Following a surprising national trend, Michigan’s traffic fatalities increased during 2020 despite drivers traveling less.
This week, preliminary estimates of crash fatalities showing the largest number of fatalities since 2007 were released by the U.S. Department of Transportation’s National Highway Traffic Safety Administration.
Nationwide, an estimated 38,680 people died in car crashes in 2020, which amounts to a 7.2% increase from the previous year.
In Michigan, 1,083 people died in car crashes, an increase of 9.9% deaths compared to the previous year, according to the Michigan Office of Highway Safety Planning.
Can’t see the chart? Click here.
The Michigan Department of Transportation has been bringing awareness to the deadly trend through its podcast, Talking Michigan Transportation.
Host and MDOT Director of Communications Jeff Cranson pointed out that Americans have started to be desensitized to the death toll of car crashes consistently being between 35,000 and 40,000.
“If we had that many deaths, 100 or 200 at a time, in air traffic crashes that would not be acceptable,” he said.
A traffic accident occurred almost every two minutes in Michigan in 2019, according to a Michigan Office of Highway Safety Planning report.
Related: Michigan vehicle travel slowed to a crawl during the pandemic, but bounced back better than others in the U.S.
Michigan’s travel did decrease during the pandemic due to stay-at-home orders. The state even exceeded the national decline, according to StreetLight Data Inc., a transportation analysis firm that uses smart phones and navigation devices to track vehicle travel.
Nationally, traffic dropped 64% in April 2020 compared to pre-pandemic levels in January, while Michigan road traffic dropped even lower than the national average, at 73%.
Although the overall number of crashes decreased by 21.9% in Michigan, fatal crashes increased by 12%.
The reason behind the fatal trend is still coming into focus, said Peter Savolainen, MSU Foundation Professor in the Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering.
“A lot of people reduced their travel and there’s probably some subsets of drivers who didn’t and those people might be higher risk,” he said.
One factor could be cautious drivers being more likely to have stayed home, leading to a more concentrated population of riskier drivers on roads. For example, crash data shows that seat belt usage declined as well.
There was a 4% increase in fatal crashes among those properly wearing seat belts, compared to 16% increase in those who did not, according to Michigan Office of Highway Safety Planning data.
Can’t see the chart? Click here.
Increased speed and less dense traffic are also in the mix. However, Savolainen pushes back on the growing narrative that drivers became accustomed to open highways and formed a deadly habit. He’s working on an ongoing project assessing speed limit increases in 150 different locations in Michigan and has yet to see speed as a predominant factor in the higher number of crashes.
Comparing speeds at which crashes took place shows the highest number of fatal crashes, 411, happened at about 55 mph.
Fatal crashes at 25 mph increased 97.6% from 2019 to 2020. The number of fatal crashes at that speed went from 42 to 83 in one year. For comparison, fatal crashes at 65 mph declined 36.4%.
A growing number of fatal crashes also involved pedestrians and bicyclists in 2020. Pedestrian-vehicle crashes increased 21% and bicycle-vehicle crashes rose 76.2%.
National data also shed light on a racial disparity in fatal crashes. Fatalities among Black people rose 23% from 2019 to 2020.
Again, Savolainen said there’s more to unpack from that data point in terms of geography and socioeconomics. For instance, the Detroit area saw the largest increase of fatal crashes in Michigan, with 24.6% more crash fatalities in one year.
Another factor is considering who was on the road.
“There’s the people who have the choice of whether or not to travel and some of those chose to basically ignore the stay-at-home orders,” Savolainen said. “Then there’s also those people that had to travel, the essential workers.”
Nationwide, 17% of frontline workers are Black, according to a Center for Economic and Policy Research report breaking down demographics on grocery store clerks, nurses, cleaners, warehouse workers, and bus drivers, among others.
“Just given the nature of their job, they had to travel more and so they’re accepting or being forced into a higher level of risk of crash involved right now,” Savolainen said.
More on MLive:
Westbound I-94 lane to be closed several days
Woman attempts to drive around oncoming train, dies in crash
Bicyclist dies after being dragged under utility trailer in Huron County
