Carseats/Booster seats requirement

[Alex2kMommy]

I can't seem to find an earlier post about this, sorry if this is a repeat for some.

We'll be travelling with DS5 and DSnearly2. Our travel agent had said that carseats/booster seats would NOT be required with the shuttle service on our package, and that our youngest would be a 'lap child'.

However, I had read previously that it is California law that carseats/booster seats are required on rented transportation and transportation services for all children under certain height/weight restrictions. (I believe the booster seat was required for under 80 lbs.) When I read the excerpted law text, it indicates that (and I'm paraphrasing) while carseats/booster seats are required, the transportation service is not responsible for seeing that the law is upheld, it is up to the parents/guardians of the children.

Someone mentioned that they thought the vans had built-in child safety straps, so boosters were not necessary, so I figured I should just check with our shuttle service to be sure.

Here is the response today from Super Shuttle: "...our policy for california is carseats are not required however strongly recommended."

I don't get this! If state law requires carseats/boosters, why don't they just say that?! With the various bits of information, it sounds like what it really means is "WE don't care, but YOU could get arrested!"

I guess we will plan to bring 2 carseats to be on the safe side. Uff!

 

[amw]

I posted the last thread on boosters I think the gist of it was 6 years/60lbs, and don't trust that the shuttles will have built-ins. If in doubt, just bring your own.

Our province has higher standards (8 yrs/80lbs) so I think I'll still bring them for my DD7 so she doesn't ask why she needs them in one city and not another. The boosters have made two trips to WDW before - they seem to like to travel

 

[mimichan]

We will be traveling with a 14-month old and also NOT bringing a carseat so that's why we opted to travel by bus since infants and children are NOT required to be strapped in (buses don't have seatbelts anyway). I found out that if you travel by taxi, however, the driver would probably pick you up. If you happen to get pulled over by an officer, the parents of the infant/child would be fined, not the taxi driver, thus the reason they don't care and will be up anyone traveling w/children and NO carseat. The Super Shuttle also told me that infants or children DO NOT need a carseat but they did not tell me that the parents would be responsible. They just told me it's not required on their shuttles so I really don't know if it's legal or not to ride in a shuttle type van w/o a carseat. The only problem with having to bring a carseat for a toddler (over 20 lbs) is that these type carseats are way too bulky to lug around. I guess the only way to get around this is to rent a car and carseat.

 

[amw]

I guess the only way to get around this is to rent a car and carseat.

I would highly discourage anyone from renting carseats from car rental places. I looked into it the first time I went to WDW when my DDs were 3 and 18mths. They were asking for $10/day per seat, and you're not even guaranteed them. That's $70/week per seat and that was 3 years ago. I've heard that some car rental seats are horribly old, and some disers have received broken ones. In Orlando, I heard of people actually heading to a Wal-mart or such (by taxi?) and purchasing new seats for their car rentals, and chucking them at the end of their vacation. Seems wasteful to me, but was actually cheaper then renting.

It's not a big deal to check carseats at the airport though. They don't even count as a piece of luggage with your bag alottment. Air Canada provides a plastic bag to wrap them with too (I'm sure other airlines do the same) -- just make sure you have a luggage tag connected to them. In Florida, there were quite a few of the same booster seats at luggage pick-up!

 

[Alex2kMommy]

Now I'm considering getting a little booster seat for DS5.

Ironically, we got a regular carseat that holds up to something like 80 or 100 lbs. for him (instead of a booster) because the booster just didn't seem enough when he outgrew the carseat. We wanted more protection around him! Of course I didn't take into account lugging the big thing through airports, or that his little friends would be saying, "Wow you have a carseat still? I'm big enough for just a booster."