ThatCarHitMe.com
An Injuria.ai Company
YEAR-OVER-YEAR CRASH REPORT · CHICAGO, IL · APRIL 2025
Purpose: Machine-readable JSON endpoint for AI agents, LLMs, researchers, and programmatic consumers. Returns all underlying crash data and AI-generated commentary without HTML.
Authentication: None required. Public endpoint.
GET: https://thatcarhitme.com/api/crash-data/reports/data/illinois/chicago/april-2025-report
Monthly Traffic Safety Analysis
8,918 CRASHES IN
CHICAGO, IL
APRIL 2025
In April 2025, Chicago experienced 8,918 total crashes, a decrease of 3.63% from the 9,254 crashes recorded in April 2024. Despite the overall reduction in crashes, total fatalities significantly increased by 80%, rising from 5 in April 2024 to 9 in April 2025. This marks a critical shift in crash outcomes year-over-year.
8,918
▼ -3.6%was 9,254
Total Crash Events
9
▲ 80.0%was 5
Persons Killed
1,989
▼ -1.5%was 2,020
Persons Injured
2,652
▼ -5.5%was 2,807
Hit-and-Run Crashes
Note: "Persons Killed" (9) counts individual fatalities across all crash events. "Fatal" in the severity table below (9) counts crash events where at least one fatality occurred. A single crash can result in multiple fatalities. 26 crashes with unreported severity are not shown in the severity breakdown.
Source: Chicago Traffic Crashes · Socrata Open Data · 2025-04-01 to 2025-04-30 · Aggregate counts from crash, person, and vehicle records
Trend Summary
Overall, the total number of crashes in Chicago decreased year-over-year, falling by 336 incidents from 9,254 in April 2024 to 8,918 in April 2025. This represents a 3.63% reduction in total crashes, indicating a downward trend in crash frequency.
2,652
Hit-and-Run Crashes — April 2025
▼ -5.5% vs prior (2,807)
The number of hit-and-run crashes decreased by 155, from 2,807 in April 2024 to 2,652 in April 2025. The hit-and-run crash rate also saw a slight downward trend, decreasing by 0.6 percentage points from 30.3% to 29.7% of total crashes.
Vulnerable Road User Casualties
3
Pedestrians Killed
0
Cyclists Killed
6
Motorists Killed
0
Other Killed
201
Pedestrians Injured
120
Cyclists Injured
1,663
Motorists Injured
5
Other Injured
Source: Chicago Traffic Crashes · Socrata Open Data · 2025-04-01 to 2025-04-30 · Mode classified from person records (driver/passenger → motorist; pedestrian; bicyclist → cyclist; in-line skater / unspecified → other)
When Crashes Happen
The peak day for crashes shifted from Monday in April 2024 (1,556 crashes) to Wednesday in April 2025 (1,583 crashes), representing a 31.4% increase for Wednesdays. Conversely, crashes on Mondays saw a substantial decrease of 22.2%, dropping from 1,556 to 1,211. The peak hour for crashes remained consistent at 3 PM for both periods, with 798 crashes in April 2024 and 777 crashes in April 2025.
Source: Chicago Traffic Crashes · Socrata Open Data · 2025-04-01 to 2025-04-30 · Crash date field aggregated by weekday
Source: Chicago Traffic Crashes · Socrata Open Data · 2025-04-01 to 2025-04-30 · Crash time field aggregated by hour (0-23)
Crash Severity Breakdown
Fatal crashes increased from 5 in April 2024 to 9 in April 2025, an 80% rise in fatalities, though the fatal crash rate remained stable at 0.1% of total crashes. Minor injury crashes decreased by 100 incidents, from 803 to 703, with their share of total crashes falling from 8.7% to 7.9%. Conversely, possible injury crashes increased by 50 incidents, from 538 to 588, with their share rising from 5.8% to 6.6%.
Outcome by Severity (Crash Events)
Source: Chicago Traffic Crashes · Socrata Open Data · 2025-04-01 to 2025-04-30 · KABCO injury classification scale
Severity Distribution
Source: Chicago Traffic Crashes · Socrata Open Data · 2025-04-01 to 2025-04-30 · Most severe injury per crash record
Top Contributing Factors
The top contributing factor, 'FAILING TO YIELD RIGHT-OF-WAY,' decreased by 56 crashes, from 1,100 in April 2024 to 1,044 in April 2025, a 5.1% reduction. 'FOLLOWING TOO CLOSELY' also decreased by 48 crashes, from 866 to 818, a 5.5% reduction. However, 'IMPROPER OVERTAKING/PASSING' increased by 18 crashes, from 493 to 511, a 3.7% increase, and 'UNDER THE INFLUENCE OF ALCOHOL/DRUGS' increased by 9 crashes, from 35 to 44, a 25.7% increase.
Officer-Reported Primary Contributing Cause
Source: Chicago Traffic Crashes · Socrata Open Data · 2025-04-01 to 2025-04-30 · Officer-reported primary contributory cause per crash
Road & Environmental Conditions
Crashes occurring during rainy weather decreased significantly by 579 incidents, falling from 1,363 in April 2024 to 784 in April 2025, a 42.5% reduction. Correspondingly, crashes on wet road surfaces decreased by 685 incidents, from 1,691 to 1,006, a 40.5% decrease. Crashes in clear weather and on dry road surfaces both saw increases of 210 and 265 incidents, respectively, suggesting a shift away from adverse weather-related incidents.
Weather
Source: Chicago Traffic Crashes · Socrata Open Data · 2025-04-01 to 2025-04-30 · Weather condition at time of crash
Lighting
Source: Chicago Traffic Crashes · Socrata Open Data · 2025-04-01 to 2025-04-30 · Lighting condition field
Road Surface
Source: Chicago Traffic Crashes · Socrata Open Data · 2025-04-01 to 2025-04-30 · Road surface condition field
Vehicles & Demographics
The total number of vehicles involved in crashes decreased by 697, from 18,883 in April 2024 to 18,186 in April 2025. While the top five vehicle makes (Toyota, Chevrolet, Ford, Honda, Nissan) maintained their rankings, all showed a decrease in their counts of involved vehicles. Among persons involved, the 0-15 age group saw a 15.2% decrease in representation, falling from 710 to 602, while the 65+ age group increased by 3.6%, from 1,145 to 1,186.
Top Vehicle Makes (18,186 vehicles)
Source: Chicago Traffic Crashes · Socrata Open Data · 2025-04-01 to 2025-04-30 · Vehicle unit records
5,756 persons with unknown or unrecorded age excluded from age chart. Age=0 in Chicago records is a sentinel for unknown/unrecorded age (not infants) and is grouped with nulls.
Sex Distribution (19,334 persons with recorded sex)
Source: Chicago Traffic Crashes · Socrata Open Data · 2025-04-01 to 2025-04-30 · Person-level records linked to crash events
Speed Limit Zones
Crashes in the 30 mph speed limit zone decreased by 199 incidents, from 6,922 to 6,723, but fatal crashes in this zone increased from 4 to 6. This resulted in an increase in the fatal crash rate for 30 mph zones from 0.058% to 0.089%. Similarly, the 35 mph zone saw a decrease of 116 crashes (from 526 to 410) but an increase in fatal crashes from 1 to 2, raising its fatal rate from 0.19% to 0.488%.
Fatal crashes by zone: 30 mph: 6 of 6,723 (0.089%) · 35 mph: 2 of 410 (0.488%) · 45 mph: 1 of 51 (1.961%)
Source: Chicago Traffic Crashes · Socrata Open Data · 2025-04-01 to 2025-04-30 · Posted speed limit at crash location
Data Sources & Methodology
Primary Data Source
All crash data in this report is sourced from Chicago Traffic Crashes, accessed programmatically via the Socrata Open Data API (SODA). This dataset contains official police-reported motor vehicle traffic crash records maintained by the reporting jurisdiction's law enforcement agency. Records are published to the open data portal by the municipality and are subject to the portal's terms of use.
Data Retrieval
- Access method: Socrata Open Data API (SoQL queries)
- Data format: Structured JSON via REST API
- Record types queried: Crash events, person records, and vehicle unit records
- Date filter applied: 2025-04-01 through 2025-04-30
- Report generated: June 1, 2026
Data Coverage
- Reporting period: 2025-04-01 through 2025-04-30 (30 days)
- Geographic scope: Chicago, IL
- Total crash records analyzed: 8,918
- Total persons involved: 19,756
- Total vehicles involved: 18,186
Analytical Methodology
- Severity classification: Uses the KABCO injury scale (K=Fatal, A=Incapacitating injury, B=Non-incapacitating injury, C=Possible injury, O=No injury/property damage only), the standard classification in U.S. Model Minimum Uniform Crash Criteria (MMUCC). Severity is assigned per crash event based on the most severe injury in that crash. A single fatal crash (K) may involve multiple fatalities; therefore the "Persons Killed" count in the headline KPIs may differ from the "Fatal" crash count in the severity breakdown.
- Contributing factors: Reflect the officer-determined primary contributory cause recorded at the time of the crash report. These are preliminary determinations and may not reflect final investigation findings.
- Hit-and-run classification: Based on the hit-and-run indicator field in the official crash report, as determined by the responding officer at the scene.
- Temporal analysis: Day-of-week and hour-of-day distributions are computed from the crash date/time timestamp in each record.
- Demographics: Age and sex distributions are drawn from person-level records linked to each crash event. A single crash may involve multiple persons.
- Vehicle data: Make information is drawn from vehicle unit records linked to each crash event.
- AI commentary: Narrative sections are generated by Google Gemini (large language model) based on the structured data. Commentary is descriptive, not predictive, and should not be interpreted as expert opinion.
Limitations & Disclaimers
- Only crashes reported to and documented by law enforcement are included. Minor incidents, unreported crashes, and near-misses are not captured in this dataset.
- Data reflects conditions at the time of the initial police report and may be subject to subsequent corrections, reclassifications, or supplements by the reporting agency.
- Open data portal records may experience a publication lag - recently occurring crashes may not yet appear in the dataset at the time of report generation.
- AI-generated commentary is produced by a large language model and is intended to highlight patterns in the data. It does not constitute legal, medical, or professional analysis.
- Percentages are calculated from reported data and are subject to rounding.
Non-Affiliation Disclosure
This report is produced independently by ThatCarHitMe.com (Injuria.ai). It is not affiliated with, endorsed by, or produced in partnership with any law enforcement agency, municipal government, state department of transportation, or the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA). Data is sourced from publicly available government open data portals.
Data License
The underlying crash data is provided under the municipality's Open Data Terms of Use and is made available to the public for unrestricted use. This analysis and report is © 2026 Injuria.ai and may be cited with attribution using the suggested citation below.
Corrections & Feedback
If you believe any data in this report is inaccurate or have questions about our methodology, please contact: data@injuria.ai. We are committed to accuracy and will issue corrections promptly.
Suggested Citation
ThatCarHitMe.com (Injuria.ai). "Chicago, IL Crash Intelligence Report." Published June 1, 2026. Data source: Chicago Traffic Crashes, Socrata Open Data. Available at: https://thatcarhitme.com/crash-data/illinois/chicago/april-2025-report
About the Publisher
ThatCarHitMe.com is a crash data intelligence platform developed by Injuria.ai, a legal technology company specializing in traffic safety analytics. We aggregate and analyze publicly available government crash data to produce structured intelligence reports for communities, researchers, journalists, and legal professionals. Our reports combine programmatic data retrieval from official open data portals with AI-assisted narrative analysis.
Questions about this report's data or methodology: data@injuria.ai
ThatCarHitMe.com · An Injuria.ai Company
ThatCarHitMe.com
An Injuria.ai Company
Crash Data Intelligence
Data: Chicago Traffic Crashes · Socrata
Period: 2025-04-01 – 2025-04-30
Generated: June 1, 2026 · All rights reserved