If you’re a motorist in South Carolina and have ever thought “we have the worst drivers.” You would be correct. South Carolina over the last few years has consistently ranked among the worst driving states in our annual best and worst driver studies. Topping out at second worst in the county in 2018.
Carleston, Greenville and Columbia all rate near the bottom of driver quality across the county. To put it bluntly, South Carolina drivers are bad. However, we here at QuoteWizard wanted to see where the worst of the worst are located.
We analyzed QuoteWizard data from tens of thousands of insurance quotes from South Carolina to see where the best and worst drivers live. To determine overall driver quality in South Carolina, we studied drivers in South Carolina’s 50 largest cities who used QuoteWizard.com to compare quotes. We then ranked cities by the highest rate of incidents. Incidents include accidents, speeding tickets, DUIs and moving citations from that data.
Worst driving cities in South Carolina
| Rank (worst) | City |
|---|---|
| 1 | Simpsonville |
| 2 | James Island |
| 3 | Goose Creek |
| 4 | Five Forks |
| 5 | Mauldin |
| 6 | Greenwood |
| 7 | Lexington |
| 8 | Ladson |
| 9 | West Columbia |
| 10 | Mount Pleasant |
| 11 | Fort Mill |
| 12 | Hanahan |
| 13 | Aiken |
| 14 | Summerville |
| 15 | Charleston |
| 16 | Wade Hampton |
| 17 | Gantt |
| 18 | Spartanburg |
| 19 | Seven Oaks |
| 20 | St. Andrews |
| 21 | Rock Hill |
| 22 | Dentsville |
| 23 | Irmo |
| 24 | Greer |
| 25 | Taylors |
Simpsonville
Heading south east on I-385 you’ll run into the worst drivers in the state. Simpsonville does reside on the busy I-385 corridor where much of the Greenville traffic passes through. However, most of the town resides on smaller arterial roads with less traffic. Leading some to believe the quality of driver in Simpsonville is certainly among the worst in the state. Greenville county had 14.60 road fatalities per 100,000 people in 2017.
James Island
Being and island where there are only three ways on and off the island, you don’t see much traffic going through town. The poor quality of drivers appears to be isolated on the island. The lack of traffic and high rate of incidents points to the citizens of James Island being bad drivers. Charleston county had 17.69 fatal accidents per 100,000 people in 2017.
Goose Creek
Goose Creek shares a similar pattern as it’s fellow bad driving cities. Not much traffic goes thru town and yet there are a high rate of incidents among it’s motorists. The poor quality of drivers in town make the streets of Goose Creek one of the most dangerous in South Carolina. Berkeley county accounted for 15.60 fatalities per 100,000 people.
Best driving cities in South Carolina
| Rank (best) | City |
|---|---|
| 1 | Clemson |
| 2 | Port Royal |
| 3 | North Myrtle Beach |
| 4 | Sumter |
| 5 | Florence |
| 6 | Orangeburg |
| 7 | Myrtle Beach |
| 8 | Conway |
| 9 | Moncks Corner |
| 10 | Red Hill |
| 11 | North Augusta |
| 12 | Berea |
| 13 | Bluffton |
| 14 | Cayce |
| 15 | Lake Wylie |
| 16 | North Charleston |
| 17 | Columbia |
| 18 | Socastee |
| 19 | Parker |
| 20 | Hilton Head Island |
| 21 | Easley |
| 22 | Anderson |
| 23 | Gaffney |
| 24 | Beaufort |
| 25 | Greenville |
| Taylors |
Clemson
Home to the national championship Clemson Tigers and the best drivers in South Carolina! Off the beaten path and a fairly small college town, Clemson has all the makings of a good driving city. You would expect rowdy college kids to put a dent in the number of incidents in town, but it doesn’t appear to be the case. Anderson county had 22.14 road fatalities per 100,000 in 2017.
Port Royal
Residing on a desolate island has its benefits when driving on the island. Whereas Johns Island is an isolated island with bad drivers the folks on Port Royal are quite the opposite. Beaufort county had 13.92 road fatalities per 100,000 people.
North Myrtle Beach
One of the great golf destinations in the country, North Myrtle Beach is one of the great driving destinations. Could the practice of driving golf carts be the reason? Regardless the coastal drivers of North Myrtle Beach are among the best in South Carolina. Horry county had 20.10 road fatalities per 100,000 drivers.
Methodology
The QuoteWizard research team evaluated driver quality from the 50 largest cities in South Carolina by population. We analyzed 2018 data from over 50,000 insurance quotes from South Carolina drivers using QuoteWizard to find the rate of overall incidents in each city. Incidents include accidents, speeding tickets, DUIs and moving citations
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