THE TRAFFIC SAFETY IMPACT OF CALIFORNIA'S NEW DRUNK DRIVING LAW (AB 541): AN EVALUATION OF THE FIRST NINE MONTHS OF EXPERIENCE
On January 1, 1982, California enacted tougher sanctions against drunk driving (Assembly Bill 541). The present study evaluates the short-term impact of the new legislation through a comparison of monthly accident counts before and after AB 541. The following injury and fatal accident categories were analyzed by month and quarter for the period January 1977 through September 1982: Had-been-drinking (HBD) accidents, non-HBD accidents, night accidents, day accidents, and night single vehicle accidents involving males (NSVAM). The night accident categories were included as surrogates for alcohol based on past research showing night accidents, particularly NSVAM fatals, to have a high likelihood of involving alcohol. The evaluation design was based on the premise that any impact of AB 541 would be limited to accidents involving alcohol. Consequently, one would expect that AB 541, if effective, would result in a reduction in the proportion of injury and fatal accidents due to alcohol. Although all accident categories declined following enactment of AB 541 (1982), the analyses showed a statistically significant larger reduction on four of six alcohol accident categories: HBD fatal, HBD injury, night injury, and NSVAM injury accidents. The differential reductions ranged from 7-12% when 1982 was compared with 1981 over the first nine months of each year. There was a tendency for the effects to diminish in the second and third quarter, but the HBD fatal accident category showed significant reduction through all three quarters.
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Corporate Authors:
California Department of Motor Vehicles
P.O. Box 11828, 2415 1st Avenue
Sacramento, CA United States 95813 -
Authors:
- Peck, R C
- Publication Date: 1983-8
Media Info
- Features: Figures; References; Tables;
- Pagination: 25 p.
Subject/Index Terms
- TRT Terms: Crash causes; Drunk drivers; Drunk driving; Fatalities; Impact studies; Injuries; Laws; Legislation; Measures of effectiveness; Safety; Traffic safety
- Uncontrolled Terms: Effectiveness
- Geographic Terms: California
- Subject Areas: Highways; Law; Safety and Human Factors; I83: Accidents and the Human Factor;
Filing Info
- Accession Number: 00390881
- Record Type: Publication
- Source Agency: National Highway Traffic Safety Administration
- Report/Paper Numbers: CAL-DMV-RSS-83-87, HS-036 884
- Files: HSL, TRIS, ATRI, USDOT, STATEDOT
- Created Date: Nov 30 1984 12:00AM