How many more Albertans — both young and old — have to die before the Alberta government finally enacts meaningful legislation that would curb the growing trend of ATV-related injuries and fatalities in the province?
It has been two years since the provincial government promised it would review guidelines surrounding ATV use, and to this day nothing has been done. In the meantime more people have died, illustrated locally by the death of Ashton Parrish, 15, of Sturgeon County, who was riding on an ATV with two other people when they crashed near Spruce Island Lake. Her name now joins the growing list of Albertans as young as two years old who have died while using an ATV.
Parrish and the other passengers were wearing helmets, but in what circumstances is it acceptable for three individuals to ride a machine meant for one person? While the government cannot do anything about poor choices, it can start doing something about addressing the paltry bundle of legislation that governs ATV use.
More than 100 people have died as a direct cause of ATV use in the last eight years. In 2006 alone there were 632 hospital admissions and 5,062 emergency department visits, making ATV use the leading recreational cause for emergency room admissions. Between 2002 and 2009, 17 Albertans under the age of 16 years died in related accidents. Countless organizations and working groups have called for a minimum of three standards — mandatory rider training, a ban on anyone under the age of 16 operating an ATV and helmets for all riders. The government has rebuffed those claims from every conceivable direction, arguing educating the public is more important than trying to force them to do something that could save lives.
ATVs are not all made the same — there are smaller and larger machines available depending on age. One commercial for a manufacturer broadcast two years ago showed a family of four zipping through the woods on different sizes of ATVs. Yet if we are not prepared to allow children to drive a vehicle without mandatory training and a licence before they are 16, why are we allowing them to use large ATVs on public or private land?
Alberta is the only province without strict ATV guidelines. It is strange that our government would be so reticent to act given it’s already flirting increasingly with a cellphone ban and has passed laws requiring seatbelts and bans against passengers in the back of pickup trucks. It took decades to have seatbelts introduced as law and a tragic fatal accident to spur any action on the issue of pickup passengers. We are only left to guess what it will take to turn the government’s direction towards increasing safety requirements for ATV users.
A helmet bylaw, currently on hold in the legislature, would be a start, but it would also have to include mandatory training for all riders and a ban on anyone under 16 from operating any kind of ATV. Every year the government stalls means another spring and summer of carnage on both public and private property. While the government might have little say in what a person can or can’t do in a backyard, it can act on public lands. In fact, it has the moral obligation to do so.
