Car accidents cost Jersey more than traffic, AAA says

Traffic crashes cost American society far more money than traffic jams, and nowhere are the costs as high as they are in New York and New Jersey, according to an AAA research report released yesterday.

The study puts the cost of crashes to society at $164 billion a year, more than twice the $67.6 billion price tag that researchers have put on congestion.

The New York-Newark-Edison metropolitan area -- a region that includes 13 of the 21 New Jersey counties -- spends $18 billion a year, or about $962 per person, on costs associated with traffic crashes, the automobile association reported. The Texas Transportation Institute, a nonprofit think tank, puts the cost of congestion in the same area at $7.4 billion a year, or $415 per person.

"Most Americans will be sur prised to learn that motor vehicle crashes cost more than the congestion they face on their daily commute to work," said Michele Mount, director of public affairs for the AAA New Jersey Automobile Club in Florham Park. "Great work has been done by the Texas Transportation Institute to quantify the costs of congestion, raise aware ness for the problem and offer solu tions. We feel safety deserves a similar focus."

Included in the researchers' work were costs associated with property damage, travel delays, lost earnings, medical treatment, litigation, pain and a lowered quality of life. The work was done by Cambridge Systematics Inc. of Maryland.

"Traffic crashes have become such a part of everyday life, we just accept them," said Pamela Fischer, who spent 20 years at AAA before Gov. Jon Corzine named her head of the state Highway Traffic Safety Division last year.

"If a plane crashes, everyone gets all jazzed up, but if there's a traffic crash, someone's upset, but as a society we're numb to it. A report like this calls attention to the fact that this is a major public health issue."

The AAA report recommends lawmakers and transportation departments make highway safety more of a priority in their planning. It suggests tougher drunken driving laws and tighter enforcement of licensing restrictions on teenage drivers. It also calls for every state to make failure to wear a seat belt a primary offense; New Jersey is one of 26 states where it already is.

The high cost of crashes in New York and New Jersey can be attributed partly to the fact that the area is the most populous in the U.S. Al though the total cost is highest there, the AAA research found the per-person cost of traffic crashes actually was higher in many smaller cities.

The cost of crashes was $2,258 per person in the Little Rock-North Little Rock area in Arkansas; $1,772 per person around Pensa cola, Fla.; and $1,568 per person in Columbia, S.C.

Los Angeles, which leads the nation in the total costs imposed by traffic congestion, was second to New York in total crash costs, the study found.