{"id":5301,"date":"2017-08-13T07:00:06","date_gmt":"2017-08-12T18:00:06","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.drivingtests.co.nz\/resources\/?p=5301"},"modified":"2023-05-10T14:59:56","modified_gmt":"2023-05-10T01:59:56","slug":"drink-walking-drink-walker","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.drivingtests.co.nz\/resources\/drink-walking-drink-walker\/","title":{"rendered":"What is drink walking and what&#8217;s a drink walker?"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p><strong>A drink walker is a person who is walking home drunk.<\/strong> It&#8217;s most commonly seen on Friday and Saturday nights near bars and pubs and with males aged 18-30. Many pedestrian fatalities involve people who are under the influence of alcohol and drugs.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Being drunk affects a person&#8217;s ability to:<\/p>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\"><li>Judge the speed and distance of approaching vehicles (this is made more difficult by the fact it&#8217;s nighttime)<\/li><li>Hear approaching vehicles (alcohol reduces our hearing ability, as well as the kind of loud venues where alcohol is consumed)<\/li><li>Move quickly (drunk people have worse coordination and are more likely to fall).<\/li><\/ul>\n\n\n\n<p>The problem is worse with <a href=\"https:\/\/www.drivingtests.co.nz\/course\/electric-vehicle-training\/\">electric vehicles<\/a> because they don&#8217;t make as much noise when moving.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Wellington City Council made the following public awareness video which focuses on distractions, but there&#8217;s a general lack of campaigns focusing on drunk walking and more focus on drink driving ad campaigns by NZTA.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-embed is-type-video is-provider-youtube wp-block-embed-youtube wp-embed-aspect-16-9 wp-has-aspect-ratio\"><div class=\"wp-block-embed__wrapper\">\n<iframe loading=\"lazy\" title=\"Cross the Road with a Clear Head\" width=\"550\" height=\"309\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/N9ClcMg5vtc?feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share\" referrerpolicy=\"strict-origin-when-cross-origin\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe>\n<\/div><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\">What can be done about drink walking?<\/h2>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\"><li>Traffic calming measures that reduce the speed of traffic where there are a lot of licenced venues can reduce the risk of a fatal accident.<\/li><li>Pedestrian fencing can help control where drunk people enter roads.<\/li><li>Making areas with a high density of bars into pedestrian zones or mixed use zones reduces vehicle speeds to a walking pace or eliminates vehicles altogether.<\/li><li>Lock-out policies whereby bars don&#8217;t let people in who are already drunk reduces the overall alcohol consumption and reduces movement between bars.<\/li><li>Coordinated efforts by transport authorities to make public transport and taxis viable and available.<\/li><li>Encouraging people to walk in a group rather than alone.<\/li><\/ul>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\">Drugged walking<\/h2>\n\n\n\n<p>Drugged walking is similar to drink walking for some drugs. Drugs that cause tiredness, lack of coordination and lethargy cause similar results to alcohol use. Drugs that hype a person up can still cause dangers because people make rash decisions or think they are invincible.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\">How can you drive around drunk walkers?<\/h2>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\"><li>Keep a look out for people who are stumbling or staggering along the pavement, and especially those who are also using a cellphone.<\/li><li>Assume that any time you&#8217;re driving near a pub or bars that there will be drunk people around.<\/li><li>Assume that drunk walkers could be walking on unlit streets if you are near a pub in a rural area and that occasionally people fall asleep on the road and get run over. <a href=\"https:\/\/www.nzherald.co.nz\/nz\/drunk-man-found-sleeping-on-road\/HBQCSQPYP3JRDOIWUIXEIOBITI\/\">Sometimes they are lucky, though<\/a>.<\/li><li>Slow down &#8211; your best chance of stopping is if you are already going slowly.<\/li><li>Avoid areas with a high concentration of bars on Friday and Saturday night, if possible.<\/li><\/ul>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>A drink walker is a person who is walking home drunk. It&#8217;s most commonly seen on Friday and Saturday nights near bars and pubs and with males aged 18-30. Many pedestrian fatalities involve people who are under the influence of<span class=\"ellipsis\">&hellip;<\/span><\/p>\n<div class=\"read-more\"><a href=\"https:\/\/www.drivingtests.co.nz\/resources\/drink-walking-drink-walker\/\">Read more &#8250;<\/a><\/div>\n<p><!-- end of .read-more --><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":31309,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-5301","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-advice"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.drivingtests.co.nz\/resources\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5301","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.drivingtests.co.nz\/resources\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.drivingtests.co.nz\/resources\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.drivingtests.co.nz\/resources\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.drivingtests.co.nz\/resources\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5301"}],"version-history":[{"count":9,"href":"https:\/\/www.drivingtests.co.nz\/resources\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5301\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":31823,"href":"https:\/\/www.drivingtests.co.nz\/resources\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5301\/revisions\/31823"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.drivingtests.co.nz\/resources\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/31309"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.drivingtests.co.nz\/resources\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5301"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.drivingtests.co.nz\/resources\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5301"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.drivingtests.co.nz\/resources\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5301"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}