ThatCarHitMe.com
An Injuria.ai Company
YEAR-OVER-YEAR CRASH REPORT · CHICAGO, IL · JANUARY 2022
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/january-2022-report
Monthly Traffic Safety Analysis
8,195 CRASHES IN
CHICAGO, IL
JANUARY 2022
Total crashes in January 2022 were 8,195, a 15.88% increase from 7,072 crashes in January 2021. Fatalities increased by 33.33%, rising from 9 to 12 year-over-year. The most notable shift was the significant increase in overall crash volume and associated fatalities.
8,195
▲ 15.9%was 7,072
Total Crash Events
12
▲ 33.3%was 9
Persons Killed
1,415
▲ 4.3%was 1,357
Persons Injured
2,653
▲ 5.5%was 2,514
Hit-and-Run Crashes
Note: "Persons Killed" (12) counts individual fatalities across all crash events. "Fatal" in the severity table below (11) counts crash events where at least one fatality occurred. A single crash can result in multiple fatalities. 28 crashes with unreported severity are not shown in the severity breakdown.
Source: Chicago Traffic Crashes · Socrata Open Data · 2022-01-01 to 2022-01-31 · Aggregate counts from crash, person, and vehicle records
Trend Summary
Overall crash trends indicate a notable increase year-over-year, with total crashes rising by 15.88% from 7,072 to 8,195. This increase was accompanied by a 33.33% rise in total fatalities, from 9 to 12, and a 4.27% increase in total injuries, from 1,357 to 1,415. The data suggests an upward trend in crash incidents and their severity outcomes.
2,653
Hit-and-Run Crashes — January 2022
▲ 5.5% vs prior (2,514)
The number of hit-and-run crashes increased by 5.53%, from 2,514 in January 2021 to 2,653 in January 2022. Despite this increase in count, the overall hit-and-run crash rate decreased from 35.5% to 32.4% of total crashes. This suggests that while the absolute number of hit-and-run incidents rose, they constitute a smaller proportion of the higher total crash volume.
Vulnerable Road User Casualties
5
Pedestrians Killed
0
Cyclists Killed
7
Motorists Killed
164
Pedestrians Injured
21
Cyclists Injured
1,230
Motorists Injured
Source: Chicago Traffic Crashes · Socrata Open Data · 2022-01-01 to 2022-01-31 · 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 Friday in January 2021 (1,279 crashes) to Saturday in January 2022 (1,381 crashes). Similarly, the peak hour changed from 4 p.m. (524 crashes) in the prior period to 3 p.m. (668 crashes) in the current period. While Friday crashes decreased by 4.14% year-over-year, Monday saw the largest increase in crashes by day of week, rising by 59.40% from 830 to 1,323.
Source: Chicago Traffic Crashes · Socrata Open Data · 2022-01-01 to 2022-01-31 · Crash date field aggregated by weekday
Source: Chicago Traffic Crashes · Socrata Open Data · 2022-01-01 to 2022-01-31 · Crash time field aggregated by hour (0-23)
Crash Severity Breakdown
Fatal crashes increased by 22.22%, from 9 in January 2021 to 11 in January 2022, though the fatal crash rate remained stable at 0.13% of total crashes. Total injury crashes (severity A, B, C combined) increased by 5.74%, from 993 to 1,050. Serious injury crashes (severity A) decreased by 5.41% from 111 to 105, while possible injury crashes (severity C) increased by 29.48% from 268 to 347.
Severity is per crash event (most severe injury). 11 fatal crash events resulted in 12 persons killed.
Outcome by Severity (Crash Events)
Source: Chicago Traffic Crashes · Socrata Open Data · 2022-01-01 to 2022-01-31 · KABCO injury classification scale
Severity Distribution
Source: Chicago Traffic Crashes · Socrata Open Data · 2022-01-01 to 2022-01-31 · Most severe injury per crash record
Top Contributing Factors
Failing to Yield Right-of-Way remained the top contributing factor, increasing by 143 crashes (21.34%) from 670 to 813. Following Too Closely also saw a significant increase of 133 crashes (23.83%), rising from 558 to 691. Notably, crashes attributed to Disregarding Traffic Signals surged by 51.63%, from 153 to 232, while Under the Influence of Alcohol/Drugs factors decreased by 32.79%, from 61 to 41.
Officer-Reported Primary Contributing Cause
Source: Chicago Traffic Crashes · Socrata Open Data · 2022-01-01 to 2022-01-31 · Officer-reported primary contributory cause per crash
Road & Environmental Conditions
Crashes occurring in Clear weather conditions increased by 19.13% from 4,677 to 5,572, with their share of total crashes rising from 66.1% to 68.0%. Crashes on Ice road surfaces saw a substantial 504.9% increase, from 102 to 617, and their share of total crashes rose from 1.4% to 7.5%. Conversely, crashes during Rain decreased by 62.5% from 208 to 78.
Weather
Source: Chicago Traffic Crashes · Socrata Open Data · 2022-01-01 to 2022-01-31 · Weather condition at time of crash
Lighting
Source: Chicago Traffic Crashes · Socrata Open Data · 2022-01-01 to 2022-01-31 · Lighting condition field
Road Surface
Source: Chicago Traffic Crashes · Socrata Open Data · 2022-01-01 to 2022-01-31 · Road surface condition field
Vehicles & Demographics
The total number of vehicles involved in crashes increased by 15.26%, from 14,402 to 16,599. The count of Driver vehicles increased by 18.95% from 11,721 to 13,942, while Parked vehicles saw a slight decrease of 0.87% from 2,302 to 2,282. All age groups for persons involved in crashes showed an increase, with the 0-15 age group experiencing the largest percentage rise of 41.62%, from 334 to 473.
Top Vehicle Makes (16,599 vehicles)
Source: Chicago Traffic Crashes · Socrata Open Data · 2022-01-01 to 2022-01-31 · Vehicle unit records
5,270 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 (16,866 persons with recorded sex)
Source: Chicago Traffic Crashes · Socrata Open Data · 2022-01-01 to 2022-01-31 · Person-level records linked to crash events
Speed Limit Zones
The 30 mph speed zone continued to account for the highest number of crashes, increasing by 12.28% from 5,210 to 5,850, with its fatal crash rate remaining stable at 0.154%. Crashes in the 25 mph zone increased by 27.77%, from 479 to 612, though its fatal crash rate decreased from 0.209% to 0.163%. Notably, crashes in the 45 mph zone increased from 40 to 57, and saw a fatal crash rate of 1.754% in the current period compared to 0% in the prior period.
Fatal crashes by zone: 25 mph: 1 of 612 (0.163%) · 30 mph: 9 of 5,850 (0.154%) · 45 mph: 1 of 57 (1.754%)
Source: Chicago Traffic Crashes · Socrata Open Data · 2022-01-01 to 2022-01-31 · 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: 2022-01-01 through 2022-01-31
- Report generated: June 1, 2026
Data Coverage
- Reporting period: 2022-01-01 through 2022-01-31 (31 days)
- Geographic scope: Chicago, IL
- Total crash records analyzed: 8,195
- Total persons involved: 17,164
- Total vehicles involved: 16,599
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/january-2022-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: 2022-01-01 – 2022-01-31
Generated: June 1, 2026 · All rights reserved