Two Connecticut towns ranked toward the bottom of All State America's Best Drivers Report released on Monday.
New Haven had the 10th worst driving record ranking of 200 large cities nationwide "in terms of car collision frequency," two spots lower than New Haven's ranking in 2013, according to a news release. Bridgeport had the 16th worst ranking.
The average New Haven driver statistically will be involved in an automobile accident every 6.3 years, 59 percent more likely to get into a crash than the average American, according to the report. The report calculated Brideport's accident probability as a crash every 6.7 years for the average driver, 50 percent more than the national average.
“We don’t want drivers in Connecticut to be discouraged by their ranking. Instead, we want the report to challenge drivers in Connecticut to make positive changes to their driving,” Ed Bernier, a New Haven Allstate agent, said in a statement. “Our goal with this report is to make the cities that fall on the bottom of the list safer places to live and raise families.”
Other New England cities ranked low on the list, including Worchester, Massachusetts as the worst with an average of a crash every 4.3 years for the average driver, 134.8 percent more than the national average, and Boston as the second worst (4.4 years between accidents, 129.9 percent greater than the national average). Springfield, Massachusetts ranked fourth worst (5.4 years between accidents for the average driver, 85.6 percent more than the national average) and Providence ranked fifth worst (6.7 years between accidents for the average driver, 85.1 percent greater than the national average).
The report was established "to facilitate an ongoing dialogue on safe driving that saves lives," according to Allstate.
To reduce the chance of crashes in highly populated cities, Allstate recommends staying informed about events happening in the city that might affect traffic, getting directions in advance and pulling over if you need to look them up, leaving earlier so that you have plenty of time to get to your destination in the event of traffic or detours, and staying alert. As for cities that get a lot of rain, Allstate cautions drivers to keep a safe amount of distance between you and other cars and to keep up with necessary vehicle maintenance.
The data in Allstate's 2014 report includes new "data rankings and historical rankings from the past 10 years" displayed in an interactive map tool on the insurance company's website.
The full report is available on Allstate's website.
