A Study of Recreational Boating Public Interventions, Regulations and Accidents Utilizing Federal and State Data
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Date
2020-05
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Abstract
Existing research on public regulation for recreational boating focuses on the use of personal flotation devices or drunkenness while boating. This study takes a different approach by evaluating a combination of public data available from the State of Florida on the maritime domain, public interventions such as aids to navigation and public regulations like boating safety education. These data are examined with boating accident data to determine if a relationship exists at both a county level and at the accident-level. This study fills a prominent void in scholarly literature regarding boating safety public regulation and its relationship to boating accidents. The result of the analysis was surprising in that public service actions such as the placement of Aids to Navigation like buoys and channel markers and the issuance of boater safety cards as a result of education completion which are designed to reduce the boating accident rate seemed to have a reverse effect at the county level. Further, when evaluated at the accident level, age, experience and education of a boat operator had a noticeable effect on the probability of injuries and fatalities in boating accidents. Findings from this research have a potential to be incorporated into state level risk-based decision making, actuarial modeling and budgeting on public regulation programs.
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recreational boating, casualty, analysis