Preliminary Report from Analysis of Penn DOT Vehicle Crash Data for 2003 - 2005

Fact Sheet: Pennsylvania and Lehigh Valley

A reportable crash is an incident involving at least one automobile which sustained enough damage that it cannot be driven and/or in which an occupant sustained at least a minor injury.

Statewide, across a three-year period from 2003 thru 2005, there were 411,460 reported crashes in Pennsylvania and of these, 4294 crashes involved at least one fatality.

In 2006 Penn DOT reported that there were 128,342 crashes resulting in 1525 deaths and 96,597 injuries.

The fatality rate for these crashes is approximately 12 deaths per 1000 crashes.

In 2006, across the State of Pennsylvania, approximately 1 person out of every 8158 people was killed in a reportable traffic crash, for a rate of 15 crashes per hour and 1 death every 6 hours.

Approximately 1 out of every 129 Pennsylvania residents was injured in a crash.

Across that same three year period in the Lehigh Valley there were 24,619 crashes involving 62,948 people. These crashes resulted in 193 deaths and 14542 injuries.

In the Lehigh Valley for the year 2005, there were 8149 crashes resulting in 77 deaths and 4270 injuries.

The rate of fatalities for these crashes is slightly lower than the Pennsylvania State rate, at approximately 9.5 deaths per 1000 crashes.

Based on US Census data for the year 2000 there is on average approximately 1 death for every 8615 residents of the Lehigh Valley, a rate slightly less that the State.

Approximately 1 out of every 131 residents of the Lehigh Valley was injured in a crash, a rate also slightly lower that the State.

In the Lehigh Valley, between 2003 and 2005, Twenty Nine (29) teens were killed and 20 young adults died in car crashes. An additional 3770 were injured.

This represents 25% of all deaths and 32% of all injuries, yet this group represents approximately 12% of all drivers.

Report:

Young drivers (age 16 through 19 years old) account for approximately 4% of the total number of drivers on Pennsylvania roads, however, of those crashes in which the age of the driver has been recorded, approximately 17% involved a driver age 19 or younger.

The next highest age group for crashes is the 20 to 24 year olds. This group comprises just 7.5% of all Pennsylvania drivers yet accounts for an additional 16% of all crashes in which the age of the driver is known. Together these groups account for nearly 33% of all crashes in Pennsylvania yet comprise only 12 % of licensed drivers.

The percentages of fatal crashes and major injuries for Lehigh and Northampton counties are very similar to the Pennsylvania state total. Of the 24,619 crashes, approximately 45% of crashes did not involve an injury to driver or occupant. However over 50% resulted in an injury and over 3% resulted in death and serious injury.

Percentage of Injury Categories for Lehigh Valley Crashes: 2003 – 2005

Additionally of those persons killed on Pennsylvania roads, approximately 15% involved a driver between 16 and 19 years old. Approximately 20% of those individuals receiving major injuries were in car driven by a person 19 years old or younger.

Approximately 25 % of all car related highway deaths involved crashes in which the driver was between ages 16 to 24 years old. Additionally over 30% of all injuries occur to this age group as well (See Table #4 Appendix).

In all age categories, the risk of injury and death is greater for male drivers. An examination of gender by maximum severity of injury indicated that for males the number of deaths is nearly three times as high as for female drivers regardless of age of driver. The percentage of injury per crashes is more than twice as high.

SELECTED RISK FACTORS:

Alcohol Use:

In an examination of risk factors associated with crash deaths and injuries, several factors were selected that are thought to be typically associated with young drivers. The first set of factors includes Alcohol Use, Speeding, Cell Phone Use, and Aggressive Driving. These factors are typical of behaviors associated with risk taking, impulsivity, and poor judgment. Surprisingly, many of these factors are common to older drivers as well.

The rate of occurrence within Lehigh and Northampton counties for these risk factors across all drivers is consistent with statewide rates.

The first factor to be examined reflects some good news. Overall the rate of alcohol related crashes if significantly lower for drivers age 16-19. Of all alcohol related crashes that occurred between 2003 and 2005, 6% involved a young driver age 16 to 19 years old.

Percentage of Alcohol related Crashes by Age Group

Unfortunately, even within this underage group, the rate of alcohol-related crashes increased as drivers got older. In addition to maturation issues related to drinking, access to alcohol and less supervision may contribute to significantly increased rates by age 18.

Percentage of Alcohol related Crashed by Age Group

Age Categories			Alcohol Use		Total
			No	Yes	No
	16-19	Count	3926	137	4063
		% within Age	96.6%	3.4%	100.0%
	20-24	Count	3314	478	3792
		% within Age	87.4%	12.6%	100.0%
	25-29	Count	2067	307	2374
		% within Age	87.1%	12.9%	100.0%
	30-34	Count	1691	225	1916
		% within Age	88.3%	11.7%	100.0%
	35-39	Count	1783	228	2011
		% within Age	88.7%	11.3%	100.0%
	40-44	Count	1828	249	2077
		% within Age	88.0%	12.0%	100.0%
	45-49	Count	1610	172	1782
		% within Age	90.3%	9.7%	100.0%
	50-60	Count	2398	190	2588
		% within Age	92.7%	7.3%	100.0%
	61-75	Count	1716	63	1779
		% within Age	96.5%	3.5%	100.0%
	76-95	Count	1063	9	1072
		% within Age	99.2%	.8%	100.0%
Total		Count	21396	2058	23454
		% within Age	91.2%	8.8%	100.0%

Additionally the percentage of young drivers that died or received moderate injury is significantly higher for alcohol-related crashes. Proportionally, nearly 5 times as many drivers died using alcohol and driving compared to those killed, who didn’t use alcohol. These proportions hold true for both Lehigh and Northampton County Drivers and Municipalities across the state.

Percent of Death and Injuries related to Alcohol Use in all Lehigh Valley Crashes

			Injury Severity
Alc. Use			Killed	Major Injury	Moderate Injury	Minor Injury	No Injury	Total
ALC.	No	Count	129	407	2233	6653	10152	19574
		%	.7%	2.1%	11.4%	34.0%	51.9%	100.0%
ALC.	Yes	Count	64	104	317	515	893	1893
		%	3.4%	5.5%	16.7%	27.2%	47.2%	100.0%
Total		Count	193	511	2550	7168	11045	21467
		%	.9%	2.4%	11.9%	33.4%	51.5%	100.0%

The disproportionate rate of fatalities is highest for the 20 to 35 year old age groups, and a higher rate of increased risk holds across all categories of injuries.

Proportion of Fatal to Non-Fatal Crashes related to Alcohol Use in all Lehigh Valley

Cell Phone Use:

The next risk factor to be examined is cell phone use associated with a crash. Even though it is not possible to estimate the overall rate of cell phone use by drivers because the data is restricted to just crashes, there was relatively good news in this analysis. Of all crashes, less than 1% was associated with cell phone use.

Frequency of Cell phone Use associated with a crash Statewide

	Frequency	Valid Percent	Cumulative Percent
No	407935	99.1	99.1
Yes	3525	.9	100.0
Total	411460	100.0

Nevertheless, in the Lehigh Valley, of those crashes in which a cell phone was being used, nearly 23 % occurred within the 16 to 19 year old age group. While this group represents approximately 16 % of all crashes, and 4% of all drivers on the road, it has the highest rate of cell phone related crashes per age group.

Aggressive Driving:

One of the most significant risk factors associated with all crashes is aggressive driving. This category represents a composite of several risky behaviors including but not limited to speeding, frequent or illegal passing, tailgating, running red lights and other reckless or aggressive driving maneuvers. Within the Lehigh Valley, nearly 65% of all drivers involved in crashes were associated with aggressive driving.

Percentage of Crashes Involving Aggressive Driving in the Lehigh Valley

Aggressive Driving		Frequency	Percent
	NO	9137	37.1
	YES	15482	62.9
	Total	24619	100.0

Importantly of the 23,454 aggressive driving crashes involving licensed drivers, 2772 crashes involved young drivers’ ages 16 to 19 years old. This represents over 12% of all crashes involving aggressive driving behavior.

Percent of crashes associated with aggressive driving by age category

			Aggressive Driving
AGE			NO	YES	Total
	16-19	Count	1291	2772	4063
		% within Age	31.8%	68.2%	100.0%
	20-24	Count	1366	2426	3792
		% within Age	36.0%	64.0%	100.0%
	25-29	Count	865	1509	2374
		% within Age	36.4%	63.6%	100.0%
	30-34	Count	742	1174	1916
		% within Age	38.7%	61.3%	100.0%
	35-39	Count	794	1217	2011
		% within Age	39.5%	60.5%	100.0%
	40-44	Count	818	1259	2077
		% within Age	39.4%	60.6%	100.0%
	45-49	Count	684	1098	1782
		% within Age	38.4%	61.6%	100.0%
	50-60	Count	938	1650	2588
		% within Age	36.2%	63.8%	100.0%
	61-75	Count	640	1139	1779
		% within Age	36.0%	64.0%	100.0%
	76-95	Count	331	741	1072
		% within Age	30.9%	69.1%	100.0%
Total		Count	8469	14985	23454
		% within Age	36.1%	63.9%	100.0%

Proportion of Death and Major injury in Crashes Related to Aggressive Driving

Proportion of Death and Injuries * Aggressive Driving

			Aggressive Driving
			No	Yes	Total
	Killed	Count	82	111	193
		% within Killed	42.5%	57.5%	100.0%
	Major Injury	Count	210	301	511
		% within Major Injury	41.1%	58.9%	100.0%
	Moderate Injury	Count	885	1665	2550
		% within Moderate Injury	34.7%	65.3%	100.0%
	Minor Injury	Count	2523	4645	7168
		% within Minor Injury	35.2%	64.8%	100.0%
	No Injury	Count	4189	6856	11045
		% within No Injury	37.9%	62.1%	100.0%
Total		Count	7889	13578	21467
		% within Injury Severity	36.7%	63.3%	100.0%

Surprisingly, moderate and minor injuries are nearly 40% higher for crashes involving aggressive drivers for all age group of drivers. For death and serious injury, for all age group, the rate is nearly 30% higher.

An examination of injuries and fatalities indicates that for Lehigh Valley young drivers the rate of death from crashes associated with aggressive driving is nearly three times as high when compared to non-aggressive driving related crashes and injuries are twice as high when compared to non-aggressive driving crashes.

Maximum Severity of Injury * Aggressive Driving for Lehigh Valley Drivers ages 16 to 19

Aggressive Driving			Injury Severity					Total
			Killed	Major Injury	Moderate Injury	Minor Injury	No InjuryKilled
No	Count	7	32	113	347	646	1145
	% within Injury	24.1%	36.4%	30.1%	28.5%	32.8%	31.1%
Yes	Count	22	56	263	871	1323	2535
	% within Injury	75.9%	63.6%	69.9%	71.5%	67.2%	68.9%
Total		Count	29	88	376	1218	1969	3680
		% within Injury	100.0%	100.0%	100.0%	100.0%	100.0%	100.0%

Similar to the rate for total crashes, this age group represents only 4% of all drivers on the road, yet this group has nearly 4 times the rate of aggressive driving related crashes. More importantly, for all drivers, it appears that this behavior emerges early and is persistent across all ages.

Unbelted Drivers:

One risk factor indirectly related to a higher probability of crashes is the use of seat restraints by drivers and passengers. This behavior is directly associated with higher rates of injuries and death. Although the rate of this behavior across all age groups is relatively low, (only 13% of all crashes involve an unbelted driver); nearly 15% of young drivers between the ages of 16 and 24 who were involved in crashes were unbelted. However of all crashes involving an unbelted driver, the highest percentage is among the 16 to 24 year old group

Unbelted Driver (All Ages) In Lehigh Valley Crashes

		Frequency	Percent
Valid	Belted	21398	86.9
	Unbelted	3221	13.1
	Total	24619	100.0

Approximately 37% of all crashes involving an unbelted driver also involve a driver between the ages of 16 and 24 years old. In fact of all crashes involving an unbelted driver, nearly 1 in 5 (18.5%) involved a young driver age 16 to 19 years old. The percent of all crashes involving unbelted drivers appears to decline across older age groups.

Percent of Crashes involving an unbelted driver by age group in the Lehigh Valley

Across all age groups however, the group with the highest percentage of unbelted crashes are the 16 to 24 year old age group. Nearly 15% of drivers in this age group are not wearing restraints when involved in a crash.

Restraints and Injuries:

Across all categories of injuries, however unbelted drivers of all age groups sustained injuries as a significantly greater rate than belted drivers. The rate of death for unbelted young drivers is nearly 7 times the rate for belted young drivers.

Similarly, the rate of death is 5 times higher for older unbelted drivers than for belted drivers. The rate of major injury is 2 ½ times higher for young unbelted drivers and the rate of moderate injury is double that of belted drivers.

For older unbelted drivers the rate of major injury is nearly 4 times that of belted drivers, and the rate of moderate injury is more than double.

Efforts to improve the rate of seat belt use among all drivers can have a dramatic impact of serious harm, particularly among young drivers age 16 to 25. These two groups combined account for nearly 35% of all crashes involving an unbelted driver.

Maximum Severity of injury for unbelted drivers in each age category

Speeding:

In the analysis of the Penn Dot data, an examination of the risk factor “Speeding” indicated that this category is infrequently assigned to crashes. More commonly, aggressive driving is used to identify multiple factors associates with crashes. Nevertheless, a percentage of crashes are the result of drivers exceeding the speed limit.

Although only 4% of young drivers were involved in a speeding related crash, this percentage is higher than the 20 to 24 age group, a third higher that the 25 to 29 age group and nearly double the 30 to 95 year old age group.

Age Categories * Speeding

			Speeding
			NO	YES	Total
Age	16 - 19	Count	2320	103	2423
		% within Age Categories	95.7%	4.3%	100.0%
	20 - 24	Count	2324	98	2422
		% within Age Categories	96.0%	4.0%	100.0%
	25 - 29	Count	1504	45	1549
		% within Age Categories	97.1%	2.9%	100.0%
	30 - 95	Count	8175	158	8333
		% within Age Categories	98.1%	1.9%	100.0%
Total		Count	14323	404	14727
		% within Age Categories	97.3%	2.7%	100.0%

Of all crashes involving speeding, over 25% involved a young driver. In fact, drivers age 16 to 25 account for nearly 50% of all speeding related crashes.

Percent of all crashes that involved speeding by age categories