Thanksgiving is routinely described as the most dangerous driving stretch of the year. In Onondaga County the crash record says the opposite.
Across the four years from 2021 through 2024, the county averaged 30.8 reported crashes a day over the Tuesday to Saturday of Thanksgiving week. Every other November day averaged 38.4.
That is 19.8 percent fewer crashes per day during the holiday week, not more.
This story came from public records we pulled ourselves
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Why the holiday week is quieter
The likely explanation is simple arithmetic about who is on the road. The county’s crash peak sits in the late afternoon, with the 3 p.m., 4 p.m. and 5 p.m. hours the busiest of any day. Thanksgiving week removes a large share of that: schools are closed, many offices run short weeks, and the daily commute that generates most crashes largely stops.
Holiday travel adds long distance trips, but those replace a much larger volume of short local ones. Fewer total vehicle trips in the county means fewer crashes, even if the trips that remain are longer.
The trend across the four years runs the same direction, from 174 crashes in 2021 to 141 in 2024. Total crashes countywide also fell over that period, from 12,736 in 2022 to 10,845 in 2024.
What the number does not say
Two cautions are worth carrying. This measures crash counts, not severity, and the data does not say whether holiday week crashes are worse when they happen. It also measures Onondaga County, not the interstates that carry people out of it. A quieter county does not mean a quieter drive to Albany or New York.
The genuine November hazard in this data is not the holiday. It is deer. The county recorded 759 deer crashes in November across the same four years, more than a fifth of its annual total, concentrated in the second week of the month and overwhelmingly after dark.
How this was measured
The comparison uses Tuesday through Saturday of Thanksgiving week in each year from 2021 through 2024, which covers the heavy travel days on either side of the holiday. That is 20 days carrying 616 reported crashes. Every other November day in the same four years, 100 days in total, carried 3,835.
Counting whole weeks rather than the holiday itself matters, because Thanksgiving Day alone would understate the travel period and overstate the quiet.
Winter surfaces are still ahead
November also sits at the front edge of the winter driving season rather than inside it. The county recorded 286 crashes on snow, ice or slush in November across the four years, against 1,279 in January and 1,143 in February. The month that follows Thanksgiving carries 892.
The useful version
If you are planning the drive, the risk is not evenly spread across the week. The Wednesday before Thanksgiving carries the heaviest travel, and the afternoon hours carry the county’s crash peak in any season. Early departures avoid both, and they also avoid the dusk window when deer move.
Sources
- New York State Department of Motor Vehicles, Motor Vehicle Crashes, Case Information: Four Year Window, 2021 through 2024, via the New York State Open Data portal.
Every average, percentage and per gallon figure here was calculated by CNY Signal from the records cited above.
