ThatCarHitMe.com
An Injuria.ai Company
YEAR-OVER-YEAR CRASH REPORT · CHICAGO, IL · NOVEMBER 2017
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/november-2017-report
Monthly Traffic Safety Analysis
9,515 CRASHES IN
CHICAGO, IL
NOVEMBER 2017
Chicago experienced a significant surge in traffic incidents, with total crashes more than doubling from 4720 in November 2016 to 9515 in November 2017, representing a 101.6% increase. This substantial rise in crash volume was accompanied by a thirteen-fold increase in fatalities, from 1 in the prior period to 13 in the current period, marking the most notable year-over-year shift.
9,515
▲ 101.6%was 4,720
Total Crash Events
13
▲ 1200.0%was 1
Persons Killed
1,797
▲ 352.6%was 397
Persons Injured
2,446
▲ 95.2%was 1,253
Hit-and-Run Crashes
Note: "Persons Killed" (13) counts individual fatalities across all crash events. "Fatal" in the severity table below (12) counts crash events where at least one fatality occurred. A single crash can result in multiple fatalities. 19 crashes with unreported severity are not shown in the severity breakdown.
Source: Chicago Traffic Crashes · Socrata Open Data · 2017-11-01 to 2017-11-30 · Aggregate counts from crash, person, and vehicle records
Trend Summary
The overall trend indicates a substantial increase in traffic safety incidents year-over-year. Total crashes rose from 4720 in November 2016 to 9515 in November 2017, marking a 101.6% increase. Concurrently, total fatalities saw a significant jump from 1 to 13 during the same period, highlighting a worsening safety trend.
2,446
Hit-and-Run Crashes — November 2017
▲ 95.2% vs prior (1,253)
The number of hit-and-run crashes increased by 95.2% year-over-year, rising from 1253 in November 2016 to 2446 in November 2017. Despite this increase in raw numbers, the hit-and-run rate as a proportion of total crashes slightly decreased from 26.5% in the prior period to 25.7% in the current period.
Vulnerable Road User Casualties
2
Pedestrians Killed
1
Cyclists Killed
10
Motorists Killed
0
Other Killed
252
Pedestrians Injured
83
Cyclists Injured
1,460
Motorists Injured
2
Other Injured
Source: Chicago Traffic Crashes · Socrata Open Data · 2017-11-01 to 2017-11-30 · Mode classified from person records (driver/passenger → motorist; pedestrian; bicyclist → cyclist; in-line skater / unspecified → other)
When Crashes Happen
Temporal patterns remained consistent year-over-year, with Wednesday identified as the peak day for crashes in both November 2016 (938 crashes) and November 2017 (1676 crashes). The peak hour for crashes also remained unchanged at 5 PM, with 414 crashes in November 2016 and 754 crashes in November 2017. Both the peak day and peak hour saw a substantial increase in crash counts, reflecting the overall rise in incidents.
Source: Chicago Traffic Crashes · Socrata Open Data · 2017-11-01 to 2017-11-30 · Crash date field aggregated by weekday
Source: Chicago Traffic Crashes · Socrata Open Data · 2017-11-01 to 2017-11-30 · Crash time field aggregated by hour (0-23)
Crash Severity Breakdown
The severity distribution of crashes shifted significantly, with a notable increase in fatal and injury-related incidents. The fatal crash rate increased from 0.02% in November 2016 to 0.13% in November 2017, while total fatalities rose from 1 to 13. Crashes resulting in serious injuries (code A) increased from 27 (0.6% of total) to 165 (1.7% of total), and minor injuries (code B) from 154 (3.3% of total) to 689 (7.2% of total).
Severity is per crash event (most severe injury). 12 fatal crash events resulted in 13 persons killed.
Outcome by Severity (Crash Events)
Source: Chicago Traffic Crashes · Socrata Open Data · 2017-11-01 to 2017-11-30 · KABCO injury classification scale
Severity Distribution
Source: Chicago Traffic Crashes · Socrata Open Data · 2017-11-01 to 2017-11-30 · Most severe injury per crash record
Top Contributing Factors
The top contributing factors remained consistent between periods, but their counts increased significantly. 'FAILING TO YIELD RIGHT-OF-WAY' saw a 178.7% increase in count, rising from 441 crashes to 1229, becoming the most frequent factor in the current period. 'FOLLOWING TOO CLOSELY' increased by 90.1% in count, from 598 crashes to 1137, while 'IMPROPER OVERTAKING/PASSING' rose by 73.7% in count, from 251 to 436 crashes. The rankings of these top factors shifted, with 'FAILING TO YIELD RIGHT-OF-WAY' moving from second to first most common factor.
Officer-Reported Primary Contributing Cause
Source: Chicago Traffic Crashes · Socrata Open Data · 2017-11-01 to 2017-11-30 · Officer-reported primary contributory cause per crash
Road & Environmental Conditions
Crashes under various conditions increased, with a notable shift in the proportion of adverse weather and road surface incidents. Crashes in clear weather increased by 78.7% (from 3793 to 6778), but their share of total crashes decreased from 80.4% to 71.2%. Conversely, crashes in rainy conditions saw a 175.7% increase (from 606 to 1671), and their share rose from 12.8% to 17.6%. Similarly, wet road surface crashes increased by 202.7% (from 714 to 2161), with their share of total crashes increasing from 15.1% to 22.7%.
Weather
Source: Chicago Traffic Crashes · Socrata Open Data · 2017-11-01 to 2017-11-30 · Weather condition at time of crash
Lighting
Source: Chicago Traffic Crashes · Socrata Open Data · 2017-11-01 to 2017-11-30 · Lighting condition field
Road Surface
Source: Chicago Traffic Crashes · Socrata Open Data · 2017-11-01 to 2017-11-30 · Road surface condition field
Vehicles & Demographics
The total number of vehicles involved in crashes nearly doubled, increasing from 9543 in November 2016 to 19395 in November 2017. Toyota became the most frequently involved vehicle make in the current period with 2247 incidents, an increase of 100.9% from 1118 in the prior period, surpassing Chevrolet which had 2152 incidents, a 90.6% increase from 1129. All top vehicle makes experienced substantial increases in their crash involvement counts.
Top Vehicle Makes (19,395 vehicles)
Source: Chicago Traffic Crashes · Socrata Open Data · 2017-11-01 to 2017-11-30 · Vehicle unit records
5,846 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 (20,868 persons with recorded sex)
Source: Chicago Traffic Crashes · Socrata Open Data · 2017-11-01 to 2017-11-30 · Person-level records linked to crash events
Speed Limit Zones
Crashes across various speed zones saw significant increases, particularly in zones with higher speed limits. Crashes in 30 mph zones increased from 3653 to 6995, a 91.5% increase, and accounted for 8 fatalities in the current period compared to 0 in the prior period. The 35 mph zone saw 732 crashes and 3 fatalities in the current period, up from 228 crashes and 0 fatalities in the prior period. This represents a shift in fatality distribution, with higher speed zones experiencing increased fatal outcomes.
Fatal crashes by zone: 25 mph: 1 of 615 (0.163%) · 30 mph: 8 of 6,995 (0.114%) · 35 mph: 3 of 732 (0.41%)
Source: Chicago Traffic Crashes · Socrata Open Data · 2017-11-01 to 2017-11-30 · 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: 2017-11-01 through 2017-11-30
- Report generated: June 1, 2026
Data Coverage
- Reporting period: 2017-11-01 through 2017-11-30 (30 days)
- Geographic scope: Chicago, IL
- Total crash records analyzed: 9,515
- Total persons involved: 21,137
- Total vehicles involved: 19,395
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/november-2017-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: 2017-11-01 – 2017-11-30
Generated: June 1, 2026 · All rights reserved