The Most Dangerous Highway in Missouri Claims 20 Souls Per Year
What's the most dangerous highway in Missouri? It may not be the one you think. The roadway that's become notorious for fatalities in the Show Me State claims 20 souls per year.
There are a lot of ways to measure dangerous highways and interstates. I have found multiple websites including Dangerous Roads (with that name, you'd think they'd know) that have shared data and all that I have found agree that Highway 63 is Missouri's most dangerous highway.
Highway 63 northernmost point can be traced from Wyaconda Township through Thayer in the southern part of Missouri.
Here's a staggering statistic. Dangerous Roads says that in Missouri "between 2009 and 2019, Highway 63 saw 179 fatalities." I found no less than 4 lawyer websites that agreed that Highway 63 was by far the most dangerous in the state. Cantor Injury Law, Goldblatt-Singer, Cofman-Townsley and Johnson Vorhees Martucci all shared the same conclusion.
What makes Highway 63 so dangerous? If you've driven any length of it, you know it goes through a lot of Missouri's rural areas and for decades was two-lane only in many parts of the state. Dangerous Roads mentions a lack of safe intersections and they're not wrong. I used to drive the parts of Highway 63 south of Columbia before it was a 4-lane highway and it was not someplace you wanted to drive on a bad weather day or especially at night. South of Jefferson City, you're still dealing with just 2 lanes and that's not likely to change anytime soon.
I've seen estimates that to update Highway 63 and make it safer would cost upwards of $300 million dollars. There have already been upgrades that have recently been completed in the Columbia area and that helps as MODOT shared. Time will tell if the rest of the more dangerous parts of Highway 63 see improvement to help this roadway shed it's dangerous reputation.