How Is "This Ride's On Us" Doing In Weyburn?

It has been almost three weeks since the Weyburn Police Service launched their “This Ride’s On Us” campaign with their community partners.

This program allows patrons of participating establishments, bars, and restaurants in Weyburn to give their server or bartender their keys at the end of the night. In exchange, they receive a voucher for a taxi and a safe ride home. Then the next morning, they can pick up their keys from the Weyburn Police Service.

The program's goal is to help keep the roads safe and to also create an awareness. Those who participate not only receive the taxi voucher but they also have their name put in a draw for various prizes. At the end of each month, there will be a grand prize as well.

So how well is the program doing so far?

"Every weekend since we've started we've seen a slow increase in usage," said Weyburn Police Service Chief Marlo Pritchard. "People are looking at other options and taking "This Ride's On Us" and taking advantage of that. They're either leaving their vehicles or working with the cab companies and having them drive their vehicles home. Either way, it's a win in increasing safety for our community because people are going out and still having a good time, but they're not driving after."

This is a trial program that will run for two months and after that, the Weyburn Police Service hopes to keep it running for as long as possible.

"We will assess it at the end of the two-month period, but if we still have funding available after that we would look at running it hopefully until the end of the year. Maybe with or without prizes, I don't know if we'll have that. But in all fairness, if we can do it we will try," stated Pritchard.

With more funding, the program could carry on much longer and could save even more lives in Weyburn.

"It would be really nice if we saw something in the future, maybe a different organization take this on and make it a culture of Weyburn," added Pritchard. "It would be a phenomenal aspect if that helped to change the culture and helped to increase the safety on our roads."

Weyburn residents are encouraged to take advantage of this program as it helps to keep the city safer.

"We're hoping that this weekend that even more people will use the program," said Pritchard. "We encourage members of the public that are going out and want to use it that it's there and please do."

There are many great prizes available for people that use the program thanks to all the sponsorships from a number of local businesses.

"Our grand prize for the first month is coming up here shortly so hopefully people will continue to use the program and we'll be drawing for the grand prize at the end of the month," Pritchard added.

Most of the people responsible for the "This Ride's On Us" program.