Anaheim, CA Public Conduct: Skateboarding Rules (2026)

AMC Chapter 14.28, "Personal Safety," splits skateboarding regulation into two distinct rules. Subsection .010 bans riding or propelling a skateboard, coaster, or non-motorized scooter on any roadway anywhere in Anaheim, full stop, with no signage requirement. Subsection .020 is narrower: it only reaches sidewalks inside a "business district" as that term is defined in the California Vehicle Code, and only where the Chief of Police and the Traffic and Transportation Manager, or their designees, have actually posted or displayed signs giving notice of the sidewalk prohibition. Absent posted signage in a qualifying business district, riding a skateboard on an Anaheim sidewalk is not a violation of this section.

Both the roadway ban and the posted-sidewalk ban are infractions rather than misdemeanors, so violators face a fine rather than criminal jail exposure. The chapter's companion section, 14.28.050, separately makes it unlawful to ride a bicycle, skateboard, roller skates, coaster, tricycle, or similar toy vehicle inside the Anaheim Civic Center parking structure or any other city-owned parking structure, with its own escalating fine schedule of twenty dollars for a first violation and at least twenty-five dollars for each later violation within a year.

The roadway and business-district rules date to Ordinance 487 from 1926 and were substantially rewritten by Ordinance 5919 and Ordinance 5929 in 2004 to add the non-motorized scooter language and shift enforcement authority to the Traffic and Transportation Manager alongside the Chief of Police.