According to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, roadway fatalities have remained steady in 2022 after two years of alarming increases. Despite Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg’s concerns about a national crisis of traffic deaths, the trucking industry seems to have improved its safety measures.
An annual report by video safety and telematics provider Lytx reveals that there has been a significant decrease in collisions per mile traveled among fleets using their platform. In 2022, risky driving behavior was reduced by 29%, resulting in a 23.1% decrease in collisions per 1 million miles driven compared to 2019. This drop is significant, considering that 2019 was a baseline year, and 2022 driving behaviors were impacted by COVID-19.
Lytx’s EVP and GM, David Riordan, believes that the driving environment has changed, and fleets can leverage this data to analyze their performance within the new environment and make the necessary improvements.
“This last calendar year was really the first year that everybody got back to work. We heard from clients that the transition from pandemic-level roadways to almost back to normal has been a challenge. Driving during the pandemic, there were a lot fewer cars, the speeds were higher, and all of a sudden there got to be more cars, and so you had a lot more starts and stops and risky situations,” Riordan said. “Our fleets have been able to operate in those environments and actually improve their collision rates and improve their risky driving behavior.”
According to data, the 5 driving behaviors that have improved the most from 2021 to 2022 include drivers paying more attention to scanning the roadway, avoiding blank stares, and driving at appropriate speeds, with significant reductions in these risky habits ranging from 9% to 18%.
It’s clear that fleets are taking driver safety seriously, as implementation of technology and AI is credited with these improvements. In fact, driving too fast for conditions has seen a 52% reduction between 2022 and 2020, making it the top risky behavior improvement. See how these changes are positively impacting our roads and drivers.
“During that time window was the full-scale adoption of AI to better identify new risks and actually have in-the-cab interaction with drivers so they are aware of it and can take active measures, or actively make improvements themselves in the moment,” Riordan said. “Increase in AI is proactively encouraging folks to not be distracted on their cell, or to be attentive in their driving, wear their seatbelt, maintain a proper following distance, have proper speed – all of those proactive, in-the-cab alerts have really been adopted over the course of the last three years.”
Lytx’s cutting-edge technology empowers clients to reduce risks by seamlessly integrating coaching workflows, automated driver self-improvement, and state-of-the-art machine vision and AI-based in-cab alerting solutions.
“It’s just helpful context. If you can tell them things that are industry-wide benchmarks, they can then look at their specific performance in collisions and specific behaviors and use that to set targets and have a meaningful discussion internally about where they want to improve,” Riordan said.
Lytx documented over 14 million examples of risky driving across vehicle fleets last year. The consequences of risky driving can be severe, resulting in loss of life and damage to property. Shockingly, the National Safety Council reports that the death toll on American roads increased by almost 22% compared to pre-pandemic figures in 2019.
Furthermore, the NHTSA’s annual report states that there were 31,785 fatalities on American roads during the first nine months of 2022. This is despite an increase of 39 billion miles in vehicle travel during the same period.
“The environment and the statistics on fatalities are going the wrong direction, and yet commercial fleets are getting safer and having fewer accidents,” Riordan said. “I would say this data absolutely supports the fact that commercial drivers are safer and less a contributor to the increase in collisions … The percentage (of accidents) that are preventable are such that it just further supports the fact that the outside public is the main contributor to the trends.”
Below are some other interesting finds in the study:
Time of day impacts the likelihood of a collision
- In 2022, the highest total number of collisions occurred during the daytime hours (6 a.m. to 4 p.m.), with the majority occurring at 11 a.m.
• Alternatively, the highest collisions per vehicle (those on the road at each hour) occurred in the middle of the night (2 to 6 a.m.), with 2 a.m. the most likely time for a collision.
Day of the week impacts the likelihood of a collision
- In 2022, the highest collisions per vehicle occurred on Tuesday
• Saturday was the safest day of the week with the lowest collisions per vehicle. Sunday was second lowest.
Top five riskiest driving cities
- New York, NY
2. Philadelphia, PA
3. Los Angeles, CA
4. Chicago, IL
5. Dallas/Fort Worth, TX
Top five riskiest public roadways
- Michigan (I-94 at Merriman Road, Romulus)
– A complex airport interchange
- New York (George Washington Bridge near Riverside Drive, NY)
– The world’s busiest vehicular bridge
- California (Edom Hill Road and Varner Road, Desert Hot Springs)
– A lack of lane markings
- New Jersey (NJ19 and I-80 in Paterson)
– A complex interchange with highways terminating into city streets
- Connecticut (I-95 near Fulton Terrace, New Haven)
– A curved freeway entering the busy port of New Haven
In 2022, Lytx supported its clients in saving an impressive total of $1.4 billion in claims, including workers’ compensation and insurance claims. This was complemented by a huge saving of $402 million on vehicle maintenance. On top of that, Lytx played a significant role in helping clients to save an estimated $920 million on fuel costs, partly attributed to a commendable 16% reduction in idle times. The positive impact of this reduced idle time has prevented over 90 million tons of CO2 emissions and saved more than $24 million in wasted fuel.
Source: CCJDigital
