Car Accidents in Philadelphia: 2023 Data and How a Claim Works

NHTSA's Fatality Analysis Reporting System records every fatal crash on public roads. For 2023, crashes coded to Philadelphia account for 135 deaths in 128 fatal crashes, tenth nationally and the most in Pennsylvania by a wide margin. Philadelphia is both a city and a county, so the figure covers the whole county.

The pattern is pedestrians and intersections. Sixty-eight of 128 fatal crashes, 53 percent, involved at least one person not in a vehicle, a share matched only by Los Angeles, Albuquerque and Austin among the top 25 cities. Sixty-five, 51 percent, were intersection-related, a share matched only by Milwaukee and Tucson. The most common first harmful event, 99 crashes, was something other than hitting another moving vehicle, which in Philadelphia overwhelmingly means a pedestrian.

Darkness was a factor in 86 of 128 fatal crashes, 67 percent. Angle collisions, 18, were the leading two-vehicle type. Forty-two were on a weekend, a low share. FARS counts fatal crashes only; injury crashes in Philadelphia, reported through PennDOT, number in the tens of thousands per year.

FARS roadway coding identifies where fatal crashes concentrated in 2023. Three arterials account for nearly a fifth of the city's fatal crashes.

• Roosevelt Boulevard (US-1): 9 fatal crashes on the twelve-lane arterial through the Northeast, long ranked among the most dangerous roads in the country.
• Lehigh Avenue: 8 fatal crashes across North Philadelphia.
• Broad Street (SR-611): 7 fatal crashes on the city's main north-south street.
• Frankford Avenue: 3 fatal crashes.
• I-95 (Delaware Expressway): 2 fatal crashes.
• Buist Avenue: 2 fatal crashes in Southwest Philadelphia.

Pennsylvania lets drivers choose, when they buy a policy, between full tort and limited tort. Limited tort is cheaper and most Pennsylvania drivers choose it. The price is that a limited tort driver, and the household members covered by the policy, cannot claim pain and suffering from an at-fault driver unless the injury is serious, which Pennsylvania law defines as death, serious impairment of body function, or permanent serious disfigurement. Economic losses, medical bills above your own coverage and lost wages, can be claimed regardless.

The election follows the person, not the crash. A pedestrian struck on Roosevelt Boulevard who has a limited tort auto policy at home is a limited tort claimant. A passenger in a friend's car is bound by their own household's election. People who do not own a car and are not covered by a household policy are generally treated as full tort. The exceptions matter too: if the at-fault driver was drunk, uninsured, or driving a vehicle registered out of state, a limited tort claimant is treated as full tort.

Because limited tort is so common in Philadelphia, the first question in any claim is which election applies and whether the injury meets the serious injury threshold. A fracture with surgery and a documented effect on daily life usually does; a strain that resolves usually does not. The threshold is argued in nearly every limited tort claim, and the medical evidence of lasting impairment is what decides it.

Suppose you were crossing Roosevelt Boulevard at a signalized crosswalk at night when a driver turning from a side street struck you. You suffered a fractured tibia requiring surgery and a concussion, with $82,000 in medical bills and five months off work. You own a car and chose limited tort on your policy to save on premiums.

Your own policy's medical benefits coverage, the $5,000 minimum that Pennsylvania requires, paid the first bills, and your health insurance paid the rest with a lien on any recovery. Your economic losses above those payments were claimable from the driver regardless of your election. For pain and suffering, the limited tort threshold applied: a fractured tibia requiring surgery, with months of impaired walking and work, is the kind of injury Pennsylvania courts have treated as a serious impairment of body function, and the claim proceeded on that basis after the surgeon documented the lasting effect.

The driver carried Pennsylvania's $15,000 minimum bodily injury limit, which was paid within weeks. Your own underinsured motorist coverage, which you had bought at $100,000 stacked, paid the balance. Had the driver been drunk or uninsured, your limited tort election would have been lifted entirely. The claim settled at month sixteen, inside the two-year deadline. All figures are hypothetical.

Philadelphia's crashes are pedestrian and intersection crashes, and the tort election on your own policy is the first document to find.

• Get the Philadelphia Police Department report number; Pennsylvania crash reports are available through PennDOT's online system.
• Find the tort election on your own, or your household's, auto policy declarations page; it decides whether pain and suffering can be claimed.
• Identify every camera facing the intersection, including businesses and SEPTA buses, and have preservation letters sent within days; Philadelphia intersection crashes turn on the signal.
• Photograph the crosswalk, the signal, the lighting and the position of the vehicle.
• Report to your own insurer the same day and open the medical benefits claim; confirm your uninsured and underinsured motorist limits and whether they are stacked.
• Get medical care within a day and document the effect of the injury on daily life from the first week; the serious injury threshold is decided on that evidence.
• If a city street, signal, SEPTA vehicle or PennDOT road contributed, ask an attorney about governmental immunity and the six-month notice requirement for claims against the city.

Pennsylvania is a choice no-fault state. Every policy must carry at least $5,000 in medical benefits coverage, which pays your own medical bills first regardless of fault; higher amounts are optional. Pennsylvania's minimum liability coverage is $15,000 per person, $30,000 per accident and $5,000 for property damage, among the lowest in the country, and uninsured and underinsured motorist coverage must be offered and can be rejected or stacked. In a city where many drivers carry the minimum, those coverages are usually the real source of recovery in a serious crash.

Fault follows modified comparative negligence with a 51 percent bar: you recover if you were 50 percent or less at fault, reduced by your share. The injury deadline is two years from the crash. Claims against the City of Philadelphia require written notice within six months under Pennsylvania's governmental immunity statute, and claims against SEPTA and the Commonwealth, including PennDOT, have their own immunity rules and damage caps.

Crashes in the suburbs of Montgomery, Delaware, Bucks and Chester Counties follow the same Pennsylvania rules; crashes across the river in Camden, New Jersey are governed by New Jersey's no-fault system, which has its own verbal threshold election. Workers' compensation for a crash on the job runs through the Pennsylvania Bureau of Workers' Compensation with a three-year claim deadline.

A Philadelphia claim is often a pedestrian or intersection claim where the tort election on the injured person's own policy decides whether pain and suffering can be claimed, the at-fault driver carries one of the lowest minimums in the country, and the injured person's own coverage is the real source. The questions to answer early are which election applies, whether the injury meets the serious injury threshold or an exception lifts the election, and what uninsured and underinsured coverage exists. Most personal injury attorneys work on contingency.

Ask Legal Matters is a free claim-review request service, not a law firm. Requests may be shared with independent attorneys and legal services partners who handle inquiries in Pennsylvania, and an attorney must evaluate the facts before anyone can say what the claim is worth. If you were hurt in a crash in Philadelphia, as a driver, passenger, pedestrian or cyclist, you can request a free claim review.

• Car Accident Claims in the United States: The Complete Guide
• Pedestrian Accident Claims: Rights, Fault and Compensation
• Wrongful Death Claims: Who Can File, Deadlines and Damages
• Airbag Did Not Deploy in a Crash: Can You Sue, and Whom?
• At Fault in a Car Accident? Comparative Negligence Explained
• What Is the Average Car Accident Settlement? What Sets the Value
• Back and Neck Injury Settlement After a Car Accident: Factors
• Bicycle Accident Claim: Hit by a Car While Riding
• Broken Bone Car Accident Settlement: What Drives the Value

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