ThatCarHitMe.com
An Injuria.ai Company
YEAR-OVER-YEAR CRASH REPORT · CHICAGO, IL · OCTOBER 2024
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/october-2024-report
Monthly Traffic Safety Analysis
9,891 CRASHES IN
CHICAGO, IL
OCTOBER 2024
In October 2024, Chicago experienced 9,891 total crashes, a decrease of 2.05% compared to 10,098 crashes in October 2023. The most notable year-over-year shift was a substantial 35.29% reduction in total fatalities, from 17 in October 2023 to 11 in October 2024.
9,891
▼ -2.0%was 10,098
Total Crash Events
11
▼ -35.3%was 17
Persons Killed
2,371
▲ 1.4%was 2,338
Persons Injured
3,042
▼ -1.4%was 3,085
Hit-and-Run Crashes
Note: "Persons Killed" (11) counts individual fatalities across all crash events. "Fatal" in the severity table below (10) counts crash events where at least one fatality occurred. A single crash can result in multiple fatalities. 25 crashes with unreported severity are not shown in the severity breakdown.
Source: Chicago Traffic Crashes · Socrata Open Data · 2024-10-01 to 2024-10-31 · Aggregate counts from crash, person, and vehicle records
Trend Summary
Overall crash trends for October show a slight decrease in total incidents, with 9,891 crashes in 2024 compared to 10,098 in 2023, representing a 2.05% reduction. Fatalities saw a significant decline of 35.29%, dropping from 17 to 11. Conversely, total injuries increased slightly by 1.41%, from 2,338 to 2,371.
3,042
Hit-and-Run Crashes — October 2024
▼ -1.4% vs prior (3,085)
Hit-and-run crashes decreased slightly by 1.39% year-over-year, with 3,042 incidents in October 2024 compared to 3,085 in October 2023. Despite this decrease in raw count, the hit-and-run rate as a proportion of total crashes saw a minor increase from 30.6% in October 2023 to 30.8% in October 2024.
Vulnerable Road User Casualties
3
Pedestrians Killed
1
Cyclists Killed
7
Motorists Killed
0
Other Killed
303
Pedestrians Injured
214
Cyclists Injured
1,837
Motorists Injured
17
Other Injured
Source: Chicago Traffic Crashes · Socrata Open Data · 2024-10-01 to 2024-10-31 · Mode classified from person records (driver/passenger → motorist; pedestrian; bicyclist → cyclist; in-line skater / unspecified → other)
When Crashes Happen
The temporal distribution of crashes showed a shift in the peak day, moving from Tuesday in October 2023 (1,755 crashes) to Thursday in October 2024 (1,679 crashes). The peak crash hour remained consistent at 3 PM for both periods, though the count decreased from 881 crashes in 2023 to 830 crashes in 2024.
Source: Chicago Traffic Crashes · Socrata Open Data · 2024-10-01 to 2024-10-31 · Crash date field aggregated by weekday
Source: Chicago Traffic Crashes · Socrata Open Data · 2024-10-01 to 2024-10-31 · Crash time field aggregated by hour (0-23)
Crash Severity Breakdown
The fatal crash rate decreased from 0.16% in October 2023 to 0.1% in October 2024, corresponding to a 35.29% reduction in total fatalities from 17 to 11. While serious injury crashes decreased by 24.24% (from 165 to 125), minor injury crashes increased by 5.99% (from 902 to 956) and possible injury crashes increased by 7.49% (from 587 to 631).
Severity is per crash event (most severe injury). 10 fatal crash events resulted in 11 persons killed.
Outcome by Severity (Crash Events)
Source: Chicago Traffic Crashes · Socrata Open Data · 2024-10-01 to 2024-10-31 · KABCO injury classification scale
Severity Distribution
Source: Chicago Traffic Crashes · Socrata Open Data · 2024-10-01 to 2024-10-31 · Most severe injury per crash record
Top Contributing Factors
The top five contributing factors remained consistent year-over-year, with 'Failing to Yield Right-of-Way' and 'Following Too Closely' showing increases in counts by 5.82% (from 1,169 to 1,237) and 14.7% (from 796 to 913) respectively. Notably, crashes attributed to 'Weather' decreased significantly by 58.82% in count (from 85 to 35), while 'Under the Influence of Alcohol/Drugs' increased by 50% in count (from 28 to 42).
Officer-Reported Primary Contributing Cause
Source: Chicago Traffic Crashes · Socrata Open Data · 2024-10-01 to 2024-10-31 · Officer-reported primary contributory cause per crash
Road & Environmental Conditions
There was a notable shift in environmental conditions, with crashes occurring in 'CLEAR' weather increasing by 1,588 incidents (from 6,855 to 8,443), while crashes in 'RAIN' decreased by 1,188 incidents (from 1,682 to 494). Correspondingly, crashes on 'DRY' road surfaces increased by 1,555 (from 6,441 to 7,996), and those on 'WET' surfaces decreased by 1,589 (from 2,167 to 578).
Weather
Source: Chicago Traffic Crashes · Socrata Open Data · 2024-10-01 to 2024-10-31 · Weather condition at time of crash
Lighting
Source: Chicago Traffic Crashes · Socrata Open Data · 2024-10-01 to 2024-10-31 · Lighting condition field
Road Surface
Source: Chicago Traffic Crashes · Socrata Open Data · 2024-10-01 to 2024-10-31 · Road surface condition field
Vehicles & Demographics
The total number of persons involved in crashes slightly decreased from 22,319 in October 2023 to 21,911 in October 2024. The age group 35-44 saw an increase of 126 persons involved, while the 26-34 age group saw a decrease of 71 persons. Among vehicle makes, Toyota remained the most frequently involved, with a slight increase of 6 vehicles, while Chevrolet and Nissan saw decreases of 86 and 90 vehicles respectively.
Top Vehicle Makes (20,201 vehicles)
Source: Chicago Traffic Crashes · Socrata Open Data · 2024-10-01 to 2024-10-31 · Vehicle unit records
6,203 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 (21,551 persons with recorded sex)
Source: Chicago Traffic Crashes · Socrata Open Data · 2024-10-01 to 2024-10-31 · Person-level records linked to crash events
Speed Limit Zones
The 30 mph speed zone continued to account for the majority of crashes in both periods, with 7,431 crashes in October 2024, a decrease of 58 from 7,489 in October 2023. This zone also saw a reduction in fatal crashes from 11 to 10. Notably, the 40 mph speed zone experienced a significant decrease in fatal crashes, dropping from 3 fatalities in October 2023 to 0 in October 2024, despite a minor decrease of 4 crashes in this zone overall.
Fatal crashes by zone: 30 mph: 10 of 7,431 (0.135%)
Source: Chicago Traffic Crashes · Socrata Open Data · 2024-10-01 to 2024-10-31 · 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: 2024-10-01 through 2024-10-31
- Report generated: June 1, 2026
Data Coverage
- Reporting period: 2024-10-01 through 2024-10-31 (31 days)
- Geographic scope: Chicago, IL
- Total crash records analyzed: 9,891
- Total persons involved: 21,911
- Total vehicles involved: 20,201
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/october-2024-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: 2024-10-01 – 2024-10-31
Generated: June 1, 2026 · All rights reserved