Do you Know if the Roads You Drive Are Safe?
With the help of the Hillsborough County Sheriff’s Office and Florida’s Integrated Report Exchange System (FIRES), we are sharing with you Carrollwood car accident statistics for 2017. These numbers can help you more thoroughly understand how safe, or not safe the streets are that you drive every day in your own neighborhood.
Let’s start with some basic numbers. In Carrollwood and the surrounding areas, there were 3,273 crashes reported in 2017. In this area, the northern boundary is Van Dyke Road, the southern boundary is Hillsborough Avenue, the eastern boundary is Florida Avenue and the western boundary is Race Track Road. This is shown below:
Out of those 3,273 accidents, there were:
- 6,616 vehicles involved
- 1,839 crashes with injuries (Crashes with injuries are all crashes with at least one reported injury and including those where a fatality was reported.)
- 1,823 injury crashes (Injury crashes are any crash in which there was at least one reported injury, and excluding those where a fatality was reported)
- 1,427 property damage crashes
- 113 crashes with incapacitating injuries
- 585 crashes with non-incapacitating injuries
- 1,307 crashes with possible injuries
- 2,697 total injuries
- 1,892 driver injuries
- 135 total incapacitating injuries
- 729 total non-incapacitating injuries
- 1, 833 total possible injuries
- 23 crashes with fatalities
- 23 total traffic fatalities
- 15 driver fatalities
Think about that. In this almost 99 square mile area, over 1, 839 people were injured or killed in a car accident. That is unnecessary and we CAN make this better. By vowing to not use or cell phones, not driving tired and never driving under the influence of alcohol or drugs.
Some of the most dangerous intersections in this area include:
- Anderson Road and Waters Avenue
- Dale Mabry Avenue and Waters Avenue
- Linebaugh Avenue and Busch Blvd
- Bearss Avenue and Dale Mabry Avenue
- Ehrlich Road and Turner Road
- Sheldon Road and Linebaugh Avenue
Breaking Down the Numbers
When we break down the number of accidents further we can see extract some ideas about when accidents are more likely to occur based on month, day, time, driver age, road conditions and daylight. Here are some key findings for the area:
- March saw the highest number of crashes at 303. March was also highest for all of Hillsborough County.
- Most crashes occurred on Fridays at 16.93%, consistent with all of Hillsborough County.
- 4 PM saw the highest amount of crashes during the day. This varies from Hillsborough County as a whole, which saw the most amount of crashes around 6 PM.
- Most crashes had drivers at the ages of 20-24. Again, consistent with Hillsborough County.
- Finally, contrary to the thoughts of many, most crashes occurred in clear conditions in daylight, as opposed to bad weather or nighttime. This makes sense as the majority of people drive during the day and the causes of crashes are more often distraction, speeding or drinking, rather than poor weather.
As a driver, you can use this data to remind yourself to be extra cautious when driving on these days, times and locations. Carrollwood and the surrounding area have a lot of residential areas that peopl drive in often coming to and from work. Just because it’s not in the “city” part of Tampa doesn’t mean there are no risks.