Golf Cart hit and Run
 

Please watch for a purple 2 seater golf cart with damage to the front end. On Tuesday, June 4 at 9:50 am I was driving north on Morse Blvd in the turning lane towards 441 when a purple golf cart with a woman driver ran into the driver side of my car, a gold chevy equinox. She backed up, drove around the back of my car and drove away before I had time to get out of my car. If you see a purple cart with front end damage, please pm me or call the Sumter County Sheriff department.

I know it shouldn’t surprise me, but I can’t believe people don’t take responsibility for their actions.

She was probably fleeing a certain DUI

Time, for some kind of ID on golf carts

This will probably make me very unpopular, but I really believe that carts should all be licensed and that anyone driving one anyplace other than on his or her own private property should be required to have a drivers license. The idea that young teenagers and seniors who have had to give up their licenses due to poor vision or physical condition can drive golf carts is ridiculous. It is a miracle that more people are not injured in cart accidents.

kathy

Suggestion
 

I would call your insurance company. You do not state the damage to your car. I'm sure you will get all kinds of conflicting advice re: laws etc. My opinion and life experience. Fair, right, wrong, morals legal and who has money are too often in conflict.

You are not alone
 

Seems in the op the golf cart was purple. Imagine if it was a red Yamaha. A report-I was hit by a red Yamaha. At minimal cost, they should all have a number on them. Surely, some will object. A nominal fee could be charged to cover the cost of the uniform stickers that would prevent duplicate issued numbers, fake numbers etc. Wheel locks and fines would force compliance.

Cart accidents? My view is even the term accident is false.
Most, "accidents," are avoidable.

Having the individual licensed isn't helpful, because so many people let their guests use the carts, and why would an out-of-state visitor only there for a couple of days, make an effort to own up to responsibility when they caused it in the first place?

Attach ownership of the cart to ownership of the property. Make it part of a universal deed compliance regulation. It can be identified by color on the bumper with some kind of prominent sticker, to direct observers/witnesses/victims to district, or village, or region. Make it easy to narrow it down, if not flat-out identify it fully.

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I'm with you, Kathy, 100%. It's long, long overdue.

We saw an "accident" aka "big mistake" happen a few weeks ago on Bonita in front of the Largo District Office. A man in a golf cart suddenly decided to make a U-turn and collided with a moving car. He had two passengers with him. For some reason they remained in the cart. The impact knocked him into the street and tore one of the wheels off the cart.

You too will be old someday if you live long enough.

Why, if they drive off where you can’t see what good will that do. Just cause you don’t own cart don’t mean the rest of us want added cost or red tape

got news for you, just cause you have driver’s license don’t mean you can drive regardless of what age

And? Accident’s are direct results of bad driving, stupid drivers. That’s NOT going way any time soon.

... and if I have my license taken away because I can't see I shouldn't be driving a golf cart.

k.

Of course it doesn't but that doesn't mean we shouldn't try to keep people off the road if they are not physically well enough to drive. Requiring a license is a start.

k.

keep it the way it is ,thats one of the things that keeps the villages a popular place...no license required...:coolsmiley:

So, either Topspinmo or billaur has a purple golf cart.

KIDDING!!!!!!!!! Just kidding...:icon_wink:

I agree, I hope no one takes my remarks here as some kind of defensive stance, but, I don't think the inventors of the golf cart (don't know them but DO remember the old Harley Davidson kind with ONLY one front wheel !) had anything in mind other than driving them on anything but a golf course. Made it possible for many who never dreamed of playing or who had to give it up, able to play. Fast forward to ATV's, golf carts as taking the place of automobiles, government grants to purchase golf carts as "electric" vehicles, etc. etc. and what government could have possibly seen what is going on today ! Personally I can't believe the dangerous calls I have had with people who purchased a VERY fast vehicle designed to run on public automobile roads, and then what do they do, run on the golf cart paths in the V's like it's a race track. Often, this is accompanied with a strong shaking of the fist and unintelligible language as they speed around JUST having enough time to get back to the right before hitting an on coming cart head on. Why, why, why ? Not saying, just asking, would it do anything to make irresponsible people more responsible, more caring, less self consumed, to license them ? Did people stop driving drunk when it became illegal to do so ? Do boat owners never drive drunk in states where the state issues boat licenses ? Don't misunderstand, anything is worth a try ! But, sure have not seen the criminals saying to themselves, "Oh, I forgot, I HAVE to get down and register this gun". I tend to think, just a hunch, we'd end up having one more expense and the people like this one would STILL do exactly what this despicable person did. How sad. I will go on record saying I considered all sides of the controversy of teens being able to go to our local public course years ago and rent a golf cart when they could not yet drive an auto. Our park board and city council were all over the place on this. My final opinion was, unfair as it might seem, teens should NOT be able to rent gas or electric carts, but as an incentive to take up the game and not feel they were being discriminated against, could be allowed the use of the (then $2, LOL !) pull carts free of charge (in other words, included in the teen 9 & 18 hole rates) if under the age of 16. Walking is good exercise if you are physically able. Should a disabled teen be able to use a cart to get around, absolutely, life as a disabled young person is hard enough. Ok, some will probably get angry about all of this...as the person above mentioned.

You are so right on that one ! Maybe 99% avoidable, 1% mechanical failure ? (breaks wet, steering cable break, etc. rare, most DRIVER brain dead, or, perhaps, just posting on Facebook while going along at 28, 29 mph ?)

I may be wrong, but my understanding is if you lose your Florida license, you are NOT allowed to drive ANY motorized vehicle, moped, motorcycle, motorized bike, or golf cart. BTW, I do find this confusing as you do not need a license to drive a cart, but if you have a license, you lose you right to use the cart if you lose that license, go figure....

As for high speed carts, in the last week I have personally clocked 2 carts at 30 MPH on Pinellas Place and Hillsboro, in both cases, I noticed that my cruise control was at 30 mph and I was not gaining on the carts!

I am not sure where I stand on golf cart ID numbers, I can see both sides.

A student pilot certificate starts at age 14, you can fly solo at age 16.

These are the circumstances where you pray someone will see these posts and call saying "I saw that, in fact, I figured plenty of others probably caught it on their cell phone cameras, but in case not, I DID take a quick shot just in case". Wouldn't that be great !

Here’s what I learned from the DMV. There’s a sort of loophole. It’s true that if you lose your license, you can’t drive a golf cart. But, if you voluntarily surrender the license, or just don’t renew it, it’s not considered that the license has been taken away, so you can still drive a golf cart.

The speed of these carts is really getting out of hand. The retail places in the Villages think they are getting around this by refusing to sell carts that go over the Villages "allowed" speed. I recently found out it's not just "a little" business they loose, more and more people are buying from dealers outside the V's, so not selling carts that exceed the limit probably has little impact. Of course there are also those who work on their own carts ! When you think about it, should it be up to the Chevy DEALER to make sure the cars they sell will not go over 70 even though the car will do close to 120 or more ? I just think there are people everywhere that think nothing applies to them personally IF it is not something they wish to follow. We have a large sign here that says Please DO NOT place dog feces in this trash can. I mean it is summer, in Florida and some human being has to CLEAN this can, well all understand this, yet, everyday you see a person to whom this does not apply. While others are all over the place with their fast food type disposable gloves, their plastic bags of poop to carry home to dispose of at their own property, there is always someone dropping it right into the trash can for all to enjoy the aroma while lounging around the pool or postal station. It's life any where, always some special people. Same with those who will walk their dogs 2, 3 blocks away and stand in the street while they WATCH their dogs do their "duty" in someone else's lawn...then, without any shame, walk into the yard and pick up the poop (IF the home owner is lucky !), if not, they simply leave the poo ? Sure better than letting fido poo in their own grass on their property for sure ! People ? What are they thinking ? More and more I have to force myself to ignore this, with the huge population growth here, I guess the actual percentage of such people does not change, it's just that the development has grown so large so perhaps I notice the disrespect and dangerous behavior more compared to years past. Same with renters, I never used to see any difference rather a "renter" or an "owner", now, well, I don't want to seem like a negative person, so I try not to notice the rude behavior, don't want to paint every "renter" with a broad brush, but the way some of them drive the owner's golf cart, makes you wonder. Over Easter holiday the rental home down the street (comes with a cart) had four "children", one definitely looked old enough to have a license, the others no way. They were out riding every single night of the vacation, driving late at night, I tunes blaring from their cell phones, honking the horn of the cart, going as fast as possible around and around the block (probably had been told NOT to leave the immediate vicinity ?). I kept telling myself, kids will be kids, do NOT turn into a crabby old lady who calls the police....LOL ! Wish I did have the answers too all these things mentioned in this and the other forums ! I want to make sure to stay a happy, positive, person. I guess I will have to work hard to keep my eyes, and my ears, closed...LOL !

:faint:

Getting back to the OP accident. Would an ID sticker on the GC that hit him or her made a difference? As the OP said, the offending GC “drove away before I had time to get out of my car.”

Accidents are going to happen, TV is a city with Guinness Book numbers of GCs. I don’t know the reason for the person to run, maybe panic. Is adding several layers of bureaucracy to drive your GC the answer? Anytime the government increases regulation it never seems to be enough, it just brings on more regulations and that will bring on more regulation, and so on. Regulation is a slippery slope that makes me cringe because it can easily get to the level of ridiculous. BUT I will concede if GC driving becomes a real problem, meaning we’re unable to police ourselves, then we must increase regulation.

Good post, I agree.

That's why I don't think a drivers license on the driver is going to be useful, or helpful, in checks and balances against hit and runs. You need to be able to identify the golf cart. Once you do that, you can figure out who was driving it. Perhaps requiring the carts themselves to be registered and provided with a plate, or special identification sticker - whether the driver is licensed or not. Maybe it could be tied to the cart insurance.

All the white rental carts have 4 digit ID #'s, what would be so difficult with having a golf cart with an ID #, on a data base ?, @ least the owner can be traced when a new cart is purchased a tag is issued --a tag for a trailer is approx $14.00

Just thinking outta the box a little bit. The dream come true and the registration and numbering or identification is complete on every Golf Cart in the entire community. I notice a cart at the square or pool with the perfect amount and area of damage corresponding to the damage on my cart and claim a nice payday on that cart because it has an I.D. on it. Or a neighbor, poster, family member or someone I pass by that I don't like or someone who actually cuts me off or does something dopey while driving the cart and I do get the cart number, I think I got the cart number because it was 5 minutes from the time I saw the person and the time I wrote the number down because I couldn't find a pen and a piece of paper and the number is that of a Snowbird or a cart that is off the premises being repaired.

How about reality. Who is going to pay the army of people who have to administer this identification program and the people who will enforce the daily complaints that are surely coming?

It is a shame what happened to the OP, terrible actually but there are to many holes in the ID program for it to accomplish its goal instead of creating more problems.

I don't care one bit if it stays the way it is today or someone figures out a way to really make it work. I would be supportive either way just be warned it could be a giant mess.

Good Luck figuring it out. Let's see what the story is if it costs people a couple of dollars. Call the WAAAMBULANCE!

:agree:

I was actually amazed when I found out that golf carts didn't have to be registered...and required to display that registration #.

In every state that I've lived previously (8), everything from a 10' jon boat to snowmobiles, were required to pay for a registration (usually a small amount)...and to prominently display that registration number on the unit.

And while the whining complaints of "being cut-off" or "they were going too fast" might occur, in collisions/incidents like described in the OP...it would make it easier to possibly find the offender.

A few years ago a golf cart hit a bicylist on Paige Place, the rider was injured--all the police had to look for was a cart with blue curtains--perp was never caught

Hard to imagine that they weren't caught, there can't be more than a few thousand carts with that description...running around here. :oops:

Check with businesses in the area for camera footage. Even though the accident may not have been captured, the purple golf cart in the area during that time frame may be identified for another clue.

I agree plus it isn't clear how such a thing could be implemented from a legal point of view. At the state level, you would need someone to champion it - probably not likely given that there is really no upside. The Villages spans 3 counties - same issue plus you would need all 3 counties to put something in place. At the CDD level, I suspect they don't have such authority plus they have no say over the county roads. There are 70,000 + golf carts in The Villages. The boat has left the dock.

Trying to identify where this happened? What Villages are around there? You might want to try the Villages web-sites that were close by. A purple golf cart kind of sticks out. The Virginia Trace web-site has a list of Neighborhood Web-Sites. Welcome Back

Mine is maroon and not scratch on it. Hit and runs happen all the time by low life looser’s. Registration, driver’s licenses, or insurance has nothing to do with it. :ho:

So, with that vague description due think tiny plate on the back would of identified it?

With all the concern over golf cart safety, last Sunday, the local newspaper decided to put a picture on the cover of one of its sections, of a woman and three kids sitting in the front seat of a golf cart waving, all smiles, one very young child sitting on the lap of another child. Really!
Great reporting. No seat belt was in evidence.