Maine Studded Tires Are Legal October 1 to May 1, and Only MaineDOT Can Extend That

The Maine rule is written around protruding metal rather than around a product name. Section 1919(1) reaches "tires having metal studs, wires, spikes or other metal protruding from the tire tread," so a home-made spiked tire is caught by the same sentence as a factory studded snow tire. The prohibited window runs from the first day of May to the first day of October. Everything outside that window is open season: a driver in Presque Isle can mount studs on October 1 and leave them on until April 30 without notifying anyone, without a permit and without a fee.

Retractable studs are treated as a separate category, and Maine is unusually explicit about them. The second sentence of subsection 1 says pneumatic tires featuring embedded blocks, studs, flanges, cleats, spikes or other protuberances that are retractable may be used any time of the year, provided the protuberances are not engaged or extended between May 1 and October 1. A Maine owner of retractable-stud tires therefore does not have to swap wheels in the spring. The tire stays mounted and the studs stay retracted. Fixed studs get no such treatment and must come off.

The extension power sits with MaineDOT. Section 1919(2)(A) says a person may use studded tires outside the statutory window if the Commissioner of Transportation extends the use period or, in a special case, issues a permit covering stated periods of time. That is a MaineDOT decision, and nothing in section 1919 gives the Secretary of State or the Bureau of Motor Vehicles any role in it, which matters because the BMV is the agency Maine drivers usually deal with on vehicle rules. The permit fee is bounded by statute at not less than $3 and not more than $15, with the exact figure set by the commissioner. Paragraph B adds a carrying duty: a permit holder must keep the permit in an easily accessible place in or about the vehicle, so leaving it at home defeats it.

The exemption list is two items long. Section 1919(3), as amended by PL 2019, c. 31, says subsection 1 does not apply to fire department vehicles or school buses. Ambulances, municipal plow trucks, rural mail carriers and utility trucks are not named, so they are inside the May-to-October ban like any other vehicle.

One requirement that catches Maine drivers out is not in Title 29-A at all. Maine still runs a mandatory annual safety inspection under 29-A M.R.S. § 1751(1), and tires are on the statutory list of inspected equipment in § 1751(2)(L). Section 170 of the Maine Motor Vehicle Inspection Manual, the Chief of the State Police rule that inspection stations actually work from, carries two studded-tire rejection items under its Tires and Wheels standards: reject the vehicle if it is equipped with studded tires in violation of law, and reject the vehicle if it is a front-wheel drive with studded tires only on the front. That second item has no counterpart anywhere in section 1919. The inspection rule is the narrower instrument here, so a front-wheel-drive car studded only on the drive axle can be driven legally in January under the statute and still be refused a sticker at the lane.

Maine has no chain law to go with any of this. A full-text search of Title 29-A returns "tire chains" only in § 2381, which is about moving heavy and oversize objects, and the one chain equipment section, § 1924, is titled Chains on skidders. There is no seasonal chain requirement on any Maine highway and no chain prohibition for passenger cars. Note also that the Revisor's server still hosts § 1375 of the repealed Title 29, which reads like a studded-tire section and is not current law; Title 29-A replaced it in 1995.

§ 104 applies: except as otherwise provided, a person who violates a provision of Title 29-A commits a traffic infraction. Under § 103(3) the exclusive penalty for a traffic infraction is a fine of not less than $25 nor more than $500, or suspension of a license, or both. Section 103(1) states a traffic infraction is not a crime and its penalty may not be treated as penal or criminal punishment, § 103(2) removes any right to a jury trial, and § 103(4) puts the burden on the State at a preponderance of the evidence standard, which is a lower bar than the criminal standard.

Enforcement is roadside by any law enforcement officer, and separately at the annual inspection: a station that finds studs in violation of law, or a front-wheel-drive car studded only on the front, refuses the sticker under Section 170 of the Maine Motor Vehicle Inspection Manual rather than issuing a citation.