Rural Roads a Deadly Scene for Georgia Auto Accidents
Auto accidents are not always going to be relegated to city streets. Although major metropolitan areas remain clogged with cars, higher death tolls tend to accumulate on rural roads. Multiple lanes, shoulders and medians are all a common sight on roads in major cities like Atlanta. However, they often fail to be a part of many rural roads throughout the state of Georgia.
Accidents on rural roads claim more lives than accidents in urban areas. A report from the Georgia Rural Health Association indicated that there is one death in every 74 accidents on rural Georgia roads. That is far greater than the one death per 339 accidents in metro Atlanta.
There are many reasons for that disparity. Crash risks are much greater on horizontal curves, which make up many rural roads in Georgia. Another problem on rural roads is that there is rarely a shoulder. In accidents where a car leaves the road, victims are much more likely to perish.
Rural roads also make for a high probability of angle wrecks. An angle wreck occurs when one vehicle makes a turn and another vehicle crashes into it from the side. Probability rates for fatalities in these types of crashes increase significantly in comparison to other kinds of collisions.
In more urbanized areas, problematic intersections can be improved by widening roads. Making rural roads wider just doesn’t seem to be possible. In 2012, the state of Georgia took preventative measures to decrease the number of crashes at a problem intersection in Colquitt County. According to the Georgia DOT, a right and left turning lane were added to SR 133 to improve the angle of the intersection.
Problems with auto accident deaths on rural roads are just not due to the composition of roads. There is also a lapse in safety practices by drivers in rural areas. In a study conducted by the Georgia Department of Health and the University of Georgia, approximately one third of teens in rural areas of Southeast Georgia wear seat belts.
Researchers compiled their data by observing teens driving out of twelve southeast Georgia high schools. The 50 to 60% of teens not buckled up was a statistic equivalent to Atlanta’s seat belt level use in 1964.
Single car crashes are not uncommon on rural roads, In those instances, vehicles can often go far off the road and out of the sight of passing drivers. That could delay response time, which could mean the difference between life or death.
Accident News is a safety and education initiative from Montlick & Associates, designed to help people better understand and thereby avoid common accident causes. To learn more about our injury prevention programs, including iridesafe.com - click here. We hope you are never in an accident, but if you or family member are injured, call Montlick & Associates 24/7 for your free consultation at 1-800-LAW-NEED (1-800-529-6333) or use our live chat at Montlick.com.
Sources:
http://www.dot.ga.gov/BuildSmart/ResearchDocuments/reports/RP9905.pdf
https://www.nhtsa.gov/sites/nhtsa.dot.gov/files/documents/ga_fy2016_annual_report.pdf
https://www.cdc.gov/motorvehiclesafety/seatbelts/facts.html