By Paul Basha, Summit Land Management Traffic Engineer
I’m a big hockey fan. The untimely death at 31 years old, of Johnny Hockey (Gaudreau) and his younger brother, while bicycling in New Jersey, at the hands of a drunk driver, disturbs me deeply.
Are the drunk driving laws in the United States effective?
Sad, indeed. On average, 37 people in the United States die every day because of an unthinking, irresponsible, inconsiderate drunk driver.
Everyone knows drinking and driving is unsafe. The first drunk driving arrest occurred in London, England on 10 September 1897, when a 25-year-old taxi driver drove his cab into a building. New Jersey was the first state in the United States to criminalize drunk driving in 1906, with drivers subjected to a police officer’s opinion. Historically, states have established maximum allowable blood alcohol content for driving. In the 1930’s and 1940’s, many states legally permitted driving with a blood alcohol content of 0.15%.
For driving purposes, the current definition of drunk in most states in the United States is a blood alcohol content of 0.08 grams of alcohol per 10 liters of blood. That is almost, though not exactly, 0.08% of alcohol in your blood.
(Reportedly, the driver who killed the Gaudreau brothers had a blood alcohol content of 0.087%.)
For a 200-pound person, one 12-ounce beer or one 5-ounce glass of wine or one shot of liquor in an hour results in a blood alcohol content of 0.01%. In case you’re counting, the current allowable legal limit is eight drinks an hour. Though that’s not correct, as the body cannot process that much alcohol that quickly – the more you drink, the longer the body needs to process each additional drink. Suffice it to say, a blood alcohol content of 0.08% occurs from many drinks in a short time.
In 2022, in the United States; 13,524 people were killed by a driver with 0.08% or more alcohol in their blood. Another 2,337 people in the United States in 2022, were killed by a driver with 0.01% to 0.07% of alcohol in their blood.
Below is a compilation of information relating behavior to blood alcohol content:
0.02%: Measurable impact on your brain and body. You will experience an altered mood and feel relaxed. Your multi-tasking ability will decline, and you may make poor judgments.
0.05%: Your behavior becomes exaggerated, speaking louder with more gesturing. You may lose control of small muscles, so your vision will become blurry with a reduced ability to track moving objects. Your coordination will weaken.
0.08%: You will lose more coordination, so your balance, speech, reaction times, and hearing will worsen. Your self-control, concentration, judgment, reasoning, and memory will be damaged, with a lowered ability to detect danger. Your information processing capability will be noticeably diminished.
0.10%: Your perception and reaction time and your self-control will be further degraded, your speech will be slurred, your thinking and reasoning abilities will decline further. Your ability to coordinate your arms and legs will be poor.
0.15%: All of the effects at lower blood alcohol content will worsen further. You will be unable to focus your attention. You will have much less control over your balance and voluntary muscles, so walking and talking will be difficult, and you may fall.
The National Highway and Transportation Safety Administration developed a Standardized Field Sobriety Test which evaluates a person’s behavior to determine if they are impaired by the amount of alcohol in their bloodstream. This test includes the officer watching the person’s eyes for involuntary jerking, the officer watching a person’s ability to walk in a straight line and turn on one foot, and the officer watching a person balance on one foot.
This test was statistically examined by using trained police officers during their routine patrols to conduct the test on drivers. The police officers utilized the Standardized Field Sobriety Test to decide if drivers should be arrested for drunk driving or not. Subsequently, the blood alcohol content of the drivers was determined by a breath alcohol test. The breath alcohol test results validated the officers drunk driving decisions for 91% of the drivers. Based upon this statistical test, a blood alcohol content of 0.08% or above was defined as the standard determinant of driver impairment.
OK, fine, so there is correlation between simple physical tasks and a particular blood alcohol content. Is there a correlation between driving tasks and simple looking, walking, or standing tasks? Is there a correlation between driving tasks and a blood alcohol content of 0.08%?
A definitive compilation of people with various levels of blood alcohol content, while operating driver simulation devices, was published in the June 1987 issue of the Institute of Transportation Engineers (ITE) Journal. This article reported the following relationship between blood alcohol content and collision risk:
The collision risk increases dramatically. Notice the first 0.05% increase in blood alcohol content results in a doubling of the collision risk. The next 0.03% increase in blood alcohol content results in a tripling of the collision risk. A 240% increase in blood alcohol content over 0.05% results in a 2400% increase in collision risk.
After examining more than two dozen professional publications discussing research of driving subsequent to alcohol consumption, this article also suggests that alcohol negatively influences coordination, inhibitions, and thought processes. Furthermore, the negative consequences begin gradually, then increase rapidly.
The article evaluates 10 specific driving tasks compared to blood alcohol content. The 10 driving tasks included: steering difficulties, driving closer to centerline, abrupt stopping and starting, decision-making, and complex information processing. Possible impairment begins for 4 of the 10 driving tasks at a blood alcohol content of 0.05%. Probable impairment begins for 5 of the 10 tasks at a blood alcohol content of 0.10%. Definite impairment begins for 4 of the 10 tasks at a blood alcohol content of 0.15%.
Very good, this article provides a basis for a blood alcohol content measurement for driving ability. Though, what’s the reason for 0.08%?
The New York Times recently reported on World Health Organization international blood alcohol content legal limits in 109 countries from 2019.
Prior to the year 2000, most states allowed blood alcohol content of 0.10%. On 22 October 2000, then President Clinton signed the bill, passed by the United States Congress, which stated that states could not receive federal highway funds if they allowed people to legally drive with a blood alcohol content above 0.08%. All states complied so they could receive federal funds for highway construction and improvements.
On 14 May 2013, the National Highway Traffic Safety Board recommended that the maximum allowable blood alcohol content be 0.05%. In 2018, Utah lowered its legal limit to 0.05% (Utah is the only state that currently has an allowable maximum blood alcohol content different from 0.08%). In 2019, in Utah, all fatal car crashes decreased by 19.8% compared to 2016. Instead of drinking less in response to the law, people just got a ride home.
The state legislature in Hawaii is currently considering lowering the allowable blood alcohol content to 0.05%. The states of Washington, Connecticut, and New York have also discussed similar legislation.
The June 1987 Institute of Transportation Engineers Journal article states that there is a scientific basis for the belief that alcohol is removed from the body at a rate of one drink per hour. Blood alcohol content diminishes at 0.015% to 0.017% per hour.
Personally, I adhere to the practice of only one glass of wine or one beer per hour, with a meal, if I will be driving. One very unpleasant evening, about 15 years ago, I had dinner with a friend, and I consumed two beers in more than two hours. While I was driving home after the meal, for an unfortunate non-vehicle and non-driving reason, I needed to stop the vehicle on the shoulder of the road. Two police officers stopped to offer their assistance. When they asked if I had been drinking, I answered that I had two beers in more than two hours with dinner. They thought I was being less than truthful. When they asked if they could use a breathalyzer on me, I answered of course. The first test revealed that my blood alcohol content was well below the legal limit. They did not believe the test results, so they repeated the test, and the second test revealed the same result. So, they told me that I was free to leave. And that was that.
With the current ride-share services of Uber and Lyft, and my personal favorite, Waymo, we have many choices to get home from a bar or restaurant after drinking. Presumably, we each have friends who will help us when in need. We do not need you to risk our lives and the lives of others merely because of pride, arrogance, or any other excuse.
For half a century, I have investigated traffic collisions. For two of those years, I was employed by a small consulting engineering firm where the exclusive practice of one of the two partners was a plaintiff expert witness on behalf of people who themselves were seriously injured in traffic collisions, or their loved ones were seriously injured or killed in traffic collisions. My responsibility for him was to investigate those collisions, analyze the data and the circumstances, and prepare him to testify in depositions or courtrooms attempting to convince a judge or jury that the public agency that provided the roadway was responsible for their injuries or death. We won every case – either in trial or through generous settlement without trial.
During my time as the Scottsdale Traffic Engineer, I often needed to defend the City of Scottsdale from lawsuits from people claiming that the City of Scottsdale was responsible for serious injury or death in traffic collisions that occurred on Scottsdale streets. We only lost one of those lawsuits in trial – a collision 25-plus years ago at an intersection that I often enter in the same direction as that driver long ago.
During my nearly two-dozen years as either Scottsdale Traffic Engineer or Transportation Director, I applied the knowledge and lessons I learned from those litigation experiences and collision analyses to ensure that the streets in Scottsdale were planned, designed, and operated as safely as possible.
When the light rail system first opened in Phoenix in 2010, there were an average of two collisions each month involving a light rail vehicle and a private vehicle. The City of Phoenix hired me to analyze those collisions and the light rail operation to prevent those collisions. The City of Phoenix implemented virtually all of our 50 recommendations. In the first 15 months, those modifications resulted in a 37% total collision reduction, an 80% reduction in collisions involving right-turning vehicles, and a 79% collision reduction at the 4 downtown intersections that previously had multiple collisions.
For 28 years, I was a Faculty Associate at Arizona State University for traffic engineering undergraduate and graduate courses. The students were always surprised and attentive at my stories of collisions and the people seriously injured. They understood my intensity for thorough analyses in planning, designing, and operating streets and intersections to ensure safety.
Are the drunk driving laws in the United States effective? Yes and no. It is a certainty that our law, mandating that people with a blood alcohol content greater than 0.08% cannot legally drive, has prevented serious injuries and deaths. Each of us, when we are driving, is controlling a two-ton metal box at speeds of 60 to 90 feet-per-second. Obviously slower than a Space-x or Starliner, though much faster than walking. There are human beings – with loved ones and their own hopes and dreams – in the other two-ton metal boxes. There are people walking or jogging near our very comfortable two-ton metal box with exactly the temperature we want and exactly the music or talk radio or silence we desire. There are people riding on four-wheeled or two-wheeled vehicles near our rapidly-moving two-ton metal box. The lives of every one of those people are directly dependent on our behavior, and our life is directly dependent on the behavior of every one of those other people.
I’ve noticed that sometimes people need encouragement to behave properly or discouragement from behaving irresponsibly.
The maximum allowable blood alcohol content for driving should be the amount recommended by the National Highway Traffic Safety Association, which is the same amount utilized by most nations of the world, at 0.05%.
Each of us should be certain, that when we drive, alcohol in our system does not impair our ability to drive, regardless of the legal maximum blood alcohol content.
Obeying the law is certainly a consideration. The amount of alcohol in our blood is also a consideration. The primary consideration is our capabilities at the moment – to concentrate, track moving objects, process information, make judgments, detect danger. The ultimate determinant when driving after drinking alcohol is the consequences of our actions.
We need each other.
Curious about something traffic? Call or e-mail Paul at (480) 505-3931 and pbasha@summitlandmgmt.com.
