TAMPA, Fla. — If you live in Florida, you already know the Sunshine State is notorious for having dangerous roads and highways — Interstate 4 is continuously rated as one of the deadliest interstates in the country. But what about the drivers in Florida?
A new study from Forbes Advisor shows one Florida city cracks its Top Ten list for the worst drivers in the United States, and it's right here in the Tampa Bay region.
It's the home of "malfunction junction" — Tampa.
Forbes says the number of deadly car crashes has increased across the U.S. by as much as 10 percent between 2020 and 2022. Beyond the overall rise in fatalities, the study pinpoints where some cities have a higher percentage of "dangerous" drivers, "putting everyone at greater risk when they get behind the wheel."
The study reportedly compared the 50 most-populated U.S. cities across a serious of metrics in order to find where drivers are engaging in the "most hazardous behavior that threatens public safety." Those metrics included the following, per 100,000 city residents: the number of deadly car accidents, number of deadly crashes involving a drunk driver, deadly crashes involving distracted drivers, deadly car crashes involving speeding and the total number of people killed in the city. Find out more about the methodology here.
Worst drivers in Florida?
According to the Forbes study, Tampa is No. 10 on the list of cities with the worst drivers in the U.S. Of the Top 50 U.S. cities with the most dangerous drivers, only one other Florida city made the list — Jacksonville at No. 14.
What makes Tampa so dangerous for drivers? According to Forbes, distracted driving has contributed to a lot of deadly car crashes, causing Tampa to have the 14th highest number of fatalities involving distracted drivers in the country.
Beyond that, Tampa reported the eighth-highest total of deadly car crashes in the country. Additionally, the city ranks ninth for the number of people killed in crashes.
However, nine other cities ranked worse when it comes to dangerous drivers. Here's the Top 10:
- Albuquerque, New Mexico
- Memphis, Tennessee
- Detroit, Michigan
- Tucson, Arizona
- Kansas City, Missouri
- Dallas, Texas
- Louisville, Kentucky
- Phoenix, Arizona
- Fort Worth, Texas
- Tampa, Florida