New data shows that Kentucky teen drivers have an abnormally high risk of being involved in fatal car crashes.

The Kentucky Transportation Center is working with researchers at the University of Kentucky to develop new driving strategies to make the road safer and protect teen drivers.

Just a recent report from the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration came out showing that Kentucky was abnormally high compared to other states in terms of teen driver crashes where the teen driver is involved.

So the fatal crashes.

And so we were really interested as to why we wanted to look at, teen Driver crashes across a five year period.

We were really interested in learning what crash risk factors were driving these crashes.

And what can we learn both from the driver level but also the environmental level?

So what we have seen so far, is that our teen drivers are not completely, different than other states in terms of their risk factors.

We still see that they have trouble driving at night.

They have a lot of risk in that first six month of licensure.

But what we have seen that has surprised us is that, the teen driver involved crashes, fatal crashes and serious crashes have uptick since the pandemic.

A lot of people were at home.

We saw vehicle miles traveled, decreased across the United States.

And so for a lot of teens, the exposure wasn't there.

They weren't able to drive with their parents and weren't able to practice as much.

They weren't traveling to and from school and for social activities.

The reality is that safe driving involves exposure.

You have to learn how to drive.

And so what we didn't want from this study to happen is to scare teens and their parents into thinking that they shouldn't, be learning how to drive, that they shouldn't be licensed, when it's time for them to be licensed.

I have a teen driver and a and another teen getting ready to start.

They make some mistakes that seasoned drivers don't make.

Things like speeding.

When when anyone goes off the road, it's a huge risk.

But, you know, those types of risk come after someone was speeding and distracted and, you know, passing improperly and things like that.

So, behavioral factors for sure, they factor into this.

But also, you know, narrow shoulders in rural areas, maybe, maybe higher speed corridors that you know, or everyone's going over the speed limit.

So we, you know, we look for patterns, both, you know, spatially and in terms of behavior and, and other things.

To try to figure out why crashes are happening like they are from there.

We want to use that data, though, to improve the education and training resources that we have here in Kentucky.

We've had a lot of conversations with our cabinet partners about how we can help improve the education and training resources that are available.

We don't have a universal driver's education program here in Kentucky anymore.

Many states don't.

And so we're looking to use the data from this study to help develop, low cost of, you know, if, if at all possible, free, education and training resources that meet the needs, for all parents and teens that they can use, with or without having to think through for profit options.

The team plans to provide improved training resources based on the data that was gathered.