ThatCarHitMe.com
An Injuria.ai Company
YEAR-OVER-YEAR CRASH REPORT · SOMERVILLE, MA · JANUARY 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/massachusetts/somerville/january-2025-report
Monthly Traffic Safety Analysis
44 CRASHES IN
SOMERVILLE, MA
JANUARY 2025
In January 2025, Somerville experienced 44 crashes, a decrease of 13.73% compared to the 51 crashes reported in January 2024. The most notable year-over-year shift was in hit-and-run incidents, which increased from 2 crashes in the prior period to 5 crashes in the current period.
44
▼ -13.7%was 51
Total Crash Events
0
Persons Killed
10
▼ -16.7%was 12
Persons Injured
5
▲ 150.0%was 2
Hit-and-Run Crashes
Note: "Persons Killed" (0) counts individual fatalities across all crash events. "Fatal" in the severity table below (0) counts crash events where at least one fatality occurred. A single crash can result in multiple fatalities. 1 crash with unreported severity is not shown in the severity breakdown.
Source: Massachusetts Crash Data (MassDOT CDV) · Arcgis_yearly Open Data · 2025-01-01 to 2025-01-31 · Aggregate counts from crash, person, and vehicle records
Trend Summary
Overall, crash activity in Somerville showed a downward trend year-over-year, with total crashes decreasing by 13.73% from 51 to 44. Total injuries also decreased by 16.67%, from 12 in January 2024 to 10 in January 2025, while fatalities remained at zero for both periods.
5
Hit-and-Run Crashes — January 2025
▲ 150.0% vs prior (2)
Hit-and-run crashes increased significantly year-over-year, from 2 incidents in January 2024 to 5 incidents in January 2025. This change represents an increase in the hit-and-run rate from 3.9% of all crashes to 11.4%, indicating an upward trend.
Vulnerable Road User Casualties
0
Pedestrians Killed
0
Motorists Killed
4
Pedestrians Injured
6
Motorists Injured
Source: Massachusetts Crash Data (MassDOT CDV) · Arcgis_yearly Open Data · 2025-01-01 to 2025-01-31 · Mode classified from person records (driver/passenger → motorist; pedestrian; bicyclist → cyclist; in-line skater / unspecified → other)
When Crashes Happen
The temporal pattern of crashes shifted significantly year-over-year. The peak day for crashes moved from Tuesday (12 crashes) in January 2024 to Friday (9 crashes) in January 2025, while the peak hour shifted from 11 AM (7 crashes) to 6 PM (4 crashes). Notably, Friday crashes increased from 3 to 9, while Tuesday crashes decreased from 12 to 6.
Source: Massachusetts Crash Data (MassDOT CDV) · Arcgis_yearly Open Data · 2025-01-01 to 2025-01-31 · Crash date field aggregated by weekday
Source: Massachusetts Crash Data (MassDOT CDV) · Arcgis_yearly Open Data · 2025-01-01 to 2025-01-31 · Crash time field aggregated by hour (0-23)
Crash Severity Breakdown
Fatalities remained at zero in both January 2024 and January 2025. Total injuries decreased from 12 to 10 year-over-year. While minor injury crashes remained at 5 in both periods, their share of total crashes increased from 9.8% to 11.4%, and possible injury crashes decreased from 6 to 3, with their share falling from 11.8% to 6.8%.
Outcome by Severity (Crash Events)
Source: Massachusetts Crash Data (MassDOT CDV) · Arcgis_yearly Open Data · 2025-01-01 to 2025-01-31 · KABCO injury classification scale
Severity Distribution (Crash Events)
Source: Massachusetts Crash Data (MassDOT CDV) · Arcgis_yearly Open Data · 2025-01-01 to 2025-01-31 · Most severe injury per crash record
Top Contributing Factors
The top contributing factor, 'No improper driving,' increased by 100% from 6 crashes in January 2024 to 12 crashes in January 2025, becoming the most frequent factor. 'Followed too closely' crashes decreased by 50%, from 10 to 5, moving from the top factor to the second most common. 'Driving too fast for conditions,' which accounted for 4 crashes in the prior period, was not among the top factors in the current period, with 'Exceeded authorized speed limit' accounting for 1 crash.
Officer-Reported Primary Contributing Cause
Source: Massachusetts Crash Data (MassDOT CDV) · Arcgis_yearly Open Data · 2025-01-01 to 2025-01-31 · Officer-reported primary contributory cause per crash
Road & Environmental Conditions
Crashes occurring in clear weather conditions increased from 22 in January 2024 to 33 in January 2025, while adverse weather crashes (rain, snow) decreased from 19 to 7. Crashes on dry road surfaces increased from 26 to 31, whereas crashes on wet road surfaces decreased from 14 to 7. Daylight crashes decreased from 29 to 24, and crashes in dark-lighted roadway decreased from 16 to 12.
Weather
Source: Massachusetts Crash Data (MassDOT CDV) · Arcgis_yearly Open Data · 2025-01-01 to 2025-01-31 · Weather condition at time of crash
Lighting
Source: Massachusetts Crash Data (MassDOT CDV) · Arcgis_yearly Open Data · 2025-01-01 to 2025-01-31 · Lighting condition field
Road Surface
Source: Massachusetts Crash Data (MassDOT CDV) · Arcgis_yearly Open Data · 2025-01-01 to 2025-01-31 · Road surface condition field
Vehicles & Demographics
The total number of vehicles involved in crashes decreased from 99 in January 2024 to 83 in January 2025. The top three vehicle makes—Toyota, Ford, and Honda—all saw decreases in their involvement counts. Among persons involved, the 16-20 age group saw a notable increase from 1 person to 7 persons, while the 26-34 age group decreased from 26 to 21 persons.
Top Vehicle Makes (83 vehicles)
Source: Massachusetts Crash Data (MassDOT CDV) · Arcgis_yearly Open Data · 2025-01-01 to 2025-01-31 · Vehicle unit records
14 persons with unknown or unrecorded age excluded from age chart.
Sex Distribution (89 persons with recorded sex)
Source: Massachusetts Crash Data (MassDOT CDV) · Arcgis_yearly Open Data · 2025-01-01 to 2025-01-31 · Person-level records linked to crash events
Speed Limit Zones
Crashes occurring in the 25 mph speed zone increased from 19 to 22 year-over-year. Conversely, crashes in the 20 mph zone decreased from 10 to 5, and crashes in the 35 mph zone decreased from 9 to 5. Crashes in the 55 mph zone also saw a significant decrease from 8 to 2, and no crashes were reported in the 65 mph zone in the current period, compared to 3 in the prior period.
Source: Massachusetts Crash Data (MassDOT CDV) · Arcgis_yearly Open Data · 2025-01-01 to 2025-01-31 · Posted speed limit at crash location
Data Sources & Methodology
Primary Data Source
All crash data in this report is sourced from Massachusetts Crash Data (MassDOT CDV), accessed programmatically via the Arcgis_yearly 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_yearly 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: 2025-01-01 through 2025-01-31
- Report generated: June 21, 2026
Data Coverage
- Reporting period: 2025-01-01 through 2025-01-31 (31 days)
- Geographic scope: SOMERVILLE, MA
- Total crash records analyzed: 44
- Total persons involved: 103
- Total vehicles involved: 83
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). "SOMERVILLE, MA Crash Intelligence Report: January 2025." Published June 21, 2026. Reporting period: 2025-01-01 to 2025-01-31. Data source: Massachusetts Crash Data (MassDOT CDV), Arcgis_yearly Open Data. Available at: https://thatcarhitme.com/crash-data/massachusetts/somerville/january-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: Massachusetts Crash Data (MassDOT CDV) · Arcgis_yearly
Period: 2025-01-01 – 2025-01-31
Generated: June 21, 2026 · All rights reserved