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Some holiday numbers

Christmas might still be 10 days away, but that doesn’t mean it’s too early to be thinking about what the new year might bring.

That includes how we will bid farewell to an eventful 2024 and welcome what we hope will be a great 2025.

When it comes to the best places to celebrate New Year’s Eve, it’s good to know that our region ranks among the top 10. According to WalletHub, Pittsburgh is the ninth-rated city to be when the clock hits midnight on Dec. 31. That’s what the Washington, D.C.-based personal financial website has determined after crunching all of the data that makes up its 28 metrics.

Pittsburgh ranks seventh in total cost, 27th in food and entertainment costs and 53rd in safety and accessibility. What’s even more impressive is that the region has the third lowest average price of wine and the fourth most luxury and gourmet food stores per capita, both important factors when you’re looking to do a little celebrating.

Other cities in the region didn’t finish quite as high.

Columbus, for example, ranks 27th overall — 28th in total costs, 43rd in food and entertainment costs and 32nd in safety and accessibility. Cleveland, meanwhile, could do no better than 85th — and was 43rd in total costs, 53rd in food and entertainment costs and 87th in safety and accessibility.

A bottle of wine costs a lot more in Cincinnati than it does here, the survey revealed — the city finished 90th when you look at the average wine price. That no doubt contributed to its 25th place on the overall list — it also was 14th in total costs, 26th in food and entertainment costs and 78th in safety and accessibility.

It will come as little surprise that New York City is the best city in the country to celebrate New Year’s Eve, the survey showed, followed by Orlando, San Diego, Las Vegas, Chicago, Atlanta, Miami and San Francisco. Seattle rounds out the top 10.

WalletHub also reports that 69 percent of Americans plan to spend at least $50 on food and drink on New Year’s Eve, while 24 percent plan to celebrate at home, 54 percent will be celebrating with family and friends and 31 percent plan to eat out or order food that evening. And the survey reveals that 36 percent of Americans say they don’t plan to celebrate at all.

There will be more than 1 million people in Times Square to celebrate during the countdown to the New Year. That’s a lot of people to be gathered in one spot at one time, which is likely the reason 175 million people are expected to watch the giant ball drop on television in the United States. There will be more than 1 billion viewers of the event around the world.

Expect a lot of sparkling wine to be enjoyed — in fact, more than 360 million glasses likely will be consumed on New Year’s Eve.

There will be a lot of other alcoholic beverages enjoyed that night — in some cases, way too many.

Sobering statistics show that 10 percent of emergency room visits on New Year’s Eve are drug or alcohol related, and 42,800 people will be hurt in car crashes during that period. The average blood-alcohol reading on that evening is 0.095 percent, which makes it the most drunken night of the year. Sadly, it’s expected there will be 375 traffic fatalities during the holiday period.

••••••••

With Christmas closing in, the question already has started to come up: Will we have a white Christmas?

There’s no real way to be able to say for sure now, but according to historical numbers from the National Weather Service in Pittsburgh, the numbers show there’s not a real good probability that will happen, this year or any year, for that matter. In fact, there’s only about a 30 percent chance in the Tri-State Area.

It’s a number that can vary widely from year to year. For example, AccuWeather reports that figures from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration show that the last widespread white Christmas came in 2022, when 53 percent of the country was covered by snow. The least snowy Dec. 25 came in 2023, the State College-based private weather-forecasting company reports, when just 16.7 percent of the country had snow cover.

Actually, we really don’t get all that much in December at all. The National Weather Service says that the 30-year mean (covering 1991 to 2020) is 7.7 inches of snow for the month. January, at 13.3 inches, and February, at 11.7 inches, are the snowiest months in our region.

As always when it comes to talk about the weather, the almanacs offer interesting insight, and the chances as recorded on their pages don’t look a whole lot better than those historical probabilities. Neither the Old Farmer’s Almanac nor Farmers’ Almanac offer much reason for hope.

Old Farmer’s, which has a history going back to 1792, is forecasting sunny and chilly weather for the period of Dec. 20-26, and snowy and colder weather from Dec. 27-31.

Farmers’, which was founded in 1818, is calling for rain or snow for Dec. 20-23, sunshine and colder temperatures Dec. 24-27 and a cold and dry Dec. 28-31 to end the year.

Some numbers to think about as we head into Christmas and the new year.

(Gallabrese, a resident of Steubenville, is executive editor of the Herald-Star and The Weirton Daily Times)

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