Is it safe or illegal to park under an overpass during severe weather?

Bobby Poitevint (kxxv)

By: Bobby Poitevint

WACO, Texas (KXXV) — We’ve all seen and likely driven through some stormy weather this week here in Central Texas.

Watch the full story here:

Is it illegal to park under an overpass during severe weather?

During our reporting on Tuesday, 25News Bobby Poitevint shot video of drivers parking under an I-35 overpass to escape the storm and the hail from damaging their vehicles.

We posted the video to our Facebook page and some of you left comments raising safety concerns and also pointed to it being illegal.

Well is it? And what do law enforcement and weather experts recommend in situations like this?

Bobby checked in and got some answers.

“They can be cited — it’s code 545.302 in the transportation code. It’s parking where places are prohibited" said Sgt. Bryan Washko. He's with the Texas Department of Public Safety's Media and Communications.

He added, “Can they be cited yes, do we, it depends on the circumstance. Our main thing is public safety."

Sgt. Washko said if you're caught driving during a hailstorm, he recommends going ahead and reducing your speed and recommends taking the next exit and find a safe spot like a gas station awning for safety.

He said parking under overpasses can cause congestion, which can result in major vehicle damage, people being injured or even fatal crashes.

He added, "which is a whole lot worse than hail damage.”

"With any storm, especially with large hail, you may have the potential for a tornado and if you have a tornado you definitely don't want to be under an overpass as winds accelerate. so again, just not a good idea" said 25News Chief Meteorologist Matt Hines.

If you spotted your vehicle in that video, Sgt. Wasko told Bobby you’re not going to get a ticket in the mail, but we want to point out this problem isn't specific to vehicles shown in the video. We see it happening during every severe storm.

So we wanted to be better informed ourselves and pass along this information to keep us all safe in the future.