Safety is a priority in our region’s transportation planning work, leading our staff to engage in an ongoing analysis of roadway crashes. For the five-year period between 2020 to 2024, there were 85,700 traffic crashes in the Knoxville TPO planning region, and 55,500 of those were in Knox County.

In order to improve safety outcomes on the Region’s roadways and significantly reduce the number of fatal and serious-injury crashes, the Knoxville Regional Transportation Planning Organization (TPO) adopted the Roadway Safety Action Plan in 2023. To help track progress toward that goal, the plan calls for improving crash data and transparency.

The data has long since been compiled statewide by the Tennessee Highway Safety Office (THSO) and the Tennessee Department of Transportation (TDOT), but it is now aggregated into a Traffic Crash Map dashboard that details all reported crashes in the region that is updated quarterly. The dashboard was created and is being maintained by our staff and includes all of Knox County and parts of Anderson, Blount, Loudon, Roane and Sevier Counties.

The tool is publicly available and allows users to review crash data dating back to 2015. Different selections can be made of the data to review crash severity, manner of first collision, mode of transportation (bicyclist, motor vehicle, or pedestrian), date, and geographic location. Alternatively, users can zoom in or out on the interactive map to look at a specific stretch of roadway or an intersection. In doing so, the total number of crashes, crash severity, and crash count by road update to reflect the specified location.

To provide information on individual crashes, each is indicated on the map by a colored dot which can be clicked for more details. Those include date and time, number of vehicles, contributing factors, and any injuries or fatalities.

The dashboard can be used for more specific analysis, like with the Pedestrian and Bicyclist Crash Facts Report our staff created to highlight the trends identified in those types of crashes. It details locations and contributing factors and presents possible intervention methods.

This information is also used for project evaluation in long-term and short-term transportation planning processes by TDOT, TPO, regional municipalities, and others. When prioritizing regional transportation projects, safety is one of the highest-weighted factors, and this tool makes it easier to identify and address crash hotspots to make our roads safer for all.