Sunbelt Cities Rank Lowest in Nation for Street Safety

The newest  U.S. Safe Streets Index published by the transportation analytics firm StreetLight found Sunbelt cities in the South and Southwest to have some of the worst road safety, reports J.K. Trotter in Streetsblog USA.

According to Trotter,

“New York City came in first and Bakersfield, California came in last — and towards the bottom of that range are a lot of southern cities.”

The analysis notes that, in most of the cities at the bottom of the list, “Vehicle miles traveled exposure tends to be high, and there is also heavy speed risk on pedestrian heavy roadways, which may be linked to wider arterials and higher-speed corridors.” It also points out that the safest cities, with some exceptions, tend to be some of the oldest, whose street networks were developed before the rise of the automobile and car-centric planning. 

Ultimately, “Northern coastal metros may perform better in the Safe Streets Index due to their density and transit-oriented infrastructure, which helps limit miles driven, the highest-weighted factor in the analysis.” Dense cities reduce risk by simply lowering driving exposure. 

Cities vary across the five metrics used by StreetLight for the analysis. “Streetlight ranked Los Angeles 96th out of 100 in terms of speed differential risk. But it also ranked L.A. fifth out of 100 for residential speeds.” Portland, Oregon ranks close to the top overall, but falls outside the top third for truck activity per capita.