If you’re driving in rural areas, you may feel more relaxed. There’s far less traffic around you and fewer drivers to make mistakes. The road designs are simple. You don’t have to navigate nearly as many intersections as you do in urban settings, and roads tend to be wide open and easy to navigate. All of this may make you feel safe.
Statistically speaking, though, the rate of fatal accidents on rural roads is disproportionate to the amount of traffic. There are far fewer vehicles and drivers, and most Americans don’t live in rural areas. But these roads still lead to roughly half of all the fatal accidents every year, giving them an incredibly high accident rate. Why does this happen?
2 main things to consider
One reason for this is that the speed limits are generally higher in rural areas. For instance, consider a head-on collision. This is always a dangerous type of crash, but people are more likely to survive at 25 or 30 miles an hour in the city. The same accident at 60 or 65 miles an hour in a rural area could prove deadly.
Secondly, rural areas are farther from urban centers and high-caliber hospitals. People who have suffered major injuries often need quick treatment—sometimes needing emergency care to save their lives. If those injuries happen in a city, the hospital may only be minutes away. But if they happen in a more remote area, there could be a serious delay in medical care, and the injured party may pass away from their injuries as a result. In that sense, the accidents themselves could be identical, but the location makes a big difference.
