The impact of Ontario's extended drinking hours on cross-border cities of Windsor and Detroit

Abstract

Purpose-This study evaluated the cross-border safety impact of extended drinking hours from 1:00 to 2:00 a.m., in licensed establishments in Ontario, Canada.Methods-This study examined patterns in total and alcohol-related casualties in: (1) Windsor, Ontario, Canada compared to Detroit, Michigan, US with a 2:00 a.m. closing time, and (2) Ontario compared to Michigan for overall trends. The criterion outcome indicators were: (1) monthly motor vehicle casualties (major injuries and fatalities) for the city-regions of Windsor and Detroit and (2) Ontario and Michigan monthly motor vehicle fatalities occurring between 11:00 p.m. and 3:00 a.m. for 4 years pre-and 3 years post-policy change. In order to examine cross-border drinking consequences, data were disaggregated to assess trends of motor vehicle injury collisions involving vehicles with US licence plates and with US drivers aged 16-20 in the Windsor region; similarly trends were assessed for motor vehicle injury collisions involving vehicles with Ontario licence plates in the Detroit region.Results-The Windsor region total motor vehicle casualty data showed a non-significant pre-post increase, while the Detroit region showed a statistically significant decrease for total motor vehicle casualties. In the Windsor region, a significant increase was found for alcohol-related motor vehicle casualties after the drinking hours were extended. However, the Detroit region showed a statistically significant decrease in alcohol-related motor vehicle casualties concomitant with Ontario's drinking hour extension. No similar trends were found for the province of Ontario and the state of Michigan as a whole. Moreover, a significant decrease was found for injury collisions involving vehicles with Ontario licence plates in the Detroit region but no similar pattern was found for injury collisions involving vehicles with US licence plates and with 16-20-year-old US drivers in the Windsor region.Discussion-These data seem to support a cross-border impact of the Ontario extended drinking policy. A significant increase in alcohol-related motor vehicle casualties was found in the Windsor region and concomitantly, significant decreases in total and alcohol-related motor vehicle casualties were found in the Detroit region after the extended drinking hours amendment. The Ontario

Impact of Extended Drinking Hours in Ontario on Motor-Vehicle Collision and Non-Motor-Vehicle Collision Injuries

“…The findings of the different studies on the impact of extended drinking hours support a complex pattern of outcomes, whereby, in Ontario as a whole, there seems to be no perceived increase in alcohol-related, police-reported MVC casualties (Vingilis et al, 2005) or hospital-reported MVC injuries, although in the high-alcohol-density area of Windsor, Ontario, increases were found in alcohol-related, police-reported MVC casualties (Vingilis et al, 2006), and for Ontario as a whole, increases in non-MVC hospital-reported injuries were found for the period during which the drinking hour was extended. Thus, the change in policy, the limited implementation, and other societal factors such as economic conditions and road safety countermeasures may have mediated the effects of the extended drinking hours on MVC injuries but not on non-MVC injuries, such as falls and assaults, in Ontario.…”

Temporal Alcohol Availability Predicts First-Time Drunk Driving, but Not Repeat Offending

“…For instance, it is possible that those who tend to get arrested for drunk driving gravitate toward counties with later business hours. Indeed the finding that adjacent county hours were correlated with first-time DWI arrests suggests that people may drive to nearby counties to drink later and subsequently get arrested near to home [12]. Alternatively, outlet business hours may have been extended due to the same societal attitudes which promote drunk driving.…”

“…Moreover, past research has demonstrated that longer outlet business hours in one region affect alcohol-involved motor vehicle incidents in adjacent regions [12]. This likely reflects the fact that people often travel to adjacent regions for the purposes of drinking, and then return through both the region where they were drinking and their home region.…”

The impact of policies regulating alcohol trading hours and days on specific alcohol-related harms: a systematic review

“…Authors suggested that these results could be possibly explained by many licenced establishments non-extending their drinking hours, or may be due to insensitivity of Motor Vehicle Collision (MVC)fatality data to detect changes 10. In a subsequent study, the same authors found increased motor vehicle fatalities in the Windsor region (p=0.035) and a cross-border reduction of motor vehicle collision (MVC) fatalities in a neighbouring area of Detroit, USA (p<0.0001) 27. This increase in motor vehicle fatalities could be explained by the ‘re-patriated’ local drivers, since there was a decrease for local drivers being involved in motor vehicle collisions in the neighbouring region after the extension of the closing hours.…”