The Ford pick up truck featured at the anti-drunk driving press conference tells a story, but very few take that story to heart and change their behavior
T’is the season for boozing revelers to drive home drunk from countless parties across Calgary. A unique partnership between Big Rock Brewery, Associated Cab and the Calgary Police Service is doing its best to drive the message home that driving drunk is a social and legal no-no, but judging by the cops’ own stats drivers are turning a deaf ear. The partners kicked off this year’s responsible drinking campaign by unveiling posters and coasters that will be distributed to about 100 bars and restaurants.
Well, good luck to ‘em. Cst. Jim Lebedeff says drunk driving arrests have risen over the past three years. With a week to go in November arrests for 2009 have almost caught the total for the previous year; barring a miracle, they will easily surpass that mark.
Starting Friday, Nov. 20, 2009, and extending through the busy month of December and New Years Eve, this campaign reminds consumers to act responsibly while enjoying the holiday “spirits” and not to get behind the wheel of a vehicle.
“We want everyone to enjoy this holiday season. These coasters and posters were created to remind people to call for a cab if they have been drinking,” says Jim Button, Vice President of Corporate and Community Affairs at Big Rock.
“Hopefully, having these materials in local pubs, bars and restaurants we will keep the message top of mind when people are in the midst of holiday celebrations and, more specifically, right before they make a decision on how they are going to get home that night.”
Coaster, posters and helpful bartenders can’t hurt. Kudos to the cops, the brewer and the cab company for trying. But it looks to me like history is about to repeat itself.
Let me explain why.
In the SECN video you will see a Ford pickup involved that had been involved in a wreck. The drunk driver died. The passenger survived.
The truck is a horrific reminder of the violence too often associated with drunk driving. The front end is pushed in. The passenger compartment, particularly the driver’s seat, is a tangled wreck. What a mess.
Did any of the assembled media, police officers or anyone of the 30 or 40 people at the press conference pay much attention to this all too graphic symbol of the dangers of driving while plastered? Not that I could see. Oh sure, the truck served as a backdrop for a few interviews. But it was just that: a backdrop.
Not for me.
On April 14, 1993 my Toyota Corolla was struck just in front of the driver’s door by an early 1970s Dodge behemoth, driven by a repeat offender drunk driver, travelling between 80 and 100 kmh, according to the cops in Prince Albert, Saskatchewan. The force of the impact peeled away the door, breaking my left hip in five places, fracturing a number of ribs and collapsing one of my lungs, rupturing my spleen, causing a significant head injury, and substantial soft tissue and nerve damage.
By the time they transported me by ambulance to Saskatoon, paramedics say I had lost all blood pressure because of the internal bleeding. My doctor later told me I was probably 15 minutes from death.
Thanks to the wonders of modern medical science and the skill of the doctors and nurses at the Royal University Hospital, I can walk and lead a reasonably normal life. But life has never been the same. I can’t play hockey any more (or almost any sport for that matter). I live in constant pain and discomfort. My memory suffered as a result of the head injury, though I’ve learned to compensate.
You can understand why for me that Ford truck at the police station wasn’t just another anti-drunk driving prop. My little Toyota looked just like it. Worse, in fact, because the fire fighters who pulled me out of the car had to use the Jaws of Life to peel back the roof like a sardine can lid. Looking at that truck Friday afternoon brought back some pretty vivid memories.
And that’s why drunk driving campaigns have limited effectivness. You don’t really get it unless you’ve been through it. My wife, my children, maybe a few close friends who came to visit me in the ICU and saw me bruised up and looking like hell, they get it.
The rest, probably not. I will bet good money that some of the people, maybe even a majority, who attended that press conference will drive drunk at least once at some point during the holiday season. Or they will get into a vehicle driven by a drunk.
Cst. Lebedeff’s statistics make a powerful argument for my point.
So, even though I salute the Calgary Police Service, Associated Cab and Big Rock Brewry for their efforts, I have no faith that their campaign will make even a minor dent in the number of drunk drivers on Calgary’s roads from now until the end of the holiday season.
Rather than rely on a rational decision (to call a cab) by an inebriated person (which is pretty much the definition of irrational), I’ll simply stay off the road as much as possible. Given that my job forces me on the road to cover news stories, I won’t be able to avoid driving entirely. But if at all possible I’m not driving after dark. And I’m certainly not venturing out during obvious high-risk hours, such as late Friday and Saturday nights.
I still remember what it was like to wake up in that ICU April 15, in intense pain and slowly realizing that my life had changed forever.
Until we figure out a way to help potentially drunk drivers feel what I felt that fateful morning, all the PR campaigns in the world won’t stop Calgarians from drinking and driving.
PARTNERS LAUNCH CAMPAIGN TO GET HOLIDAY PARTIERS TO TAKE A CAB
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