To a Safe and Happy New Year

It seems like each year passes quicker than the last. At The Brod Law Firm, we are grateful for all of the clients who trusted us to advocate for them and to fight alongside them in 2014. We know the decision of which law firm to hire is often a difficult one and we are honored to have worked with you and for you this year. We understand that no one ever wants to need an attorney, but when you do, we hope you continue to entrust us with your legal needs whether in a personal injury, landlord/tenant, health care fraud, or other area.

We also want to remind everyone to be safe as you celebrate New Year’s Eve. As a Northern California DUI injury law firm, we see tragic consequences of drinking and driving. While we generally see the victims of drunk drivers and not the impaired drivers themselves, we believe everyone can use a reminder from time to time about the dangers of drinking and driving. As a recent campaign emphasized, Buzzed Driving Is Drunk Driving and the only safe level blood alcohol level is zero.

Elevated Risk on the Roadways on New Year’s Day
The New Year’s holiday is one of the most dangerous times on American roadways. Although the study is nearly a decade old, other evidence suggest that the statistics in a 2005 report to the Institute for Highway Safety entitled “Temporal factors in motor vehicle crash deaths” remain relatively relevant today. New Year’s Day, including all incidents after midnight, is among the ten days of the year that see the highest number of motor vehicle crash fatalities. Over a seventeen year period, New Year’s saw an average of 142 crash deaths. On average, the holiday saw the third highest number of passenger vehicle occupant fatalities. January 1 tied with Halloween for the highest number of pedestrian deaths. It is worth noting that the study only includes fatalities and does not address overall accident frequency.

Discussing the results of the study, the author notes that the consumption of alcohol is one of the factors that accounts for the high rate of fatalities on January 1 (it also is partially the reason more deaths occur at night and on weekends year-round). New Year’s Day had a much higher than average proportion of fatalities involving alcohol, with just over half (51%) of the January 1 deaths involving an elevated BAC. There was also a marked increase in the number of deaths occurring in the hours between midnight and 6 AM, a period that typically saw 20% of fatalities on an average day but saw 48% of the fatalities on January 1.

Options for Safe Travels
There are a number of programs offered to help keep our roads during the New Year’s celebrations. One example is AAA’s Tipsy Tow service which is available on a number of holidays throughout the year including from 6 PM on December 31 to 6 AM on January 1. The service is free to anyone; you do not need to be a AAA member to use it. If you call 880-222-4357 (AAA-HELP), they will provide a ride home and a free tow of up to ten miles so both you and your car can get home safely. Additional passengers will be accommodated as long as they can fit safely in the tow truck.

Several public transit lines will also be offering free service beginning at 8 PM on New Year’s Eve. Muni, SamTrans, VTA and CalTrain will offer free rides and will have extended service hours and extra runs on many lines.

We urge all of our readers to be safe on New Year’s Eve, New Year’s Day, and throughout the coming year. If someone else’s dangerous decisions leave you injured or claim the life of a loved one in the Northern California region, please call. We are here to help with convenient offices of our personal injury law firm in Oakland, Santa Rosa, and San Francisco. A call is always free and in most cases you don’t pay unless you recover compensation.