Tag Archives: GM

Boston’s awful traffic might soon get better thanks to Google’s AI

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I live in Maine, which means that I often have to brave Boston traffic to do “big city stuff.” The Massachusetts metropolis’ age and dense population make it one of the most miserable places to drive in the country, worse than Los Angeles in many areas. The city is attempting to address the problem through a new partnership with Google’s Project Green Light, which leans on artificial intelligence to alter traffic light patterns in hopes of reducing congestion.

Boston’s chief of streets, Jascha Franklin-Hodge, told WCVB that the system “provides our traffic engineers with important data to tweak a signal by seconds, which can help reduce congestion along a corridor.” The city also said the tech should smooth stop-and-go traffic and cut emissions.

The partnership has so far been successful in limited early testing. Officials said, “At the intersections of Huntington Avenue and Opera Place, and at Armory Street and Green Street, stop-and-go traffic has been reduced by over 50%. Cities around the world that use Project Green Light have experienced a 10% average reduction in emissions.”

Boston consistently ranks among the worst cities in the U.S. for traffic. Earlier this year, CNBC noted that drivers lost an average of 42 hours sitting in traffic in 2023, so any improvement in commute times is a benefit everyone can get behind.

Google product manager Matheus Vervloet said, “Through Project Green Light, we are using AI to improve the lives of people in cities around the globe by reducing traffic and emissions. The success of Green Light is only possible thanks to the partnership we have with cities like Boston. We’re encouraged by the initial results we’ve seen in Boston and look forward to working closely with the city to scale this technology to more intersections.”

Project Green Light is still a new effort, with Seattle the only other U.S. city in its testing program. Google said that the project is live in over 70 intersections globally, impacting 30 million car rides every month. The company plans to expand to “hundreds of cities and tens of thousands of intersections in the next few years.”

New tech features can cause headaches for buyers

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New cars are packed with all sorts of tech and safety features, but more isn’t always better for buyers. J.D. Power’s 2024 U.S. Tech Experience Index Study found that the loads of features in new vehicles can be polarizing for owners, with some praising the tech and others saying it was frustrating.

The organization ranks vehicle features on a “problems per 100 vehicles” (PP100) scale. Owners reported 43.4 PP100 for gesture controls, with 21 percent of them saying that the feature lacks functionality, according to a new performance metric J.D. Power included in this year’s study. Other tech, such as the myriad of hands-free driving assistance systems, received low scores for usefulness, and more advanced versions of those systems didn’t fare much better in the study.

That said, some advanced driver assistance systems (ADAS) received favorable ratings. Owners like features like blind spot monitoring, which address a specific need while driving rather than introduce an innovation that they don’t understand.

Few owners responded positively when asked about passenger display screens, with many classifying the feature as “not necessary.” Automakers have pushed to include more screens in higher-end models, but only 10 percent of vehicles regularly have front passengers, and dealers have struggled to educate owners on how to use the displays.

Tesla, one of the most tech-forward automakers around, but it is experiencing growing pains as it expands beyond eager early adopters into more mainstream buyers. Some features in the company’s repertoire trended downward in this year’s study, with tech such as the direct driver monitoring system causing issues for owners.

J.D. Power collected responses from almost 82,000 owners of 2024 model-year vehicles within 90 days of their purchase. This year, the organization introduced a new return on investment analysis, which it will use to help automakers determine the best tech features for new vehicle models.

America’s EV charging network is growing but not fast enough

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In a report, the White House released new figures on the build-out of the nation’s EV charging network, a small positive development in what is typically a sore spot for EV adoption.

In its third quarter update, the Joint Office of Energy and Transportation revealed there are over 192,000 publicly available Level 2 or DC charging ports in the US, an increase of approximately 9,000 ports from Q2, though down from the 13,000 ports added in Q2.

The nation’s charging infrastructure includes mostly privately owned networks, though the government, through the National Electric Vehicle Infrastructure (NEVI) program, is funding this build-out as well as state initiatives to increase publicly owned chargers.

President Joe Biden has put tremendous political capital into the EV transformation of the US, and part of that is a $7.5 billion build-out of the nation’s EV charging infrastructure. Through the use of public and private funding, the White House is targeting 500,000 new chargers by the end of the decade via the NEVI program.

The Joint Office of Energy and Transportation said the size of the nation’s charging network has doubled since the start of the Biden-Harris administration.

In March, the White House took some heat when it revealed only seven publicly funded charging stations had been built with 38 ports available for charging since the program began in 2021. The White House countered that it took its time with the program to “get it right,” and that the build-out would speed up as 2024 progresses.

“Currently, there are 69 NEVI-funded public charging ports in operation across 17 stations in eight states, more than twice as many operational NEVI ports as last quarter. A total of 40 states have released at least their first round of solicitations,” said the Joint Office of Energy and Transportation in the Q3 report. “Of these states, 29 have issued conditional awards or put agreements in place for over 2,800 fast charging ports across more than 700 charging station locations.”

Experts believe the delay is also down to state and local governments, who, despite NEVI funding, have little to no experience building out charger infrastructure.

Nevertheless, the build-out and sheer increase in the number of publicly available chargers is crucial to the administration’s goal of electrifying the nation’s fleet of vehicles. The White House’s new vehicle emissions target, though less severe than originally planned, still requires more EVs on the road by 2030.

And a huge component of that is charging. A Yahoo Finance-Ipsos poll conducted in late 2023 found that the main reason Americans are holding back from buying an EV is a lack of charging stations or home charging, with 77% of respondents stating that concern.

“I’m often asked if there is a magic number for the number of public charging stations we need in the United States. That’s a very difficult question to answer since so much of having an adequate charging infrastructure is predicated on the number of EVs on the road, access to home charging, use cases, etc,” said Brent Gruber, executive director of J.D. Power’s EV practice, to Yahoo Finance. “Instead, I look at the number of charging ports in terms of how well they’re satisfying EV owners with their availability.”

Gruber notes that while the number of charging ports in the US is growing, satisfaction with the availability of chargers is mixed. J.D. Power’s latest survey found satisfaction with DC fast charging availability rose by 20 points year over year (from 673 to 693), though the much more prevalent and less powerful Level 2 charger availability fell (from 593 to 583).

“With the satisfaction levels for both categories being as low as they are, we’re certainly not yet at the level we need,” Gruber said.

John Bozzella, CEO of the Alliance for Automotive Innovation, an automotive trade group, doubled down on that sentiment earlier this year, noting the administration’s EV adoption plans are at stake.

“America’s EV transformation goes hand-in-hand with reliable EV charging infrastructure. You can’t have one without the other, he said. “Getting more Americans comfortable with going electric starts with making sure they’ve got access — no matter their ZIP code — to reliable and ubiquitous public charging.”

Pras Subramanian is a reporter for Yahoo Finance. You can follow him on Twitter and on Instagram.

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Free Parking: How to find free, low-cost and convenient parking near you

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If you live anywhere near an urban center, there’s a good chance that you will spend more time than you’d like looking for parking. Planners try to incorporate as many parking spaces as possible, but it’s rarely enough to handle the influx of commuters and everyday drivers that most cities endure. Waiting on a solution can take a lifetime, so it’s up to the market and technology to help frustrated citizens find parking.

Smartphone apps are the perfect answer to this problem because they enable on-the-go assessments of parking spots and can provide maps or directions on reaching them. Most people have a smartphone, so the barrier to entry is low, and many apps are incredibly cheap or even free. They don’t solve every problem, but a solid parking app can help you save time, money, and stress.

Parking apps typically compare prices for garages, lots, and other parking locations to help you find an open spot for a better price. Some allow in-app payments to speed through entry and exit, and you won’t have to keep track of a ticket through the process. That said, you’ll need to ensure the app you choose works in your city and with the particular garage you’re hoping to use. Most apps feature similar layouts and interfaces, but not all apps work in all places.

Apps and Websites to Find Free Parking Near You:

Before we get started, we should talk about apps that help locate free parking. Most of the tech solutions to parking woes focus on paid parking lots, because there’s money to be made, but few offer information on free spots. Parkopedia.com is a good place to start your research, as the site has amassed a database of thousands of free parking lots, including street parking and garages. Others, such as Spot Angels, focus on specific cities and neighborhoods to deliver free parking information. 

Parking Apps:

BestParking

If you’re looking for an app that works in dozens of cities and airports across the United States and Canada, BestParking is your jam. The app has been featured in several major publications and media outlets, including ABC, Fox, CBS, and NBC. It’s got great reviews and boasts 850,000 active users. Parking locations are sorted by price, so you can easily find the best deals around you. 

SpotHero

SpotHero promises discounts of up to 50% off the price you pay at the entry gate. The company is able to do this through partnerships with parking facilities. SpotHero gets to sell the last remaining parking spots for a steep discount, which could save you big on regular parking. The app works in most large cities.

ParkWhiz

ParkWhiz has thousands of parking partners across 35 states and 50 cities. The company purchased BestParking in 2015, expanding its empire, and it owns a business parking subsidiary that helps companies provide and manage parking for employees and customers. Sweetening the deal, ParkWhiz offers discounts of up to 60% in some cases, which bests the industry average.

ParkMe

ParkMe has more than 84,000 locations in over 64 countries, and its app offers an easy way to find, reserve, and pay for spots. If you have a stored credit card, you can pay to reserve a spot early, and the app can track parking spots up to two weeks in the future.

Parking Mate 

Parking Mate provides logs, so you can see where you’ve parked in the past, and the app tracks your time parked to help you avoid expensive tickets and tow bills. If you live in a place with wonky parking laws, Parking Mate enables you to track your parking time and will notify you when your time runs low to prevent towing. The app crowdsources local information, so if you see a spot or learn about a new parking rule, you can share that information in the app for other drivers. 

Study: These are the best states to own a car

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At a time when many people are feeling the crush of higher prices and stagnant wages, any ability to save money can be a lifeline. Owning a car is a significant expense of a substantial number of people, but it turns out that where you live can have a big impact on how much it costs to have a vehicle. National Business Capital recently released a list of the best states to own and operate a car in 2024, looking at prices, taxes, and other factors to calculate the costs.

The study found that people in western states face the highest car ownership costs, with stout gas prices and higher registration fees. Vermont topped the list as the best state in which to own a car, with low average annual insurance rates of $400 for minimal coverage, cheap used cars, and low sales tax rates. At the same time, Vermonters pay more in gas prices and registration fees than dozens of other states. The remaining top ten best states to own a vehicle include:

  1. Vermont
  2. Ohio
  3. Minnesota
  4. Delaware
  5. Pennsylvania
  6. Indiana
  7. Wisconsin
  8. Texas
  9. New Hampshire
  10. Mississippi

Those states had reasonable insurance rates and gas prices, and people there paid less in registration and use taxes. That said, the states at the other end of the spectrum pay exorbitant prices to own a car. Nevada was ranked as the worst, followed by California, Colorado, Illinois, and Washington. Those states have “more aggressive environmental policies,” according to the study, and higher fees for less “green” vehicles.

National Business Capital also looked at used car purchases. It found that used vehicles are cheaper in the Northeast and Midwest due to several factors, including lower car prices, plenty of choice, and the potential for rust from the harsh winter weather.

Utah lowers DUI BAC limit to 0.05; NHTSA says fatal crashes there drop 20%

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As National Public Radio reports, in 1983. Utah became the first state to lower its blood alcohol content (BAC) threshold for driving under the influence (DUI) from 0.10 to 0.08. The U.S. Congress didn’t mandate a 0.08 BAC until 17 years later, after all states had already done so thanks to lobbying by groups such as Mothers Against Drunk Driving (MADD), which had been formed in 1980. Utah has again led the way in lowering the BAC threshold, dropping the official limit for a DUI classification to 0.05 on December 30, 2018, the lowest of all 50 states. A New York Times piece out today looks at the National Highway Transport Safety Administration’s 2022 review of the effects of Utah’s change, called, “Evaluation of Utah’s .05 BAC Per Se Law.” According to the paper, fatal crashes fell 19.8% when comparing the full-year 2016 data to the full-year data for 2019. The NHTSA used 2016 because Utah’s governor signed the measure into law in 2017, although the law didn’t take effect for another 21 months.

A graph in the document shows fatal crashes falling in Utah starting in 2015, falling nationwide starting in 2016. Comparing the same years, 2016 vs 2019, the number of fatal crashes fell nationwide by 5.6%.  

Digging into the Utah-specific data, though, the NYT used unadjusted vehicle miles traveled (VMT) for the state. From the paper, “In 2019, despite increased vehicle miles traveled (VMT), Utah recorded 225 fatal crashes and 248 fatalities, which were lower than the 259 fatal crashes and 281 fatalities for 2016.” Using the adjusted VMT for Utah, the decline was actually 13%. And mind you, these aren’t alcohol-related fatal crashes, these are all crash-related fatalities in Utah.

Also, since 2019, crashes and fatalities have risen nationwide, including alcohol-related incidents, and including in Utah. Utah’s Department of Public Safety Highway Safety Office documents show 332 fatalities in the state in 2021, 319 in 2022, higher than the figures for 2016 and 2019. Opening the alcohol-related portal, state figures show 22 alcohol-related fatal fatalities in 2019 out of 932 alcohol-related crashes, this being the first full year of the lower BAC law, such a crash defined as “only those incidents where at least one of the drivers tested positive for alcohol and had a BAC of > .05 starting January 1, 2019; (> .08 prior).” In 2021, that number had risen to 56 out of 918 crashes, in 2022, the number was 61 out of 911 crashes, and for 2023, the number was 41 alcohol-related fatalities out of 814 alcohol-related crashes. 

The rising numbers have, of course, led to local outlets like The Salt Lake Tribune declaring in 2023, “The data all points in the same direction: The law hasn’t worked.” The Tribune piece believes the problem isn’t the law itself, it’s that the law “isn’t targeting the real problem — those who drink well beyond any legal limit and get behind the wheel.” Instead, more than 2,000 drivers with a BAC below 0.08 were arrested between 2020 and 2023, while arrests of drivers with a higher BAC reading fell 45% on average. The Tribune, and quite a few commenters at that piece and the NYT piece, aren’t arguing for a relaxed drunk driving rules, but are asking for laws that focus on aspects like repeat offenders and those with high BAC levels. 

5,000 miles, nine countries and an electric VW ID. Buzz, what could go wrong?

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Completing a 16-day, nine-country rally around the Baltic Sea is hard enough. Doing it in an all-electric car seems like, well, madness. Right? Well, that’s exactly what my husband and I did, tackling the 2024 Baltic Sea Circle Rally in a European-spec short wheelbase Volkswagen ID. Buzz Pro EV.

The Baltic Sea Circle Rally is the brainchild of Hamburg, Germany-based rally organization Superlative Adventure Club (SAC). Run since 2011, the Baltic Sea Circle Rally is part fun run and part competition, touring through backroads with no GPS and only paper maps, packed with a massive sense of adventure as teams camped along the way.

Each year, the Baltic Circle Sea Rally (both summer and winter iterations) asks teams to raise at least 500 euros (approximately $540 USD) for their favorite charity. We chose to support The Jessi Combs Foundation – the charity named in honor of the late racer and TV personality, which educates and supports young women seeking careers in automotive trades and similar fields. Along with several generous donors, we raised $3,239 USD (over 2,985 euros) for the nonprofit.

Unlike some competitions in North America, like the Alcan 5000 Rally, the Baltic Sea Circle Rally is an adventure rally where unique daily challenges and off-the-wall missions created an exciting journey around the Baltic Sea while basking in the midnight sun. There were 140 teams entered in this year’s Baltic Sea Circle Rally, with all but one team not from Europe or its nearby regions: us. My husband and I traveled from Oregon to Germany to compete. We were also the only team piloting an all-electric vehicle this year — an incredible feat given we needed to travel 5,000 miles through nine countries.

Where did the rally take us?

Some rallies, like time-speed-distance competitions, are based on precision and particular routes. But the Baltic Sea Circle Rally has a suggested course that’s noted in a thick spiral-bound roadbook. It can loosely be followed, as long as you cross the finish line. Or, as some teams did, you could massively deviate from the course or head home early if you chose.  

Teams started in northern Germany and worked their way through the eight of the nine countries that meet the Baltic Sea, plus Norway. Over the 16-day duration, June 22 through July 7, we drove a clockwise route through Germany, Denmark, Sweden, Norway, Finland, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania and Poland. Despite the name, we didn’t actually spend much time near the Baltic Sea.

That was especially true when we achieved one of our personal goals: drive to the northernmost point in all of Europe: Nordkapp, Norway, aka the North Cape. This special place beckons adventurers with its steep cliffs and iconic globe sculpture located at 71°10′21″N 25°47′04″E. Nordkapp is just 1,306 miles from the North Pole and is considered the mid-point of the Baltic Circle Sea Rally.

A big green box with a Ququq BusBox

Our 2024 Volkswagen ID. Buzz Pro arrived sporting a very cool Bay Leaf Green paint job with a matching Jade Green/Mistral two-tone interior. Unlike the minivan-like three-row ID. Buzz that will eventually come to the United States, this was the Euro-spec, short-wheelbase two-row model that’s basically an enormous hatchback with sliding doors. Emphasis on enormous. Besides its sheer capacity, it features several smartly designed areas for storage, including a clever floor-mounted center console with bins, drawers and cubbies that’s removable and reversible, making the most of the vehicle’s storage capabilities. It even includes a secret bottle opener.

Our ID. Buzz Pro van also featured a Ququq BusBox-4 camping system for sleeping, cooking, and storing gear — an extra installed for the rally. This unique interior camp unit is easy to set up in any ID. Buzz. Simply fold the rear seats down, secure the Ququq camp box in place, and voilà, the ID. Buzz turns into a camper van. The system works super-well; it’s well built, thoughtfully designed, sturdy and easy to use.

Volkswagen’s volts

This Euro-spec ID. Buzz has a single rear motor that generates 201 HP and 229 pound-feet of torque, which is the same output as the ID.4 Standard sold here in the United States, albeit with a bigger, 82-kilowatt battery. Considering the ID. Buzz is a bigger vehicle, it shouldn’t be surprising that it’s quite slow, hitting 62 mph (100 km/h) in 10.2 seconds.

As this was an earlier-built 2024 ID. Buzz, that 82-kWh battery was said to achieve 250 to 262 miles of range, but that’s on the uber-optimistic WLTP European testing cycle. Here’s what it actually managed.  After 36 charges and extensive statistical analysis, our ID. Buzz Pro netted a wide range of total kilometers after charging to 100%. On the high end, we actually surpassed that WLTP estimate. For instance, we charged in Molde, Norway, arriving with 57% and 272 kilometers (169 miles) of charge left. We had a lot of remote traveling coming up, so we decided to top off. After 38 minutes to reach 100% charge, we bumped our ID. Buzz up to an impressive 467 km (290 miles). We also managed two other charges that topped over 440 kilometers (273 miles). Conversely, we amassed a few charges that barely topped 200 miles when fully charging it.

Our VW ID. Buzz Pro was said to have a 30-minute charge time from 5% to 80% SOC (state of charge), if you used DC charging at 170kW, the max it would handle. This time frame seemed accurate compared to our figures.  

Most of the chargers in our nine-country jaunt were 150 kilowatt (a few were faster), though when we crossed from Finland into the Baltic nations of Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania, ultra-fast chargers were hard to come by. Most were 22 kW or lower, with occasional 50 kW units mixed in. We packed patience and left earlier each morning as other teams still slept so we could keep pace with the competition.

Volkswagen ID. Buzz impressions

“I was worried about whether or not we’d have enough range between charges,” my husband Andy said. This was his first long-distance endurance event in an all-electric vehicle. “There were so many unknowns having an EV in Europe; I worried we might run out of charge in the middle of nowhere.”

However, after finishing, Andy was confident in traveling longer distances with an EV, especially as we were driving one with a relatively modest range like the ID. Buzz.

Beyond its EV-ness, the ID. Buzz has great outward visibility and it was able to do everything we wanted to do in it, including sleeping, storing gear and cooking. The ID. Buzz never lacked a place to put gear, and remember, we had the smaller, two-row model. The one that’ll show up in the United States will be bigger, complete with a 91-kWh battery and a more powerful 282-hp motor from the updated ID.4. A dual-motor, all-wheel-drive variant good for 335 hp will be available.  It’ll also have an updated infotainment system and interior controls, unlike ours that was still blighted by what came in the original ID.4.

Charging challenges (and consequent wins)

Previous ralliers told us to cover at least 310 miles (500 km) a day to finish the rally in time. However, we pressed beyond and forged our way through 500 miles (800+ km) multiple days.

Most days we charged least three times, maintaining continual reserves in case broken chargers, missing machines, etc. delayed us. That was a good call, it happened multiple times.

Turns out charging an electric vehicle in Germany is rather difficult for Americans. We could not download German charging apps to our U.S.-based phones, nor could we pay with our American credit cards at German chargers as they inevitably required apps, special charging cards or RFID keys. Thankfully, we knew this in advance and enlisted my German nephew, Pual, to give us a hand. Not only did he procure a number of those special charging cards, he loaned us an old iPhone that would in fact work with the various German charging apps.

Once in Scandinavia, however, we were able to download charging apps and could use our phones to pay for charging. We also were able to use Tesla Superchargers.

The eastern side of the Baltic Sea brought new challenges. Once we crossed into Estonia, no app would work, including the new ones we loaded. Our initial research showed they should have, but that seemed to be incorrect. The Baltic nations’ Circle K chargers were apparently not the same as Scandinavia’s Circle Ks, and that app didn’t work, either. Even Tesla no longer worked in Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania, plus Poland.

We weren’t dead in the water, though. New QR codes and app download instructions on charge machines came to the rescue. Greenway is the largest charging system in Poland, and once we figured that out it became our go-do charging system until back in Germany.

All told, it was fascinatingly complicated to figure out how to pilot an all-electric vehicle through nine countries and 4,771 miles with European phones and credit cards. That’s an infrastructure, technology and banking issue, though. Once charging sessions were authorized, our 2024 ID. Buzz was seamless and trustworthy, giving us smooth charging experiences time after time.

There is also hope for the future. By 2027, new European EV chargers will be mandated to accept credit cards without needing charging accounts, with existing units being retrofitted. Only two of the 36 chargers we used had direct credit card capability.

Crossing the finish line

In short, we successfully completed the 16-day, nine-country international rally in our electric Volkswagen van. After crossing the finish line, we became the first duo that lived outside of the European Union or adjacent country to compete in and finish an SAC rally with an EV. We also proved an important point: Long-distance EV travel is possible. It takes planning, patience and flexibility, especially when things need to change, but what we accomplished is a whole lot harder than trying to travel 4,771 miles through nine American states. Our charging infrastructure still needs a ton of work, but at least you don’t need to borrow your nephew’s phone or download 13 different charging apps.

New Yorkers have the longest commutes in the country

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It doesn’t matter how much you love driving or how nice your car is, commuting often sucks. Nobody wants to spend hours of their life sitting in stop-and-go traffic on the way to work, only to have to do the same thing again eight or more hours later. Commuters in some states have it way worse than others, however, as this week’s Energy.gov Fact of the Week shows. New York drivers top the list for the longest commute time in the U.S. 

Drivers in New York, Maryland, and New Jersey had the longest commute times as reflected in data gathered in 2022, with New Yorkers averaging 33.2 minutes one way and the other two averaging more than half an hour.

Top 10 states with the longest commute times:

  1. New York
  2. Maryland
  3. New Jersey
  4. District of Columbia
  5. Massachusetts
  6. California
  7. Illinois
  8. Georgia
  9. Virginia
  10. Florida

These states beat the national average of 27 minutes, sometimes by a considerable margin, but remember that averages tend to favor the most prominent members of a given data set. States like New York, where one or two metro areas hold the vast majority of the population, tend to be a bit skewed because of the numbers coming from the major urban centers.

It’s also important to look further down on the list, as rural states like Maine and Indiana have longer commutes because of the extreme distances between places. Here in Maine, it’s easy to spend upwards of an hour commuting to Portland (our largest “city,” where all the jobs are), even when there is little to no traffic on the way.

On the opposite end of the spectrum, people in South and North Dakota spend the least amount of time commuting, and you can learn more about states with the best commute times here. Both average less than 18 minutes of commute time, followed closely by Wyoming, Montana, and Nebraska. It’s possible that in these areas, people live and work in the same small town, and the relatively low population density across the state makes it easy to get around, even in the busier areas.

Here is the full chart of findings, taken from U.S. Census data:

Average one-way commute time by state:

Best and worst states for distracted driving in 2024

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Distracted driving might make for entertaining dashcam videos on social media, but it has increasingly become a deadly problem on America’s roads. Bader Scott Injury Lawyers’ recent study found that distracted driving kills thousands of people each year, but some states see much higher numbers than others.

New Mexico was the worst state in the study, with a final score of 100, and almost 40% of its fatal crashes were caused by distracted driving. The ten worst states for distracted driving include:

  • New Mexico: 100 Final Score/39.7% fatalities caused by distracted driving
  • Kansas: 48.01/26.83%
  • Louisiana: 40.16/17.33%
  • Kentucky: 37.91/17.2%
  • New Jersey: 36.36/26.72%
  • Hawaii: 30.59/21.55%
  • Idaho: 25.97/16.28%
  • Texas: 22.48/11.23%
  • Wyoming: 21.01/8.96%
  • Washington: 18.8/13.23%

Bader Scott calculated its overall score by examining other factors, including total crash deaths, fatalities by distracted drivers, deaths per 100,000 residents, and distracted drivers per 100,000 licensed drivers. New Mexico took the “top” spot in a few categories, including distracted drivers per 100,000 licensed drivers.

Some states performed much better in the study, with one scoring a zero overall. Rhode Island ranked as the best state for distracted driving, earning the lowest overall score. The ten best states include:

  • Rhode Island: 0/0%
  • Connecticut: 3.42/2.23%
  • Alaska: 4.36/2.44%
  • Mississippi: 4.74/1.71%
  • Nevada: 4.97/2.64%
  • California: 5.65/3.34%
  • Minnesota: 5.9/4.05%
  • North Carolina: 5.99/3.01%
  • New Hampshire: 6.24/4.11%
  • Iowa: 6.27/3.85%

The law firm looked at data from the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA), the Federal Highway Administration (FHA), and Census Bureau Population figures. It’s important to note that while the distracted driving rankings apply to the 2024 calendar year, Bader Scott’s data from the NHTSA and FHA came from 2022. Overall scores were calculated based on three key indicators: distracted driving fatality percentage (30% weight), number of people killed per 100,000 residents by distracted drivers (35%), and the number of distracted drivers involved per 100,000 licensed drivers in fatal crashes (35%). Those weighted scores drove the final calculations, and states were ranked based on the overall number.

After crash that killed 6 teens, NTSB chief says people underestimate marijuana’s impact on drivers

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DETROIT — A horrific crash that killed six high school girls in Oklahoma two years ago has the head of the U.S. National Transportation Safety Board urging parents to warn teenagers about the risk of driving after using marijuana.

Chairwoman Jennifer Homendy made the appeal to parents Thursday as her agency released the final report on the March 22, 2022 collision between a tiny Chevrolet Spark hatchback and a gravel-hauling semi in the small town of Tishomingo.

The board, after an investigation by its staff, determined that the crash was caused by the 16-year-old driver slowing for an intersection, then accelerating through a stop sign because she likely was impaired by recent marijuana use and was distracted by having five teen passengers in the car, the NTSB report said.

In an interview, Homendy also said the cannabis problem isn’t limited to teens. As more states have legalized recreational marijuana, teens and adults tend to underestimate the risks of driving under its influence.

“There’s a perception that in states where it’s legal that it’s safe and legal to drive impaired on marijuana,” she said.

In its report on the crash, the NTSB cited studies showing that marijuana decreases motor coordination, slows reaction time and impairs judgment of time and distance, all critical functions for driving.

Currently it’s legal for people 21 and older to use marijuana recreationally in 24 states plus Washington, D.C., according to the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety. Oklahoma doesn’t allow recreational use, but like most states, it’s legal for medical purposes. Driving while impaired by marijuana is illegal in all states and Washington, D.C.

The NTSB, which investigates transportation-related crashes but has no regulatory power, put out a safety alert Thursday urging parents to talk to young drivers about how marijuana can impair driving, and how they can make responsible choices to avoid driving while impaired or riding with impaired drivers.

Homendy said states that have legalized marijuana are behind in making sure people know that it’s illegal to drive under its influence. Over half of Americans live in a state where recreational cannabis use is legal, she said.

“Unfortunately, I think state laws that are legalizing recreational and medicinal use of marijuana have really come before thoughts or action on what are they going to do about traffic safety,” Homendy said. “They are far ahead on legalizing it, but very behind when it comes to traffic safety.”

States, she said, need to collect more data on how legalizing marijuana has affected traffic safety, and they need to start enforcing laws against driving while impaired by cannabis.

“Enforcement has got to be there in order to deter,” she said.

One study on crashes in Washington state, which has legalized recreational marijuana use, showed that more drivers involved in fatal crashes tested positive for marijuana after it became legal, the NTSB said.

In Tishomingo, about 100 miles southeast of Oklahoma City, six high school girls got into the car designed to carry four for a lunch break, the NTSB report said.

At an intersection, the driver slowed to 1 mile per hour, but accelerated and didn’t come to a complete stop for a sign. Instead, she sped up and turned left in front of the gravel truck. The truck driver braked and steered to avoid the Spark, but hit the driver’s side at just under 50 mph (80 kilometers per hour). All six teens died of multiple blunt force injuries.

Tests on blood taken from the driver’s body found a THC concentration of 95.9 nanograms per milliliter, the NTSB said. If such a level of THC, the main chemical component of marijuana, were found in a living person, it would indicate “a high likelihood that the person had used cannabis very recently, and therefore was likely still experiencing acute impairing cannabis effects,” the report said.

But the NTSB cautioned that body-cavity blood samples can sometimes be contaminated by other body fluids or by THC from other tissues, including the lungs, that may contain high concentrations.

In addition, the Oklahoma Highway Patrol found vaping mouthpieces and cannabis buds in the car at the scene of the crash, the report said.

The NTSB recommended in the report that the Oklahoma State Department of Education develop a drug and alcohol abuse curriculum for local school districts that tells students about the risk of cannabis-impaired driving. At present, only Massachusetts and Rhode Island have such course requirements, the NTSB said.

The agency also wants the Governors Highway Safety Association, a group of state highway safety officers, the National Conference of State Legislatures and the National Association of State Boards of Education to inform members about the Tishomingo crash and the need for cannabis information in school and driver education coursework.

The safety association said in a statement that cannabis-impaired driving is a growing safety concern, and state highway safety offices are focused on eliminating all impaired driving.

“We have to start communicating well ahead of time, to kids, that driving, having ingested or smoked or inhaled marijuana is impairing, and it’s a risk to them and a risk to others,” Homendy said.