San Diego

There was a 12.3% drop in traffic-related deaths and a 10.9% drop in fatal accidents on San Diego city streets over the first six months of the year, measured against the first six months of 1987. Those figures are contained in a report released Thursday by the traffic division of the San Diego Police Department.

The report also showed a 5.8% increase in injury-causing accidents on San Diego city streets. In a statistical quirk, there were exactly the same number (3,725) of drivers arrested on suspicion of operating a motor vehicle under the influence of drugs, alcohol or both during the first six months of 1987 and 1988.

The decline in fatalities may be related to greater seat-belt use, according to Department spokesman Bill Robinson. He said people may be influenced by a mandatory California seat-belt law that went into effect in January. He tentatively related this to the decline in traffic fatalities on city streets, from 57 in the first six months of 1987 to 50 during the same period in 1988.

Robinson said that is good news because there were fewer lives lost, but that it is too early to determine if the figures show the beginning of a longer trend.

The report also showed that there were 49 traffic accidents causing one or more deaths during the first six months of 1988, contrasted with 55 such accidents during the same period in 1987. The number of traffic accidents that resulted in non-fatal injuries was up by 240, however, and reached 4,401 during the first six months of 1988, according to Robinson.

There were 6.3% more people injured in traffic-related accidents during the first six months of 1988, the report said. The number of people injured was up by 354, to 5,961.