Many families move to sprawled, automobile-dependent suburbs because they want a safe place to raise their children. They are mistaken. A smart growth community is actually a much safer and healthier place to live overall.
According to the Victoria Transport Policy Institute, the top smart growth communities have about a quarter of the traffic fatality rates as the “dumb growth” communities (as this bar graph shows), indicating a huge safety benefit. 
Increased transit use (and walking and biking) also decreases traffic fatalities (see graph below).
As people in a community drive less and rely more on alternative modes of travel, overall traffic safety tends to increase significantly for several reasons. In smart growth communities,
- People drive fewer annual vehicle-miles.
- Traffic tends to be slower so crashes are less severe (urban areas tend to have many fender-benders, but rural areas tend to have much higher fatality rates).
- There are better alternatives for higher risk drivers (including teenagers and people who lose their license).
Read more at Planetizen.com.
