DC is number one! (for unsafe drivers)

[jrenaut]

I didn’t see any info on methodology aside from “number of accidents”. I’d rather be in 1000 fender-benders that don’t injure anyone than 1 accident that sends someone to the hospital – does this include things like that?

It’s probably just Allstate’s justification for setting higher rates in certain cities.

[PotomacCyclist]

I’d guess that many of the DC and Arlington accidents are at lower speeds, except on the GW and Rock Creek Parkways, and the few highways like 395.

I think Allstate was measuring the number of years between accidents per vehicle, on average. So each city would have a number such as an accident every 8.3 years for the average vehicle. Seems like a reasonable way to measure costs in local areas, though the severity of accidents would also be important. A fender-bender isn’t going to be as expensive for Allstate as a complete destruction of the car would be.

[mstone]

With the modern plastic eggshell cars, a fender bender isn’t necessarily much cheaper than totaling the car if it’s more than a couple of years old. Injuries are where the money is, and people can claim neck pains after even a low-speed crash.

[jrenaut]

Good point over at TheWashCycle – a huge number of cars in DC are actually commuters from Maryland and Virginia. My only accident in the city (Hit on foot while in a crosswalk by an F-250 Super Duty) was a Maryland driver not used to people in crosswalks.

So if they measure by dividing accidents by registered drivers, it’ll way overestimate the accidents. The “population” of DC is much higher during the day when the commuters are all in at work.

[PotomacCyclist]

But the fact that Arlington and Alexandria also rank low indicates that commuters aren’t the only explanation for DC’s rank. Other cities also increase population during the day. DC probably has a higher percentage increase of people during the day than other major cities because of the lower density (no super-tall apartment buildings).

Baltimore’s low rank is also interesting.

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