition, even if I’ve never participated in it.
bfg9k
Atlanta, GA might be next if they get their heads out of the sand and realize what a water crisis they have on their hands.
They’ve already outlawed car washing (and landscape watering and filling swimming pools and about any other outdoor water use you can think of) in the Atlanta area due to the drought. Any day now, we’re expecting them to tell us we can only flush our toilets every other day, depending on what number your address ends with.
bfg9k: Apparently the previous posters have never heard the word “drought”.
Most of these bans aren’t in response to a drought.
I think everyone agrees that measures have to be taken in extreme situations to conserve dwindling water supplies.
These measures are permanent, and were not taken in response to an emergency situation.
Martin Schwoerer: Sure it used to be a German ritual to spend every Saturday morning washing the darn car. The neighbors looked down on you if you didn’t. Good riddance to a tiresome habit, I say — life is too short.
That’s your choice, but others have a different take. I find washing and detailing the car to be an enjoyable, relaxing weekend activity. Life is too short to drive around in a dirty car.
Life should also be too short to be micromanaging what others do in their free time on their own property…
I remember when I was younger for the better part of a decade they had water restrictions in San Juan PR where they would only turn your water on 3 days a week for 2 hour intervals. And sometimes, depending on where you lived your water time was at 2 or 3 am. Try living in a place where you can only take a shower 3 days a week.
Although I live in south GA, no water restrictions, YET! Anyone know how to get pine sap off your clear coat? We have tried a bunch of stuff and nothing works. I would like to get rid of it before they tell me I can’t wash my car.
I’m not sure if it should be banned, but I certainly wouldn’t mind restrictions on it (keeping it to one or two days a week), like we have here quite often in south Florida.
Pine sap: I cut a wooden tongue depressor off to a chisel edge and use it in conjunction with the stuff that body-shop suppliers sell as silicone-removal cleaner for paint. Unfortunately, you will have to rewax in the areas where you use it, and if you let the sap get hard, you’re fricked.
Call me a cynic, but I’ve said it before: These type of bans keep personality-defective busy-bodies employed with enforcement and ignore many more wasteful uses.
Bottom line: If water is scarce, raise the %#$$@##@$$!! PRICE for excess use.
There are 2+ acre estates in Florida drought areas with emerald green lawns. How? Regulatory loopholes allow watering at very limited times. Combine that with hi-flow automated sprinkler systems that unleash Niagara Falls for 15 minutes every few days and you’ve got your own private 2+ acre putting green.
But watering and fertilizing the lawns of that suburban Wasteland that is Fairfax is obviously OK. As is chlorinated swimming pools.
If it wasn’t for the climate and shear natural beauty of this place, I doubt a single literate being would remain here past the end of the month.
From my back yard I can see Lake Ontario,on a clear day I can see Rochester N.Y.I will continue to hand wash both cars once a week.I may rethink this practice,when the day comes that I can walk over to Rochester.
I never understand the OMG WE ARE RUNNING OUT OF WATER screaming. See that ocean there? What is in it, Coca-Cola?
Now, we may be running out of CHEAP water (desalination plants are expensive). But that’s different.
mikey: From my back yard I can see Lake Ontario,on a clear day I can see Rochester N.Y.I will continue to hand wash both cars once a week.I may rethink this practice,when the day comes that I can walk over to Rochester.
I have a friend in Olcott. He sees lake Ontario every day. He can see Toronto occasionally. It’s much nicer than Rochester…
Summer 2006, Denver asks residents to conserve water due to lack of rain.
2007. Denver raises price of water because overly successful conservation by citizens reduced water revenue to below the fixed costs of running the facilities.
Overall, I would say that Denver is pretty well run (though there are WAY too many city employees). Still, they made this error. Canada made similar errors in health care planning that nearly resulted in the death of yours truly. Think about this whenever discussing government regulation of anything. It’s not because they are evil. It’s just because they attempt that which cannot be done. It’s foolish.
Everyone should pay the same price for the water and use it as they wish. Keep raising the price until it settles at a point that is sustainable. The fact is that people will start leaving areas where there is not enough water. So long as you don’t subsidize water for the poor, or some other idiotic scheme it works out.
Rare droughts are another issue, but the Cali thing is just idiotic.
You guys seem to be missing the point. Its not really about the water used except where there drought conditions. Its about the crap off the cars and the chemicals in the detergents polluting the environment.
An obvious first step would be banning the use and sale of non biodegradable detergents except in commercial and maybe certified car washes where the water is recycles of filtered and doesn’t flow into the storm drains.
Hey California, I need to take a dump. That OK?
The one thing that really bothers me is the swirl marks that these car washes usually make on the vehicles.
Then again, I don’t want to pay somebody loads of money just because they have a license to wash cars.
My solution is to have the dealer auctions do it for me. In fact, nearly every car that goes through the auctions will usually get a quick spray and rise. Depending on your relationship, you can also have them detailed but some of the stuff they use is rather strong in my opinion.
As William Foster would have said if he was still ‘Falling Down’ in California, “If there’s a drought….. don’t use the water unless you absolutely have to.” If folks can’t get through their thick heads then I am all in favor of harsh penalties. Turning off their water, and levying a heavy cash fine help real quick in that process. So can William Foster.
Um….is it not the case that dirty cars get lower gas mileage, thereby causing higher CO2 emissions per mile driven? By logical extension, according to our favorite tree-hugging Kalifornians, would that not result in more global warming, thus less rain and therefore deepening the drought?
So, by that logic, would we not want to promote car-washing as a means for promoting more water?
Also, I learned in chemistry class the basic principal (popularized by the great “Yes” tune, total mass retained, which indicates that water exists as vapor, or as water, or as ice. The same amount of water exists on the planet as did millions of years ago, but perhaps in a different form. If that is true, why all the fuss?
Gallagher was correct. Cali is like a bowl of granola…what ain’t fruits and nuts is flakes….
I have a much bigger problem: A neighborhood association that frowns upon car washing because it might sully the neighborhood. I even went so far to inquire Barry Meguiar to lend me a company attorney to help keep my right to a clean car. If I am using biodegradable products and a minimal amount of water, what is the problem? Sorry Martin, I actually enjoy washing my car and I don’t want to give it up. Once a week for twenty years; its my relaxation.
For all of you who have a problem with California, it’s time to resurrect a screed from the days when Texas power traders were manipulating our energy market into crisis.
From:
http://politicalhumor.about.com/library/jokes/bljokecalpower.htm
Dear Fellow Americans,
America has engaged in some finger wagging lately because California doesn’t have enough electricity to meet its needs. The rest of the country (including President Bush) seems to be just fine with letting Californians dangle in the breeze without enough power to meet their needs.
This is how it really is:
California ranks 48th in the nation in power consumed per person.
California grows more than half the nation’s fruit, nuts, and vegetables. We’re keeping them. We need something to eat when the power goes out. We grow 99 percent or more of the nation’s almonds, artichokes, dates, figs, kiwi, olives, persimmons, pistachios, prunes, raisins, and walnuts. Hope you won’t miss them.
California is the nation’s number-one dairy state. We’re keeping our dairy products. We’ll need plenty of fresh ones since our refrigerators can’t be relied upon. Got milk?
We Californians are gonna keep all our high-tech software in-state. Silicon Valley is ours, after all. Without enough electricity, which you’re apparently keeping for yourselves, we just plain don’t have enough software to spare. Can you say “typewriter”?
We’re keeping all our airplanes. California builds a good percentage of the commercial airliners available to fly you people to where you want to go. When yours wear out, you’d better hope Boeing’s Washington plant can keep you supplied. There isn’t enough electricity here to allow us to export any more planes than we need ourselves. And while we’re at it, we’re keeping all our high-tech aerospace stuff, too. Oh, yeah, and if you want to make a long-distance call, remember where the satellite components and tracking systems come from. Maybe you could get back in the habit of writing letters.
Want to see a blockbuster movie this weekend? Come to California. We make them here. Since we’ll now have to make them with our own electricity, we’re keeping them. The labs, printing facilities, editing facilities, and sound facilities are all here.
Want some nice domestic wine? We produce over 17 million gallons per year. We’ll need all of it to drown our sorrows when we think about the fact that no matter how many California products we export to make the rest of America’s lives better, America can’t see its way clear to help us out with a little electricity. You can no longer have any of our wine.
You all complain that we don’t build enough power plants. Well, you don’t grow enough food, write enough software, make enough movies, build enough airplanes and defense systems, or make enough wine.
Love,
The Californians
Fairfax is in a relatively wet part of Marin County but its streets and driveways drain into the Northern part of San Francisco Bay, which has many wetlands and is an important wildlife habitat. It is perfectly reasonable to ban activities that damage that habitat, especially when good alternatives are widely available (including do-it-yourself car washes that don’t make swirl marks and recycle/filter their water).
How you use/waste your water in the various flyover states is up to you; please let us protect our environment in California.
Well said, from a New Yorker ( with a daughter in San Fran). I suppose every 10 posts somebody has to point out that the problem is pollution, not drought.
Why is it so important to have a squeaky-clean car anyway? I suspect there are people who wear their underpants for a week who wouldn’t dream of letting their Porschie get dirty.
My neighbor washes his BMW Z3 (Mrs.) and his Porsche Boxster S (Mr.) every single week-end. I guess when you have nice cars, it lets you spend time ogling them.
As for my Mustang, I next plan to wash it sometime in March.
Martin’ right: Life’s too short to wash a car. I’d rather be driving it. The only time anything good comes out of washing a car is when the washing of said car occurs in a porno movie.
So in California, I can’t buy a huge bottle of water, put it in a plastic bag, and take it outside to wash my car in my driveway?
What is more wasteful? Washing your car in your driveway or jumping sitting in that California traffic to get to your nearest car wash?
OK, I get it, it is about pollution.
But unless they make it mandatory to have your car washed on a regular basis at government licensed facilities, how is banning home washing of cars going to keep vehicle run off out of sewers & ground water?
It has to rain sometime, and between falling rain, wet roads and spray from other vehicles, most all the nasty stuff on a car is going to wind up as run off eventually.
Its amazing how some of the same posters who are critical of brand resale value are the same who don’t care about a clean car. If you wash your car and keep a coat of wax on it, your ride can be a statistical outlyer on resale price. Or don’t care for it and don’t complain on your dealer trade-in value because no one would buy it for big bucks in a private sale.
Nopanegain… the key word here is ‘drought’.
We’re having a very nasty one in the Southeast right now. Let me put it to you this way. You can WALK into Lake Allatoona and Lake Lanier, two of metro-Atlanta’s largest reservoirs right now. We’re not talking about a few feet. We’re talking a good 100 to 150 feet depending on where you start.
Virtually the entire Southeast is getting glazed at the moment. The question is not whether the free market will work. It’s whether the weather will work.
No doubt Steve,
I was replying to other posters who went off on a tangent. As much as I enjoy washing my car, I wouldn’t if there were a water shortage in my area.
Yes, you’re absolutely right, a clean car is a far more valuable car, in terms of resale. But how sudsing the thing every weekend accomplishes that I don’t know. What I do is keep the interior impeccable–no food within 50 feet of the car, vacuum it out once a week or so, floormats plus rubber winter floormats and all that stuff–but hell, I can wash the thing the day before I sell it and it’ll look fine, as far as that goes.
Okay, I wax the Porsches before the winter and before the summer, but that’s it. Anything beyond that is preening, not protecting resale value. We’re not talkin’ 1930s lacquers here, these are paints that are hugely durable.
My feeling is that pretty much anybody can make a modern car look neat from the outside with a half-hour’s work, but if you’ve spent two years eating fast food inside it, you’re fricked.
I can understand car washing limitations if you are undergoing a drought.
But as a way to reduce pollution?
People better wake up to how the socialists and the nanny-statists are using “green” as a way to totalitarianism.
As I stated, droughts (not the ones that happen every other year, the real ones) are a different thing altogether. Having lived in California, I can tell you that the problem there is the government, not the weather.
Atlanta is a different case. What you are going through is mostly a weather problem being exascerbated by government. From what I read, the government has finally gotten it’s act together, so now you just need rain. Nothing to be done about that. You could blame “climate change”, but then you would have to explaing the whole dust bowl thing as well.
I don’t understand why a discussion about ecological topics has to slide down into ideology. Buzzwords like “nanny state” or “socialism” or “American tradition” are not helpful, I would say.
(I admit that when I wrote about car washing being a tiresome habit, it sounded like I was saying that my personal taste should be law, so I wish to apologize for that).
Anyway — why not talk about the merits and demerits of driveway car washing based on a civil exchange of ideas and of data?
Here’s a quote which I hope is correct, but please guys point out if it is not.
“Few people realize that washing our cars in our driveways is one of the most environmentally un-friendly chores we can do around the house. Unlike household waste water that enters sewers or septic systems and undergoes treatment before it is discharged into the environment, what runs off from your car goes right into storm drains — and eventually into rivers, streams, creeks and wetlands where it poisons aquatic life and wreaks other ecosystem havoc. After all, that water is loaded with a witch’s brew of gasoline, oil and residues from exhaust fumes — as well as the harsh detergents being used for the washing itself.”
So: it’s not just the additional water consumption in comparison to commercial car washes. It’s not just the detergent. And it’s only the same as leaving your car outside in the rain if the rain contained detergents or solvents.
Martin,
You are correct. If the runoff does go into storm drains it will pollute rivers, wetlands, etc. The question is by how much? Can it really be measured? Nature is more resillient than we give her credit for. Only non-biased scientific inquiry could answer this question. Alas most science today has built in bias, especially if money (government grants etc.) is attached to it.
The pollution issue is why car washes have filtering & recycling systems since they do so many cars ** at one location **. I’m not ready to concede that you washing your car once a week in your driveway/at your curb is causing severe enough harm to be banned. Also I believe in NJ the storm drains in many communities are connected to the sewers so the runoff is processed. Anyone from NJ please correct me if I’m wrong.
One more thing, mobile detailers/car washers have been required to contain runoff since the passing of the Clean Water Act in the early 1970’s (for the same reason as fixed car washes). Many do not. It’s because although the regulation is federal, the enforcement is left up to local authorities who have other priorities. If you use a mobile detailer you should insist he/she contains their runoff and complies with the law. Too many ‘fly-by-night’ detailers who don’t want to spend the money to comply. If they do that, why not skip liability insurance converage or a business license as well?
windswords: I agree with you if you are saying that the effect of one car washed in the driveway is certainly negligable, and that nature can handle a whole lot of gunk.
On the other hand, your argument was used in the 1970s by opponents of emission control, and they were kinda right too: why install catalysers in cars in New Hampshire? Why should people in rural Texas have to adopt to standards that those picky Californians set? Where is the measureable damage?
Why, I can remember how car lobbys, back in the 1970s, opposed phasing out leaded fuel here in Germany. They said the damage caused by lead was a quantité négligable, if you’ll pardon my French.
They had a point, but they were on the wrong side of history. Meaning: modern societies try to stop emission of harmful substances at the source, before proof has been submitted that people or animals are actually dying.
The cleaning agents I use are all designed to minimize harm to the environment (much like household detergents have been for years).
The non-water washing agent referred to in The Wall Street Journal sounds interesting. The only drawback appears to be that, when it is used, it takes longer to clean the vehicle than if water is used, which would be more of an issue with a business than with an individual (I can spare the extra 15 minutes).
Reading the articles again, I also note that they want to ban washing vehicles on the street, not on grass or lawns.
As others have noted, in many communities, storm drains are connected to water processing plants, which would make this a non-issue (except during droughts, obviously).
Eric_Stepans:
The root cause of your energy crisis was a botched “deregulation” scheme (that didn’t completely deregulate the market, which was the real problem) passed by the California legislature and approved the Governor of California. The problems would have happened without the intervention of Enron.
I’ve invested in some ONR (no rinse wash) and I’ll probably buy water to use it with, so the water nazis can leave me alone. The last time i had my GTI serviced the dealership did me the ‘favor’ of installing swirls into every square inch of my meticulously upkept clearcoat (and actual scratches, to boot)… my car now looks as bad as my nearly 10 year old integra did when i got rid of it, and it doesn’t help that because it’s black it now looks dirty all the time from the swirling.
Once I get it polished i’ll break the fingers of anyone who tries to wash it for me. You can run your car through a swirl-o-matic, but I actually like my car, and want to keep it looking good for a long time. I’d rather do the upkeep properly than have to polish it every time some idiot thinks they know how to wash a car for me.