LUBBOCK, Texas -
A City of Lubbock report highlights the intersections in Lubbock with the most traffic crashes.
Sterling Kiper lives and works in an area that made the top five.
"I'm really not surprised," he said. "There has been a lot of crashes over there in front of my apartment complex. I've seen some down here, so I'm not surprised at all."
According to a study by the city's traffic engineering department, Fourth Street and Frankford Avenue is number five on the list.
"I hear a lot of the ambulances, mainly on Friday and Saturday night's between 1 a.m. and 4 a.m., I get woken up a lot," he said.
Marsha Sharp Freeway and Interstate 27 is number one on the list. LPD Lt. Ray Mendoza said the main reason is drivers aren't familiar with the area.
"One of the main things with this study is we look at everything of what could be causing the crashes not just what the numbers show," he said. "We looked at Marsha Sharp and I-27, and obviously it is a newer intersection and people are not quite, we think, adjusted to it yet. So that is one of the reasons, and again distracted driving always seems to be an issue.
Mendoza said distracted driving could mean a lot of things.
"We are not just talking about texting and driving, we are talking about people not paying attention," he said.
Top five locations for 2014:
- Eastbound frontage road of Marsha Sharp and northbound I-27
- 50th Street and the southbound I-27 frontage road
- 34th Street and the southbound West Loop 289 frontage road
- Clovis Road and Landmark Lane
- Frankford Avenue and Fourth Street
"Lubbock is growing, and new intersections are popping up all the time, and so again, people are going to have to pay attention and they are going to have to learn the routes, or just be more alert," Mendoza said.
He said LPD will typically beef up patrol in the areas where most crashes occur.
"So one of the things that are watch commanders do, is they pay attention to what those intersections are showing, and that is where they try to deploy their resources," he said.
The numbers for 2015 are still being tabulated.
