Court Opinion

ID: 9548638
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-07 18:06:22.415277+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T15:19:12.695769
License: Public Domain

CONCURRING OPINION OP
M. DOI, CIRCUIT JUDGE.
I concur.
However, I believe that the purpose of HRS § 286-81(1) (A) is not narrowly confined to protection of an individual from his own folly. In its preamble, the act expresses concern over “deaths of persons and injuries to them and damage to property with other losses suffered on account of highway traffic accidents.” This is sufficiently broad to embrace repercussions beyond the immediate interest of the individual alone.
A direct' beneficiary of the statute’s protective thrust may be the individual cyclist, but the scope of its salutary results is not confined to him. Whether by relieving further strain on emergency services or overcrowded medical facilities subsidized by government or by preventing excessive liability, criminal as well as civil, on the part of other users of the highways, all by means of guarding against the significantly increased hazards of serious injury or death to the unhelmeted cyclists in this day of heavy and highspeed traffic, there are real and practical ramifications of substantial interest to others which are well within the ambit of public purpose as distinguished from private concern.
Regulating the use of public highways in the interest of safety is a valid state object, the power with respect thereto being “broad and pervasive”, “exceptional” in *524scope, and carrying “a strong presumption of validity when challenged in court.” Bibb v. Navajo Freight Lines, 359 U.S. 520. Appellant fails in his challenge in this case.