Jessica Mathews / news@whmi.com


Once again in 2023, officials say Oakland County saw a substantially lower traffic-fatality rate on its roads than the state or nation as a whole or than any surrounding county.

County, state, and national fatality rates were recently released for 2023. For the year, Oakland County’s fatality rate was less than half of either the state or national rate. Officials say Oakland County has had the lowest, or among the lowest, traffic-fatality rate in the state nearly every year for the past several decades.

For 2023, Oakland County’s traffic-fatality rate was 0.46 deaths per 100 million miles of vehicle travel. For the year, the statewide rate was 1.15 fatalities per 100 million miles of vehicle travel and the national rate was 1.35.

RCOC Managing Director Dennis Kolar said “Safety is our number-one priority. While we are always striving to reduce the number of crashes on our roads, and even one fatality is too many, it is still encouraging to see that our roads remain very safe compared to others across the state and nation. That is the result of more than 40 years of using crash data as the number-one factor driving road project selection and design decisions. This has involved a lot of hard work and commitment to safety by everyone at RCOC, but that work has clearly paid off.”

A press release is attached.