Max Dorfman, Research Writer, Triple-I

Recreational marijuana use is associated with automobile crash trends, according to a paper published in the Journal of Studies on Alcohol and Drugs. However, the study also noted that retail marijuana sales aren’t solely responsible for the general rise in accidents.

Legalization of recreational marijuana use was correlated to a 6.5 percent growth in the rate of crashes involving injuries and a 2.3 percent rise in those involving fatalities. With legalization and retail sales, the study found that the total impact was a 5.8 percent rise in injury crash rates and a 4.1 percent increase in fatal crash rates.

But these results were inconsistent across states, with the effects on injury crash rates varying from a 7 percent decrease to an 18 percent rise and fatal crash rates ranging from a 4 percent increase to a 10 percent decline. Colorado experienced the biggest rise in injury crash rates after legalization and retail sales, coming in at 17.8 percent. Nevada experienced the largest decline in fatal crashes, at 9.8 percent.

“Legalization removes the stigma of marijuana use, while the onset of retail sales merely increases access,” said lead researcher Charles M. Farmer of the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety. “But access to marijuana isn’t difficult, even in places without retail sales. Users who previously avoided driving high may feel that it’s okay after legalization.”

Farmer added, “Studies looking for a direct causal link between marijuana use and crash risk have been inconclusive.” Unlike with alcohol, no objective measure yet exists for how impaired a marijuana user has become.

As Triple-I notes, most studies find that marijuana use results in impaired coordination, memory, associative learning, attention, cognitive flexibility, and reaction time. Although it is clear from this research that driving ability is diminished, the extent of impairment continues to be studied.

Younger drivers are at higher risk of traffic accidents than older drivers, with younger male drivers at high risk. Early evidence indicates that younger male drivers are most likely to drive under the influence of marijuana.

Another study, in the journal Drug and Alcohol Dependence, suggests chronic, heavy use of recreational marijuana impairs driving skills, even when the driver is not high, with those who started regularly using marijuana before 16 years old showing the worst results.

These results demonstrate that the effects of marijuana vary widely across demographic groups, making it all the more important for everyone to be cautious when using the drug.

By Max Dorfman, Research Writer, Triple-I

Distracted driving in the United States has risen more than 30 percent from February 2020 to February 2022, as the coronavirus pandemic has upended driving patterns, according to a recent report by telematics service provider Cambridge Mobile Telematics (CMT). This comes despite improvements in other dangerous behaviors, like speeding, which has declined as traffic returned since the early phases of the pandemic.

Drivers in January 2022 averaged 1:35 seconds of distraction per hour, a high for the past three years. Additionally, in February 2022, this figure increased to 1:38 seconds – a 25.5 percent increase from February 2019, and a 30.3 percent rise from February 2020, which was the last month of pre-pandemic driving.

Additionally, evening and late-night distracted driving has dramatically increased compared to pre-pandemic levels, with evening distraction ballooning to almost 35 percent from February 2020 to April 2020. Late-night distraction has become even worse, with 40 percent of drivers in the same period. This trend has remained high, with the average time distracted standing at 1:29 seconds per hour by February 2022 for late-night driving.

The U.S. government takes notice

Recently, the Governors Highway Safety Association (GHSA) released a report detailing data limits and other barriers to limiting distracted driving. The report found that approximately 3,142 people died in distraction-related accidents in 2020, with an estimated 400,000 people injured each year in such crashes. The true numbers, according to the study, are likely higher due to underreporting.

The GHSA report also notes that the most prevalent and highest-risk behaviors include:

• Cell dial;
• Cell text;
• Reaching for an object;
• Cell-browse and;
• In-vehicle device.

A total of 15 percent of police-reported motor vehicle traffic crashes recorded distraction as a factor, according to national crash data, with drivers aged 15 to 20 years at the highest risk for distracted driving in a fatal crash.

This comes despite 80 percent of drivers stating that talking on a hand-held cell phone is extremely or very dangerous. However, 37 percent admit to doing this. Almost all drivers (95 percent) said reading or typing a text or email on a hand-held cell phone while driving is extremely or very dangerous. However, 23 percent reported typing or sending a text or email on a hand-held cell phone at least once in the past 30 days, with 34 percent stating that they read on a hand-held device while driving.

Can telematics help?

A 2020 study by Triple-I’s sister organization the Insurance Research Council (IRC) focused on public perception and use of telematics, which can be used to lower the cost of insurance for responsible drivers.

Indeed, 45 percent of drivers surveyed said they made significant safety-related changes in the way they drove after participating in a telematics program. An additional 35 percent said they made small changes in the way they drive.

And although many individuals who made small or significant changes ultimately return to previous driving habits, one in four participants reported that they consider the changes made to be permanent, with an additional 19 percent saying they engaged in previous driving habits only rarely.

These kinds of shifts in behavior hold promise not only for the future of telematics, but for safer roadways with significantly fewer accidents.

By Max Dorfman, Research Writer, Triple-I

Local governments in the United States in recent years have begun adopting “Vision Zero” policies, which aim at cutting roadway fatalities to zero. Such policies – which have demonstrated success abroad – have drawn even more interest since the onset of the pandemic, during which traffic fatalities and injuries have surged.

The Vision Zero Network is a nonprofit focused on helping local governments implement the Vision Zero plan. First implemented in Sweden in 1997, that country has seen its traffic fatalities halved, inspiring other governments to adopt similar measures. Vision Zero is also becoming an initiative for the entire European Union.

More than 40 communities across the United States have adopted these policies, including major metropolitan areas like New York City, Los Angeles, and Portland, Ore. In Portland, several data points are helping government officials better understand how to reduce traffic fatalities and injuries, including a high percentage of pedestrian crashes occurring because of long distances between marked crossings. Portland has taken the initiative, building “a system to protect pedestrians includes frequent safe crossings, street lighting, a cultural acceptance of slower speeds and people educated about how to interact safely on the streets.”

Success in Hoboken, NJ

Hoboken, a city of about 54,000 people across the Hudson River from New York City, has experienced zero traffic deaths for three years as of 2021. Instrumental in this has been Mayor Ravi Bhalla’s Vision Zero program. Mayor Bhalla’s 2019 executive order has resulted in the city extending its bike-lane network 38 percent in 2019 and 2020, with its total on-street network of 16.3 miles now nearly half of the city’s 33 miles of streets.

The city also has put in curb extensions at intersections, marked wider crosswalks, and timed traffic signals to give pedestrians a seven-second head start. When it’s warmer, major commercial areas of the city are closed to cars entirely or assigned as “slow streets” with decreased traffic and velocities.

“While we’ve made major progress in the past three years, having no pedestrian fatalities and a reduction in pedestrian injuries, we are striving to create even safer streets in the years ahead,” said Mayor Bhalla. “With the adoption of the Vision Zero Action Plan, we’ll be able to take even more actionable steps to reach our goal of all traffic-related deaths and injuries by 2030, one of the most ambitious Vision Zero goals in the entire country.” 

With these steps being implemented nationwide, entire communities are becoming safer. Additionally, insurers could potentially pass the savings produced by lower accident rates onto consumers, as they did earlier in the pandemic.

Now the U.S. federal government has announced its own version of Vision Zero. In late January, federal transportation officials released a plan to reduce the tens of thousands of road deaths that occur every year.

By Max Dorfman, Research Writer, Triple-I

After years of steady declines, traffic fatalities in the United States are on the rise, contributing to increasing auto insurance rates. This comes despite declines in the average number of miles driven due to the pandemic. In 2020, 38,680 deaths occurred on U.S. roads, the most since 2007.

In late January, federal transportation officials released a plan to reduce the tens of thousands of road deaths that occur every year, an issue that has become more significant since the beginning of the coronavirus pandemic.

“We cannot and should not accept these fatalities as simply a part of everyday life in America,” said Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg. “No one will accomplish this alone. It will take all levels of government, industries, advocates, engineers and communities across the country working together toward the day when family members no longer have to say good-bye to loved ones because of a traffic crash.”

Pandemic’s impact

Roadway safety in the United States had increased for decades before the pandemic, primarily due to enforcement of seat belt laws and vehicle safety features, such as airbags, improved braking, and stability control. Yet, the first year of the pandemic saw a 7.2 percent rise in U.S. roadway deaths from 2019. Some experts saw this rise in reckless driving as due, in part, to the isolation associated with the pandemic lockdowns. 

“You’ve been cooped up, locked down, and have restrictions you chafe at,” said Frank Farley, a professor of psychology at Temple University in Philadelphia.

In the early months of the COVID pandemic, insurers were giving rebates for personal auto policies, spurred by reductions in miles driven and anticipation of fewer accidents. However, it quickly became clear that reduced miles driven didn’t automatically lead to fewer deadly accidents. Instead, reckless driving – and fatalities – increased.

The end of pandemic shutdowns hasn’t helped either, with the U.S. Department of Transportation’s National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) estimating that 31,720 people died in motor vehicle traffic crashes for the first nine months of 2021, rising about 12 percent from the 28,325 fatalities projected for the first nine months of 2020. In Q1 of 2020, traffic fatalities were 1.12 per 100 million miles driven. By the end of Q3 of 2021, this number had spiked to 1.41 per 100 million miles driven.

What can be done?

The federal infrastructure deal promises to spend more on new safety measures, with the goal of eliminating road deaths. With this in mind, the Department of Transportation is implementing a Safe System Approach, under the premise that fatal accidents can be avoided if individuals understand the need for safe driving and accept that crashes can be avoided. The aim is zero traffic deaths.

Indeed, the Safe System Approach, which has been adopted across several countries in Europe, has seen remarkably positive results. Traffic fatalities fell 50 percent In Sweden and the Netherlands between 1994 and 2015.

“There are communities that have gotten to [zero traffic fatalities] already,” added Buttigieg. “And I’m not just talking about Oslo,” which experienced zero pedestrian deaths in 2019, “but a place like Hoboken, N.J., in the U.S. has seen multiple years with zero deaths.”

Auto insurance premium rates are affected by many factors, and accident and fatality trends are a major ones. Reckless driving trends – combined with increasing auto repair costs associated with safety, efficiency, and comfort – can only continue to put upward pressure on rates. Individual behavior and government policies must converge in the direction of improving responsibility and safety for all drivers.