Whitehorse cab company aiming to curb drunk driving with car pick-up

A Whitehorse cab company is offering a new pilot program designed to keep impaired drivers off the road during the holiday season.

Ken Giam, the owner of Premier Cabs, is offering to drive party-goers home and then drive them back to their car the next morning.

Intoxicated patrons can tell their driver or dispatcher they are leaving a car andthe next morning a cab driver will pick them up again at home and drive them back.

The first pick-up will cost a regular fare, but the ride back will be free.

Called the Free Ride Back program, it's an effort to give an extra incentive to people considering driving home drunk.

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High drunk driving rates

Giam'scompany owns 30 cabs, with another 10 owner-operators. WhenGiamdrove a cab himself, he often saw people staggering out of a bar after a night of drinking only to get into their car and drive home.

"Ask any taxi driver, especially weekend and night drivers trying to cross the Alaska Highway, [they'll say], 'If it was three seconds earlier I would have been smashed, because that person just crossed the red light,'" Giam said.

Yukon and the Northwest Territories have some of the highest drinking and driving rates in Canada, explained Cpl. Shawn Pollard with the RCMP Traffic Services.

Still drunk in the morning?

Pollard applauds any effort to combat drinking and driving, but has concerns about how effective the Free Ride Back program might be.

"Quite often here in the territory and in my experience, I get a lot of my impaired drivers in the morning," Pollard said. "People who have gone home and slept for four, five hours or longer and are still intoxicated at noon."

"You have to be very careful. You can still be well-over the legal limit even if you've had eight hours of sleep. It all depends on how much you've had to drink."

At the end of the holiday season, Giam will assess the program and look at how successful it is. He said there may be the possibility of expanding it throughout the year or bringing it back in 2017 if all goes well.

"I hope this Christmas and holiday season we can all go home safe with our families," he said.