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snowmaninheat t1_j406omf wrote

I had some colleagues back in the day who did transportation research, and there’s a lot of good evidence to suggest 0.05 is a more appropriate threshold. That said, I’m anticipating a lot of pushback here.

Edit: check that time stamp.

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whatyouwant5 t1_j43bayd wrote

Why not 0.04? That is the limit for pilots. Also the limit for pharmacists in AZ

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yourlocalFSDO t1_j47ys3k wrote

.04 is really only a limit for pilots in name. It's prohibited to fly for 8 hours after consuming alcohol or while "under the influence of alcohol" which pilots are taught includes hangovers. If you can drink, wait 8 hours, not be hungover, and still blow a .04 that would be a hell of a trick

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iamlucky13 t1_j42okik wrote

I'm not necessarily going to disagree, but I do wonder if that slight reduction in the legal limit really addresses the issue effectively.

Certainly it would be expected that a lower limit would incrementally reduce the rate of accidents, but by how much?

Actually converting the more strict law into results means more strict enforcement. Will it be more effective to focus that enforcement on mildly impaired drivers, or on better enforcement of seriously impaired drivers.

We aren't currently achieving adequate enforcement, treatment, etc of drivers operating over 0.08%...often well over. Will law enforcement even be able to identify drivers a meaningful fraction of drivers operating over 0.05%?

Of course, there's the people like me who will obey the law whatever the limit is, but I already stay well away from 0.08%.

I see someone else posted an article discussing Colorado's law, where they have an 0.08% limit for a DUI, but a lower limit of 0.05% for a less serious charge of Driving While Ability Impaired.

I think I like that idea - there is some level of escalation in seriousness of the violation correlated to increase in risk. We do similar with speeding versus reckless driving.

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[deleted] t1_j435k5s wrote

Everyone has "colleagues back in the day" who did "research" to confirm their own bias lol

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snowmaninheat t1_j43dktc wrote

I've worked in research for almost a decade, but nice try!

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vogeyontopofyou t1_j4162pu wrote

Yea sure you did.

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