If you believe a recent study by the Allstate insurance company, you may want to stay off the roads around the Dallas-Fort Worth area. According to the study, drivers in this area are ranked among the worst in the country.
The insurance company, for the obvious reason that it wants to pay as few insurance claims as possible, releases the America’s Best Drivers Report on an annual basis to focus attention on saving lives through safe driving. The report examines 200 cities across the country in terms of car crash frequency. In addition to looking at the number of accidents that occur in an area, it also looks at factors such as population density and the amount of precipitation the area receives.
None of the cities in the Dallas-Fort Worth metro area ranked higher than 146 out of the 200. Mesquite was ranked at 162.
According to the report, the national average of time between auto accidents for a driver is 10 years. The safest city in America has an average of every 13.3 years. The lowest ranking city in the Dallas-Fort Worth area had an average of 7.8 years between accidents.
The news for Texans is unfortunately representative of statistics across the country. The National Safety Council maintains figures for the number of accidents in any year, as well as the number of injuries and fatalities caused by those accidents. For the first six months of 2015, the numbers are higher than they have been since 2007, with traffic deaths up 14 percent from the first half of 2014. Injuries are 30 percent higher.
In addition to the Council’s figures, the Federal Highway Administration’s figures show that travel has increased by 3.5 percent in 2015. Factors that contribute to the increase include lower gas prices and the improving economy.
Regardless of the reasons for the increase in traffic and the increased number of accidents, the focus should be on how to decrease these numbers. Unfortunately, regardless of efforts to lower the average times a person is in an accident, car accidents will occur. If you have been involved in an accident, contact an attorney with experience in personal injury cases to determine whether you have a right to recover compensation against the person who caused the accident.
Source: Frisco Enterprise, “Frisco takes top spot among North Texas cities in Allstate ‘Best Drivers’ report, but ranks only 146 out of 200 cities examined,” Sept. 1, 2015
