Louisville's deadliest highways and corridors

Jefferson County records more traffic crashes than any other county in Kentucky, and it isn't close. In 2024, agencies across the county reported 25,417 collisions to Kentucky State Police, more than double the crash count in Fayette County (Lexington), the state's next-largest metro area.¹ Those crashes killed 113 people, down from 134 deaths in 2023, but still enough to make Jefferson County the deadliest single county on Kentucky's roads two years running.¹

Part of that is simple math: Louisville is Kentucky's largest city, and more cars on more miles of road mean more chances to crash. But crash data compiled by Kentucky State Police and the Kentucky Transportation Cabinet also point to a specific, recurring set of interstates, interchanges, and surface streets where Louisville's crashes cluster, year after year.

I-65 and the Watterson Expressway

Statewide, no interstate recorded more collisions in 2024 than I-65, with 2,868 crashes and 16 deaths.¹ A large share of that mileage runs through Jefferson County, including the stretch through downtown Louisville where I-65 merges with I-64 and I-71 at the Kennedy Interchange, known locally as Spaghetti Junction. A 1972 University of Kentucky Transportation Center study of the interchange called it "the most geometrically complicated" junction in the state and found merging traffic could collapse into gridlock during peak hours.² More than fifty years and two ramp redesigns later, the interchange still produces crashes serious enough to shut the interstate down. A semi truck caught fire and hung off I-65 near Jefferson Street in 2025, reviving longstanding safety concerns about the ramps there.³

I-264, the Watterson Expressway, sits entirely inside Jefferson County and recorded 1,428 collisions and 2 deaths in 2024.¹ The Kentuckiana Regional Planning and Development Agency (KIPDA) has identified the interchange where I-65 meets I-264 as the highest-crash interchange in its six-county region.⁴ Three ramps have to merge into two lanes in a short distance there, backing traffic up onto both interstates during peak hours.⁴ The Kentucky Transportation Cabinet opened a planning study on the interchange in 2019. As of the most recent state highway plan, only the planning phase has secured funding, and construction money still isn't in place.⁴

Broadway, Dixie Highway, and the High Injury Network

Away from the interstates, Louisville Metro Government and the Kentucky Transportation Cabinet mapped the city's most dangerous surface streets in a January 2024 report called the High Injury Network, built from 2018 to 2022 crash data.⁵ The findings were stark: 53 corridors make up just 5% of Jefferson County's non-interstate road miles, but account for 55% of the fatal and serious injury crashes on those roads, 1,213 crashes in the five years studied.⁵ Surface-road crashes killed more than 900 people in Louisville between 2016 and 2023 and seriously injured roughly 4,200 more.⁵

The single most dangerous stretch identified in that report is Broadway between 22nd Street and Baxter Avenue, a corridor with six or seven travel lanes and heavy pedestrian traffic that Vision Zero planners say invites speeding.⁶ Other corridors named to the network include Dixie Highway, Bardstown Road, Westport Road, Taylor Boulevard and New Cut Road, Second Street out to the Clark Memorial Bridge, and Hill Street through the Algonquin, Park Hill, and Park Duvalle neighborhoods.⁵ Seventeen of the 20 most dangerous stretches in Jefferson County are owned by the state, not the city, so fixing them requires Frankfort's cooperation and money.⁶

Preston Highway (KY 61) shows the pattern up close. A Kentucky Transportation Cabinet study of the seven miles between the Watterson Expressway and the Gene Snyder Freeway found the corridor averages 715 crashes a year, with 13 deaths and 33 serious injuries since 2021 alone, concentrated around Preston's intersections with Broadway, Eastern Parkway, and the Outer Loop.⁷ The danger isn't just historical. Over one week in December 2025, Preston Highway saw two fatal crashes eight miles apart: a pedestrian killed near Minor Lane on December 23, and a motorcyclist killed near Maple Spring Drive four days later.⁸

Dixie Highway carries a similar reputation in southwest Louisville. On the evening of May 25, 2026, a pickup truck struck another vehicle and then a group of five pedestrians waiting at a bus stop at Dixie Highway and Rockford Lane in Shively. One woman died at the scene; a second died two days later. A third remains hospitalized in critical condition. The driver, whom Shively Police say was intoxicated, faces murder and DUI charges.⁹

What Kentucky is doing about it

Statewide, the trend is improving even as Louisville's crash count stays high. Kentucky State Police and the Kentucky Transportation Center's 2024 Traffic Collision Facts report counted 707 traffic deaths statewide in 2024, down from 814 in 2023 and the lowest total in a decade.¹ Of those 707 deaths, 47% of vehicle occupants weren't wearing a seatbelt, 33% involved speeding or aggressive driving, and 19% involved alcohol.¹⁰ Jefferson County's own numbers moved the same direction, 113 deaths in 2024 versus 134 the year before, even as total collisions ticked up slightly.¹

Vision Zero Louisville, the joint city-state initiative behind the High Injury Network, has set a goal of zero roadway deaths by 2050 and is using the network to prioritize projects.⁵ The Preston Highway plan, finished in 2025, calls for rebuilding the road itself, narrowing lanes and adding other physical features meant to slow traffic instead of relying only on posted speed limits.⁷ A separate conceptual plan would rebuild Broadway from Shawnee Park to Baxter Avenue with fewer travel lanes and room for bus rapid transit.⁶ Progress is slow. The I-65/I-264 interchange study has been sitting on the state's books since 2019, still without construction funding.⁴

If you've been hurt in a crash on one of these corridors, an attorney who handles Kentucky traffic cases can help you deal with insurance claims and medical bills while you recover. You can find one through the legal directory.

This is general information, not legal advice.

Sources

1. Kentucky State Police and Kentucky Transportation Center, "Kentucky Traffic Collision Facts 2024" (Report KTC-26-06, first published September 29, 2025), https://wp.kentuckystatepolice.ky.gov/wp-content/uploads/2025/10/2024-FY2025-Crash-Facts.pdf

2. Jerry G. Pigman, William M. Seymour, Kenneth R. Agent, and Don L. Cornette, "An Operational Analysis of the I 64, I 65, I 71 Route Junction in Louisville," Kentucky Transportation Center Research Report, April 1972, https://uknowledge.uky.edu/ktc_researchreports/910

3. WDRB, "Fiery semi crash on I-65 in Louisville reignites safety concerns for accident hotspot," https://www.wdrb.com/news/fiery-semi-crash-on-i-65-in-louisville-reignites-safety-concerns-for-accident-hotspot/article_7ff8f536-8bf3-4b9e-9d0b-d8cbc71239f9.html

4. Kentucky Transportation Cabinet, "I-65/I-264 Interchange Planning Study," https://transportation.ky.gov/DistrictFive/Pages/I-65_I-264_Interchange_Planning_Study.aspx

5. Louisville Metro Government, "High Injury Network," Vision Zero Louisville, https://louisvilleky.gov/government/vision-zero-louisville/high-injury-network

6. WDRB, "New study ranks the 53 most dangerous stretches of roadway in Louisville," https://www.wdrb.com/news/new-study-ranks-the-53-most-dangerous-stretches-of-roadway-in-louisville/article_bd412078-dbec-11ee-86f7-d36511b1f84a.html

7. WDRB, "Public meeting Tuesday will gather feedback for major improvements to Preston Highway in south Louisville," https://www.wdrb.com/news/public-meeting-tuesday-will-gather-feedback-for-major-improvements-to-preston-highway-in-south-louisville/article_06e38390-16d2-11ef-9960-c3482867963d.html; Kentucky Transportation Cabinet, "Jefferson County - KY 61 Preston Highway Planning Study 5-80205," https://transportation.ky.gov/DistrictFive/Pages/Jefferson-County---KY-61-Preston-Highway-Planning-Study-5-80205.aspx

8. WDRB, "2 deadly crashes on Louisville's Preston Highway spark calls for improved safety measures," https://www.wdrb.com/news/2-deadly-crashes-on-louisvilles-preston-highway-spark-calls-for-improved-safety-measures/article_c45d9f3b-9550-4578-8bb7-4ced8dfee1d4.html

9. WAVE3, "One dead, multiple injuries after crash at Dixie Highway and Rockford Lane, driver charged with DUI and Murder," https://www.wave3.com/2026/05/26/one-dead-multiple-injuries-after-crash-dixie-highway-rockford-lane-driver-charged-with-dui-murder/

10. Kentucky Transportation Cabinet, "Decline in Highway Fatalities in 2024" (press release, May 8, 2025), https://transportation.ky.gov/NewsRoom/Decline%20in%20Highway%20Fatalities%20in%202024.pdf