He said he spoke with managers of other Grismer locations across the Miami Valley who all reported lower than expected traffic on Wednesday.
Statistics from the Ohio State Highway Patrol seem to agree with Woodie’s theory that there simply weren’t a lot of people on the roads to get into accidents.
Troopers responded to 15 crashes in Montgomery County between Saturday and Monday, according to the OHSP crash statistics dashboard. They responded to 40 over the same period last year.
According to the National Safety Council, Americans drive the second fewest number of miles during January, behind only February, the shortest month.
In 2023, the most recent year for which NSC statistics are available, people drove an estimated 248.7 billion miles in January resulting in 3,382 traffic deaths nationwide.
The heaviest traveled month is August. An estimated 290.9 billion miles were driven in 2023, with 4,074 fatalities.
But the winter months are typically busy ones for mechanics, who get bombarded by a string of complaints about dead batteries, faulty heaters and no-starts throughout the season.
Ron Cheili, owner of Liberty Auto & Truck Service on Hamilton-Middletown Road in Hamilton, said he’s been dealing with those issues since people got back on the roads Tuesday, along with another issue that only comes up during heavy snow.
“We’ve got three or four complaints from customers about ‘vibrations’ in their vehicle. It’s snow and ice stuck to the rims,” Cheili said.
Both Woodie and Cheili expect business to pick up as more drivers head back out on the roads.
But as far as the record snowstorm?
“Business is really about the same,” Cheili said.
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