A stretch of North Lakeland roadway ranks among the Top 10 Polk County-owned roads with the highest collision rates.
Now, officials are attempting to find a way to cut the number of fatal accidents.
Kathleen Road, from Interstate 4 north to Sleepy Hill Road, has been identified by the Polk Transportation Planning Organization as one of the 10 county-owned, county-maintained roadways in its “High Injury Network Segments,” Chuck Barmby, Lakeland’s planning and transportation manager, told city commissioners on April 16.
“It’s a Top 10 list of the county’s facilities with the highest crash rates, high injury and high fatality rates,” he said.
From January 1, 2020, to December 31, 2025, this roughly 1.5-mile stretch of roadway had:
Federal funding obtained through the Safe Streets for All program has given the TPO, of which Lakeland is a member, a chance to study the roadway more in depth and consider what’s contributing to crashes.
Two of the three fatal accidents involved bicyclists or pedestrians at Kathleen Road and Mall Hill Drive, Barmby said. In one case, a pedestrian was using the crosswalk as a vehicle attempted to turn onto Mall Hill Drive, striking and killing the person.
Barmby said there may be lighting or crosswalk enhancements that could be made to prevent that from happening again.
The study found 84 of the crashes, or 23%, happened in dark conditions. Barmby said there have been some issues with street lighting on Kathleen Road, and it’s an area being considered for improvement.
Over one-third of the total accidents reported on Kathleen Road were rear-end collisions. Only about 12% of the accidents happened on wet pavement related to rainy weather.
Barmby said the TPO is continuing its analysis and is expected to present recommendations for improving the roadways to Lakeland commissioners at a future meeting.
How is Vision Zero going?
Polk ranked No. 7 in the state for average number of fatal traffic accidents, while being No. 8 in population, according to Barmby. These are based on a yearly average of 146 fatal accidents over a five year period from 2019 to 2023.
“We’re ahead of where we should be,” he said. “We’re north into the top half of counties in Florida. It’s a bad safety indicator.”
Some of the roadways Lakeland has concerns about include U.S. 98/Bartow Road and U.S. 92/Memorial Boulevard, Barmby said.
“These are the corridors we’ve been talking about, that’s where the crashes are occurring. That’s where the fatalities and serious injuries are,” he said.
In Polk, there were 103 fatalities and 345 serious injuries due to traffic accidents in 2025, according to the data reported by law enforcement agencies to Signal Four Analystics for the State of Florida.
That’s the lowest number of fatalities in a single year in over a decade.
The analytics state the most crashes occur on Saturdays, between the hours of 3 p.m. and 10 p.m. The most common cause for fatal accidents are lane departures, followed by lack of occupant protection, then impaired driving.
What other roads make the Top 10 list?
Polk TPO’s complete Top 10 list for the “High Injury Network Segments” of county-owned and maintained roadways include:
It’s important to recognize this list does not include any city-owned roadways, as those lists are kept by individual municipalities.
This article originally appeared on The Ledger: Lakeland road among Polk’ s 10 most accident prone. What can be done?
Reporting by Sara-Megan Walsh, Lakeland Ledger / The Ledger
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