St. Louis Named Most Dangerous Driving City by Magazine
On behalf of Brown & Crouppen, P.C. posted in Motor Vehicle Accident on Monday, March 19, 2012
St. Louis has been named to the top of a list that residents will probably not be very proud to be on. The city’s drivers are being called the most dangerous in the U.S. by Men’s Health magazine after editors compared St. Louis’ car accident rates and other statistics with those of other major cities.
Behind St. Louis were three Texas metropolitan areas: Dallas, Houston and Austin. Besides Providence, Rhode Island, and Billings, Montana, the rest of the “top” 10 list of dangerous drivers were made up of Southern cities. Interestingly, New York City and Los Angeles, two cities popularly thought of as having a lot of accidents, ranked fairly high, at number seven and 40, respectively.
Besides rates of fatal car accidents and accidents overall, Men’s Health editors looked at how many accidents in each city involved speeding, DUI or hit and run. They also examined rates of seat belt use and whether there are distracted driving laws, such as restrictions or bans on cell phone use behind the wheel.
The magazine used the data to compile a list of 100 cities based on how safe they are to drive in. The safest city was St. Paul, Minnesota, while a number of Eastern and Western cities rounded out the list.
St. Louis, meanwhile, scored poorly in Men’s Health’s 2011 poll, and has only gotten worse, according to the magazine’s deputy editor.
For comparison’s sake, Kansas City, Missouri, ranked relatively higher than St. Louis at number 69. But that was still low enough to earn a “D” grade from the magazine.
Source: Reuters, “Fear of driving? Avoid St. Louis and Dallas,” Chris Michaud, March 13, 2012