See the video and the story coverage from KFYR HERE
Drunk drivers crash into all kinds of things -- mostly other cars and drivers, and tragically pedestrians. But of course stationary objects take the biggest brunt -- poles, guardrails, fire hydrants, and houses seem to be the most common. But storefronts take a beating too, and this is just one of four liquor store accidents from the weekend just passed that I saw in media reports. Impaired driving of all kinds -- alcohol, drugs, and marijuana -- seems to be more and more common. And it is a bigger factor than most realize for businesses along busy streets where vehicle traffic can pass by at high speed, or where intersections might point traffic straight at storefronts.
This video shows very clearly the great amount of damage that a 5000 LB vehicle moving at 25 to 30 MPH can do. ASTM continues to document and complete a standard covering the testing of bollards and barriers and other safety devices for exactly this application, as regular readers of these pages are aware.
So ask yourselves -- could anyone standing in that store protect themselves? Could they move out of the way of an oncoming pick up truck? Of course not.....so why do we expect people to protect themselves against things that they cannot? Local codes need to catch up to what is happening out in the world. Sixty times per day or more, a vehicle crashes into storefronts. People are injured and killed everyday.
And it doesn't have to be this way.