Years ago I lived in California and when I was at UCLA traffic and parking tickets were not uncommon. I had more time then money so I would go to court and back then you could elect to do a driving school and they would waive the fine, or you could plead guilty with and explanation and they would reduce the fine. I also found here in Oregon that by going to court the judge would reduce the fine.
Not sure if you can still expect this type of leniency or alternative traffic school, but you can certainly go down to the court before your appearance date and sit in on the session and see what the judges are doing when others appear and enter such pleas. That should give you an idea of what to expect on your day in court.
Read your ticket carefully - it should explain your pleading options. You can usually plead not guilty and then change your plea later, but you need to figure out if that's the way you want to go first before you plead, as you don't want to waive the option to go to traffic school or something like that.
Another tactic, which may or may not work in your area, is to plead not guilty and then take a chance that the officer won't show up on the day of trial. This can lead to the case being dismissed since the state is not ready to present their case, but the court does have the discretion to reset the matter so it doesn't always work. You need to talk to a local attorney to find out what the likelihood of this working is and what the consequences would be if you the officer shows up and the case proceeds. Keep in mind that if the officer does show up, you will have to proceed with a trial. (You are innocent until proven guilty so the officer still has to convince the court by testifying what happened and you get a chance to cross examine the officer and testify if you want - you don't have to testify though.)
One other tip - go to the courthouse and ask the clerk to give you a copy of any notes the officer made. Sometimes the officer will make additional notes on the back of the original ticket but your copy won't have those notes. There can also be notes made by the officer in a separate notebook - the mechanics of getting that might be tricky and you might need to talk to an attorney to figure that out. This is called discovery and you are entitled to see any documents that relate to your case.
I don't practice in California so this is not meant to be legal advice specific to your problem, but general ideas on what can be done to fight traffic tickets. Please consult with a local attorney before acting on any of these ideas.
