Yearly Traffic Safety Analysis

3,423 CRASHES IN
IOWA, IA
2020

All metrics benchmarked against2019

In Scott County, total vehicle crashes decreased by 15.9% from 4,070 in 2019 to 3,423 in 2020. Despite this overall reduction in collisions, the most notable year-over-year shift was a significant 133.3% increase in fatalities, which rose from 9 to 21. The number of injuries also saw a decline, falling 17.8% from 1,291 to 1,061.

3,423

▼ -15.9%was 4,070

Total Crash Events

21

▲ 133.3%was 9

Persons Killed

1,061

▼ -17.8%was 1,291

Persons Injured

17

▲ 88.9%was 9

Fatal Crash Events

Note: "Persons Killed" (21) counts individual fatalities across all crash events. "Fatal" in the severity table below (17) counts crash events where at least one fatality occurred. A single crash can result in multiple fatalities.

Source: Iowa Crash Data · ArcGIS Open Data · 2020-01-01 to 2020-12-31 · Aggregate counts from crash, person, and vehicle records

Trend Summary

Traffic safety data for Scott County indicates a downward trend in the total volume of crashes and injuries year-over-year. Total crashes fell by 15.9%, from 4,070 to 3,423, and injuries decreased by 17.8%. However, this positive trend was countered by a sharp rise in crash fatalities, which more than doubled from 9 in 2019 to 21 in 2020.

Vulnerable Road User Casualties

3

Pedestrians Killed

Prior: 1↑200.0%

1

Cyclists Killed

Prior: 0→%

17

Motorists Killed

Prior: 8↑112.5%

0

Other Killed

Prior: 0→0.0%

23

Pedestrians Injured

Prior: 28↓-17.9%

22

Cyclists Injured

Prior: 22→0.0%

1,012

Motorists Injured

Prior: 1,240↓-18.4%

4

Other Injured

Prior: 1↑300.0%

Source: Iowa Crash Data · ArcGIS Open Data · 2020-01-01 to 2020-12-31 · Mode classified from person records (driver/passenger → motorist; pedestrian; bicyclist → cyclist; in-line skater / unspecified → other)

When Crashes Happen

The temporal patterns of crashes showed some consistency and some shifts between the two periods. Friday remained the peak day for crashes in both 2020 (557 crashes) and 2019 (691 crashes), though the total count on that day decreased. The afternoon commute continued to be the most frequent time for incidents, but the peak hour shifted slightly earlier from 4 PM in 2019 (337 crashes) to 3 PM in 2020 (300 crashes).

Source: Iowa Crash Data · ArcGIS Open Data · 2020-01-01 to 2020-12-31 · Crash date field aggregated by weekday

Source: Iowa Crash Data · ArcGIS Open Data · 2020-01-01 to 2020-12-31 · Crash time field aggregated by hour (0-23)

Crash Severity Breakdown

While total crashes declined, the severity of outcomes worsened in 2020. The number of fatal crashes increased from 9 to 17, and the fatal crash rate more than doubled from 0.2% to 0.5% of all crashes. The proportion of crashes involving serious injuries remained stable at 1.5% in both years. Conversely, the share of crashes resulting in no injuries saw a slight decrease from 71.4% in 2019 to 70.5% in 2020.

Severity is per crash event (most severe injury). 17 fatal crash events resulted in 21 persons killed.

Outcome by Severity (Crash Events)

Fatal17fatal crashes0.5%
↑88.9%prior 9
Serious Injury52serious injury crashes1.5%
↓-13.3%prior 60
Minor Injury272minor injury crashes7.9%
↓-12.3%prior 310
Possible Injury668possible injury crashes19.5%
↓-14.7%prior 783
No Injury2,414no injury crashes70.5%
↓-17.0%prior 2,908

Source: Iowa Crash Data · ArcGIS Open Data · 2020-01-01 to 2020-12-31 · KABCO injury classification scale

Severity Distribution (Crash Events)

Source: Iowa Crash Data · ArcGIS Open Data · 2020-01-01 to 2020-12-31 · Most severe injury per crash record

Top Contributing Factors

The primary contributing factors to crashes remained consistent year-over-year, though their counts decreased. "Followed too close" was the leading factor in both 2020 and 2019, with the number of incidents falling from 612 to 510. "Ran off road - left" was the second-most common factor, decreasing in count from 477 to 416. A significant reduction was observed in crashes attributed to "Driving too fast for conditions," which saw a 45% drop in count from 229 in 2019 to 126 in 2020.

Officer-Reported Primary Contributing Cause

Followed too close510 (14.9%)↓-16.7%prior 612
Ran off road - left416 (12.2%)↓-12.8%prior 477
Other (explain in narrative): Other187 (5.5%)↓-3.1%prior 193
FTYROW: Making left turn186 (5.4%)↓-29.0%prior 262
Ran Traffic Signal184 (5.4%)↓-16.0%prior 219
Animal170 (5%)↓-10.5%prior 190
FTYROW: From stop sign161 (4.7%)↓-6.9%prior 173
Other (explain in narrative): No improper action139 (4.1%)↑13.9%prior 122
Driving too fast for conditions126 (3.7%)↓-45.0%prior 229
Ran Stop Sign111 (3.2%)↑9.9%prior 101

Source: Iowa Crash Data · ArcGIS Open Data · 2020-01-01 to 2020-12-31 · Officer-reported primary contributory cause per crash

Road & Environmental Conditions

There was a notable shift in the conditions under which crashes occurred. The proportion of crashes on snowy or icy roads decreased significantly, from 10.9% of all crashes in 2019 to just 4.1% in 2020. Consequently, the share of crashes on dry roads increased from 70.0% to 78.0%. Regarding lighting, crashes during daylight hours decreased as a proportion of the total (from 68.4% to 64.7%), while crashes in darkness on lighted roadways increased proportionally from 18.9% to 21.7%.

Weather

Clear2,337 (71.3%)
↓-6.5%prior 2,500
Cloudy579 (17.7%)
↓-31.8%prior 849
Rain223 (6.8%)
↓-2.2%prior 228
Snow71 (2.2%)
↓-65.0%prior 203
Freezing rain/drizzle44 (1.3%)
↓-37.1%prior 70
Severe Winds11 (0.3%)
↓-8.3%prior 12
Blowing Snow6 (0.2%)
↓-82.9%prior 35
Sleet, hail3 (0.1%)
↓-40.0%prior 5
Fog, smoke, smog2 (0.1%)
↓-80.0%prior 10
Other (explain in narrative)1 (0.0%)

Source: Iowa Crash Data · ArcGIS Open Data · 2020-01-01 to 2020-12-31 · Weather condition at time of crash

Lighting

Daylight2,214 (67.4%)
↓-20.4%prior 2,783
Dark - roadway lighted743 (22.6%)
↓-3.5%prior 770
Dark - roadway not lighted208 (6.3%)
↓-16.5%prior 249
Dusk73 (2.2%)
↑2.8%prior 71
Dawn39 (1.2%)
↑2.6%prior 38
Dark - unknown roadway lighting6 (0.2%)
↑20.0%prior 5

Source: Iowa Crash Data · ArcGIS Open Data · 2020-01-01 to 2020-12-31 · Lighting condition field

Road Surface

Dry2,669 (81.4%)
↓-6.4%prior 2,851
Wet430 (13.1%)
↓-24.7%prior 571
Ice/frost75 (2.3%)
↓-60.3%prior 189
Snow67 (2.0%)
↓-73.8%prior 256
Slush21 (0.6%)
↓-47.5%prior 40
Gravel14 (0.4%)
↑180.0%prior 5
Other (explain in narrative)2 (0.1%)

Source: Iowa Crash Data · ArcGIS Open Data · 2020-01-01 to 2020-12-31 · Road surface condition field

Vehicles & Demographics

The top three vehicle makes involved in crashes—Ford, Chevrolet, and Toyota—retained their rankings in 2020, with each make seeing a lower count of involvements consistent with the overall crash reduction. The age demographics of persons in crashes shifted slightly; the share of individuals aged 65 and older decreased from 9.7% in 2019 to 7.7% in 2020. In contrast, the 16-20 age group saw its representation increase slightly from 10.7% to 11.3% of all persons involved.

Top Vehicle Makes (6,426 vehicles)

1
FORD1,132 (17.6%)
↓-14.2%prior 1,319
2
CHEV578 (9%)
↓-19.7%prior 720
3
CHEVROLET576 (9%)
↓-0.9%prior 581
4
NR313 (4.9%)
↓-12.3%prior 357
5
TOYT271 (4.2%)
↓-25.8%prior 365
6
HOND250 (3.9%)
↓-27.1%prior 343
7
JEEP231 (3.6%)
↑6.5%prior 217
8
GMC219 (3.4%)
↓-18.9%prior 270
9
HONDA201 (3.1%)
↓-13.0%prior 231
10
TOYOTA201 (3.1%)
↓-20.2%prior 252

Source: Iowa Crash Data · ArcGIS Open Data · 2020-01-01 to 2020-12-31 · Vehicle unit records

1,745 persons with unknown or unrecorded age excluded from age chart.

Sex Distribution (5,396 persons with recorded sex)

Male2,990 (55.4%)
↓-14.8%prior 3,509
Female2,406 (44.6%)
↓-20.5%prior 3,025

Source: Iowa Crash Data · ArcGIS Open Data · 2020-01-01 to 2020-12-31 · Person-level records linked to crash events

Data Sources & Methodology

Primary Data Source

All crash data in this report is sourced from Iowa Crash Data, accessed programmatically via the ArcGIS 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: ArcGIS 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: 2020-01-01 through 2020-12-31
  • Report generated: September 9, 2026

Data Coverage

  • Reporting period: 2020-01-01 through 2020-12-31 (366 days)
  • Geographic scope: iowa, IA
  • Total crash records analyzed: 3,423
  • Total persons involved: 8,412
  • Total vehicles involved: 6,426

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). "iowa, IA Crash Intelligence Report: 2020." Published September 9, 2026. Reporting period: 2020-01-01 to 2020-12-31. Data source: Iowa Crash Data, ArcGIS Open Data. Available at: https://thatcarhitme.com/crash-data/iowa/statewide/2020-annual-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

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