Murrieta, CA Parking Rules: Curb Color Rules (2026)

Section 10.12.090 gives the city traffic engineer exclusive authority to approve any paint applied to a street or curb surface within Murrieta. Absent that authorization, painting a curb, whether to claim a private parking spot, mark a driveway, or repaint a faded curb, is unlawful. The code carves out one exception: a resident who has complied with an applicable city ordinance or resolution may paint house numbers on a curb.

The prohibition matters because Murrieta's curb colors carry specific legal meaning elsewhere in Title 10. Section 10.32.030(C) reserves red paint for no-stopping and no-parking zones set by council resolution. Section 10.32.200(B) and (C) use yellow curbs for combined passenger-and-freight loading zones capped at three minutes for passengers and twenty minutes for freight, and white curbs for passenger-only loading capped at three minutes. Section 10.32.240 assigns green paint to time-limited parking zones running from 9:00 a.m. to 6:00 p.m. except Sundays and holidays, and Section 10.32.290 reserves blue curb spaces around the clock for parking by people with disabilities. Because each color triggers different stopping rights, an unauthorized paint job can mislead drivers into a citation or block a space the city engineer never approved for that use. The traffic engineer, not a property owner or business, decides where these zones go and maintains the required signs or curb markings.