Orlando is no longer the worst place in the
US for pedestrian fatalities, but that slight victory comes with a horrific asterisk. The City Beautiful only slid from its long-held perch as the worst place to walk because everywhere else became more deadly.
The organization Smart Growth America releases an
annual report on pedestrian fatalities to highlight the way that American cities are built to be unsafe for anyone not inside a car. The "Dangerous By Design" report has frequently shamed Orlando for its high rate of pedestrian deaths, naming them the deadliest city overall for the last two years.
Orlando was also the deadliest city of the last decade, with a rate of deaths well above any other metro between 2010 and 2019. Other Florida metros frequently fill out the rest of the top 10 and this year's report is no exception.
Orlando has been unseated by Daytona Beach as the deadliest metro, with an average of 4.25 pedestrian deaths per 100K people. That number comes from statistics for 2020, the most recent year for which the data is available.
Florida was still well-represented in the Top 10 most deadly metros, with Tampa coming in fourth, Jacksonville ranking sixth and Orlando landing in the eighth spot.
