Rebecca Clark was one month pregnant with her first baby on July 31, 2024. She and her husband were driving to see some friends before they left town the next morning. It was close to 11 p.m. and the streets were quiet. Just as they drove through an intersection, a car came careening down the road. The Clarks thought nothing of it, expecting the car to halt at its upcoming stop sign. It didn’t. The other car slammed into the front of their vehicle, sending them spinning across the road. The vehicle that hit them skidded past their car, landing in a streetside parking space. “At first we thought it was a hit and run,” said Clark, “Because we didn’t see another car on the road.” People from the nearby houses on the corner came outside. “Are you okay?” several men asked the Clarks through their open car window. A young, college-aged woman exited the car that had hit them, her boyfriend following. “Yeah… I don’t think we’re gonna make it,” he told someone on the phone as the two approached the Clarks' car. “She just hit someone.”
Although there was damage to both vehicles, no one was seriously injured. “That was scary… because I was pregnant,” Clark said. “Luckily, nothing bad happened, but… being pregnant just made it so much scarier.” At 24 years old, this wasn’t Rebecca’s first car crash. Just two years earlier, in 2022, a man slammed into the side of her car when she didn’t slow to allow him into traffic. “It was icy and I couldn’t brake to let him in,” she said. “But he just went for it.” The average American will experience about one car crash every 17 years. Clark experienced two in four years. Both where she was not at fault. Both within the 10 square miles of Rexburg’s city limits. Clark’s experience is not unusual in Rexburg. According to Idaho Transportation Department crash data, the average number of crashes per capita in Idaho is about 14 for every 1,000 residents. In Rexburg, the rate is over double that — 32.5 crashes for every 1,000 residents.
“I think a lot of it comes from having a lot of young, inexperienced drivers from a lot of different places,” said Autumn Powell, a local resident. Powell just moved to Rexburg about four months ago, and she’s already had some close calls— both as a driver and pedestrian. “I haven’t actually been hit, though,” she said. “But they were like… inches away.” Young adults between the ages of 18–25 account for about 45 percent of all people involved in crashes in Rexburg. That number might sound high, but their share in crash involvement aligns pretty closely with the estimated 50 percent of the city’s population they make up, largely due to the Brigham Young University–Idaho campus located in Rexburg.
Although college students appear slightly underrepresented in crash statistics compared to their share of the population, that may not be because they are safe drivers– an estimated half of students simply don’t own a car. But, driving or not, the sheer number of college students in Rexburg poses unique traffic safety challenges. “I’d say we have a high-turnover population,” said Keith Davidson, the Public Works Director for the City of Rexburg. “So there are always new people coming in who are unfamiliar with the area… and many are young, inexperienced drivers, as well.” Davidson also says that high pedestrian traffic, combined with distracted and inattentive pedestrians and drivers, is another of Rexburg’s street safety concerns. “We have fines for texting when you’re crossing a crosswalk just to try and get people to be more aware,” Davidson said.
Yet, fixes to some of these driving safety concerns seem obvious to many living in Rexburg. “Like, why are there all these two-way stops? Why can’t they just be four-way stops? Everybody thinks they’re four-way stops and almost crashes into the other people because they think [the other people are] going to stop,” said Petra Aten, a BYUI junior studying business management. According to Idaho’s Transportation Department’s crash data, the most common contributing circumstance to crashes in Rexburg is failure to yield. Rexburg is home to many two-way stops, where only one cross-road has a stop sign and must yield to any traffic on the intersecting road. It was at one of these two-way stops that Clark and her husband were hit. However, the solution is not as simple as throwing in two more stop signs and making it a four-way stop.
Davidson explained that stop signs and signals can only be placed when the intersection meets certain warrants set out by the Manual on Uniform Traffic Control Devices. The city can’t just decide to put in another stop sign or a light– very specific requirements regarding vehicle and pedestrian traffic, as well as other factors, must be met. “That’s why there’s that series of warrants, so you’re not just throwing [four-way stops or traffic lights] in wherever,” Davidson said. Davidson also explained that, although making a two-way stop a four-way may decrease the number of crashes, the overall severity of the crashes would go up. Another major inhibitor is cost. Rexburg is a small town, and, according to Davidson, just putting in one signalized intersection is a half a million dollar project, plus ongoing upkeep. “Money always comes into play,” Davidson said. Cost is also why some traffic lights in Rexburg do not have a light dedicated to the left-hand turn signal, meaning that the driver must be aware and know that, even with a green light, they often have to yield to oncoming traffic.
Students coming to Rexburg from states where unprotected left-hand turns are less common, or even from bigger cities with the budget to put in lights with a dedicated left-hand signal, could simply be confused by the lack of a left-turn signal and fail to give oncoming traffic the right of way. When it comes to street improvement, there’s also the question of whether the city even has the jurisdiction to alter an intersection. “Some of [the streets in Rexburg are] state highways. So a lot of people aren't aware that Highway 33 is actually Main Street, and so the state highway maintains that road, and then 2nd East going north, as well,” said Davidson. Over 26 percent of all crashes in Rexburg occur on those two streets, Main and 2nd East, that Davidson mentioned, making them the two streets in Rexburg with the highest crash rate.
Main and 2nd East are two of the busiest streets in town. Both of the crashes Clark experienced respectively occurred on these two streets. “Anywhere there’s congestion is a hazard, because people get impatient and take risks, and that’s when crashes happen,” Davidson said. “So we try to focus on ‘How can we clear up traffic congestion in these areas?’ and help things be safer that way.”
Clark, now with her 8-month-old daughter, wishes the city and BYUI would do more to educate incoming students on how to drive safely in winter weather specifically. “I know they offer a winter driving course sometimes,” Clark said, “But I wish it was a little less optional.” Powell, who was almost hit in a crosswalk last week, agrees that there needs to be more instruction for those moving here from warmer climates. “A lot of these students are from Arizona or California and have never driven in snow before,” Powell said. “Winter driving classes should be mandatory.” Davidson says one of the best things the city can do is to promote campaigns of alert driving and encourage people to learn how to drive in winter conditions. The Rexburg Police Department often offers a winter driving course for any interested, but not many students attend.
“It’s difficult to mandate something when you live in a free country,” Davidson said. However, even with droves of pedestrians texting in crosswalks and frazzled college kids not braking soon enough, traffic safety is improving in Rexburg. Despite Rexburg’s relatively high crash rate in comparison with Idaho’s state averages, the per capita rate of crashes has actually decreased 15 percent in the last ten years.
Clark, despite experiencing two crashes in under five years, rates overall traffic safety in Rexburg a 7 out of 10. Powell, who lived in Caldwell, ID, before moving to Rexburg, said that she doesn’t generally feel unsafe on Rexburg’s roads. “I don’t really think [traffic safety] is that much worse here than Caldwell,” Powell said. “It’s not that bad, really. Sometimes people just don’t pay enough attention.”