Which Massachusetts Communities Have the Most Crashes on Interstate 290?

Worcester, by a wide margin. In 2024, MassDOT recorded 178 crashes on Worcester’s two Interstate 290 segments, 98 westbound and 80 eastbound, and the highway is the city’s third and fifth highest-crash road. Marlborough follows at 65, then Auburn and Shrewsbury at 55 each, and Northborough at 44. Those five communities are the only ones in Massachusetts that recorded an I-290 segment among their eight highest-crash roads, and together those segments produced 397 crashes in a single year. The number that most people expect to follow, that this makes I-290 one of the state’s more dangerous highways, is not in the data, and the reason is set out below. What the data does show is a concentration in one small town that appears nowhere else on the corridor. Every figure here comes from MassDOT crash records and can be checked town by town in the Massachusetts crash report. To talk through a crash anywhere on the corridor, call Jim Glaser Law at (617) JIM-WINS. The line is answered 24 hours a day, and the first telephone consultation is offered without charge.

The Five Communities the Data Names

Interstate 290 runs about twenty miles from Auburn, where it leaves Interstate 395, northeast through Worcester and out to Interstate 495 in Marlborough. Five communities along it recorded an I-290 segment on their 2024 top-road lists.

Community	I-290 crashes, 2024	Segments recorded	Crashes 2022-2024, all roads	Statewide crash rank
Worcester	178	98 westbound, 80 eastbound	15,598	2 of 349
Marlborough	65	65 eastbound	3,390	25 of 349
Auburn	55	37 westbound, 18 eastbound	2,247	42 of 349
Shrewsbury	55	31 eastbound, 24 westbound	2,229	43 of 349
Northborough	44	24 eastbound, 20 westbound	853	135 of 349

Two different time windows are in that table and they are not interchangeable. The I-290 counts are 2024 alone, because MassDOT publishes the top-road breakdown for the most recent year. The all-roads totals and every rate below are 2022, 2023 and 2024 combined. No ratio anywhere in this article divides one by the other.

The Number That Does Not Support the Obvious Headline

Across 2022, 2023 and 2024, the five corridor communities recorded 24,317 crashes, 41 of them fatal. That is 1.69 fatal crashes per 1,000, against a Massachusetts figure of 2.68. The corridor sits well below the state, not above it.

The usual explanation for a low regional fatality rate in this dataset is that one large city with heavy, slow, urban traffic is dragging the average down. That explanation does not work here. Remove Worcester and the remaining four communities record 8,719 crashes with 12 fatal, which is 1.38 per 1,000. Taking the big city out makes the corridor look safer, not more dangerous.

Nor does I-290 appear on the statewide list of roads with the most fatal crashes in 2024. That list is led by Interstate 495 northbound at 9 fatal crashes, followed by Interstate 93 northbound and the Massachusetts Turnpike westbound at 3 each. No I-290 segment is on it.

Answer Capsule

Worcester records the most Interstate 290 crashes of any Massachusetts community, 178 in 2024 across two segments, 98 westbound and 80 eastbound. Marlborough is second at 65, Auburn and Shrewsbury are tied at 55, and Northborough is fifth at 44. Those five communities are the only ones that recorded an I-290 segment among their eight highest-crash roads, and the corridor total for 2024 is 397 crashes. The corridor is not, however, unusually deadly by the state’s own measure: across 2022 through 2024 those five communities recorded 24,317 crashes and 41 fatal ones, a rate of 1.69 fatal crashes per 1,000 against a statewide 2.68, and no I-290 segment appears on the 2024 statewide top-fatal-roads list. The finding that does hold up is concentration rather than severity, and it belongs to one town: in Northborough the two I-290 segments are the number one and number two highest-crash roads, and their 44 crashes exceed the next six roads on the town’s list combined. All figures are MassDOT crash records for 2022 through 2024.

Northborough Is the Real Finding

Northborough is the smallest community on the corridor. It ranks 135th of 349 Massachusetts communities for crash volume, with 853 across three years, which is one twentieth of Worcester’s total.

And Interstate 290 dominates its crash profile in a way it does not dominate anywhere else in the state.

The town’s 2024 top-road list runs: I-290 eastbound at 24, I-290 westbound at 20, Main Street at 7, Belmont Street at 7, Hudson Street at 7, Church Street at 6, West Main Street at 6, and Otis Street at 5. The interstate holds the first and second positions, and its 44 crashes are more than the next six roads added together, which come to 38. Put as a share, I-290 accounts for 53.7 per cent of every crash on Northborough’s eight highest-crash roads.

No other corridor community is close to that. The same share for Worcester is 23.2 per cent, for Auburn 20.6, for Shrewsbury 20.5, and for Marlborough 17.4. In four of the five, the interstate is one contributor among several. In Northborough it is the road that defines the town’s crash picture, and a resident’s odds of a serious collision inside their own town are dominated by a highway that most of them are only using to get somewhere else.

That has a practical consequence that has nothing to do with driving. A Northborough crash is far more likely than a Worcester crash to have happened on a state highway rather than a municipal street, and as the next section explains, those two categories are governed by different statutes.

Worcester’s Worst Road Is Not the Interstate

Worcester is the state’s second largest crash community, 15,598 crashes across three years, behind only Boston, and it ranks third in Massachusetts for fatal-crash count at 29.

Its highest-crash road in 2024 was not the interstate. It was Main Street, at 171 crashes, ahead of Park Avenue at 101 and I-290 westbound at 98. Grafton Street at 91, I-290 eastbound at 80, Belmont Street at 77, Chandler Street at 75 and Lincoln Street at 73 complete the list.

Anyone arguing that the highway is Worcester’s problem has to explain why a city street outperforms it. It is a fair guess that Main Street sees more crashes because it sees far more individual trips, turns, driveways, pedestrians and intersections than a limited-access highway, but MassDOT crash records carry no traffic volume, so that stays a guess. What is measurable is that in Worcester, more recorded crashes happen on the surface street than on either direction of the interstate. That is not a Worcester peculiarity: statewide, roads recorded as Main Street outrank every interstate entry, as set out in which road has the most crashes in Massachusetts.

Worcester also carries the corridor’s pedestrian and bicycle exposure almost entirely. Across three years the five communities recorded 374 pedestrian crashes and 153 bicycle crashes; Worcester accounts for 327 and 116 of those. Northborough recorded 2 pedestrian crashes and no bicycle crashes at all in the same period.

Why Marlborough Shows Only One Direction

Marlborough’s list shows Interstate 290 eastbound at 65, its second highest-crash road behind Boston Post Road East at 99, and shows no westbound segment.

That does not mean westbound Marlborough is crash-free, and this is the kind of gap that gets misread. Each town’s list is capped at eight roads. Marlborough’s eighth entry is Maple Street at 30. So I-290 westbound in Marlborough recorded fewer than 30 crashes in 2024, which is all the data supports. Fewer than 30, not zero.

The same cap explains why only five communities appear at all. A town where the highway produced a handful of crashes, below its own eighth-place road, is simply not listed, which is why this article says five communities recorded an I-290 segment on their top-road lists rather than claiming five towns are the only ones the highway passes through.

Injury Share Runs Below the State Too

Fatal crashes are rare enough that a rate built on 41 of them moves a lot on small changes. Injury crashes are far more numerous, so the injury share is the steadier measure, and it points the same way.

Across three years, 20.22 per cent of crashes in the five corridor communities involved injury, against 22.89 per cent statewide. By community: Northborough 22.16 per cent, Auburn 21.41, Worcester 21.00, Marlborough 17.79 and Shrewsbury 16.51. Shrewsbury ranks 308th of 349 Massachusetts communities on injury share and Marlborough 282nd, both near the bottom of the state.

Two measures, fatality rate and injury share, computed on different denominators, both put this corridor below the Massachusetts figure. That is the honest read, and it is worth stating plainly on a page published by a law firm, because the opposite claim would be easier to sell and it would be wrong.

Which Defect Statute Applies Depends on Which Road You Were On

Here is where the corridor framing earns its keep, and it is the part with real consequences.

If a road defect caused a crash, which statute governs depends on who is obliged to keep that road in repair, and the two answers carry different ceilings and different notice rules.

On the interstate. I-290 is a state highway, so M.G.L. c. 81, sec. 18 applies. The Commonwealth “shall be liable for injuries sustained by persons while traveling on state highways, if the same are caused by defects within the limits of the constructed traveled roadway.” Recovery is capped: it “shall not exceed one fifth of one per cent of the valuation of the town in which the injury was received, nor shall it exceed four thousand dollars.” The section excludes injury from want of a railing, injury on a state highway sidewalk, and injury during construction, reconstruction or repair, and it requires that notice be given to a member of the department.

On a city or town street. Worcester’s Main Street, Marlborough’s Boston Post Road East, Northborough’s Church Street and every other municipal way fall under M.G.L. c. 84, sec. 15, which caps recovery against “a county, city, town or local water and sewer commission” at one fifth of one per cent of its state valuation and “not more than five thousand dollars.” The notice requirement is M.G.L. c. 84, sec. 18: within thirty days, stating “the name and place of residence of the person injured, and the time, place and cause of said injury or damage,” given to the party by law obliged to keep the way in repair.

So two crashes half a mile apart in Worcester, one on I-290 westbound and one on Main Street, can fall under two different statutes, with two different dollar ceilings, and notice owed to two different recipients. Thirty days is short, and it is far shorter than the three-year period that M.G.L. c. 260, sec. 2A gives for an ordinary negligence claim against another driver. Those clocks run at the same time from the same collision, and missing the short one does not stop the long one, but it can remove the road-defect claim entirely.

None of this is the ordinary case. Most crashes on this corridor are one driver against another driver, and the defect statutes never come into it. They matter when the road itself is part of the story.

The Corridor Crosses a County Line

Northborough is in Worcester County. Marlborough, the next community up the highway, is in Middlesex County. The line runs between them.

For where a case is heard, that matters. A Worcester County case goes to Worcester County Superior Court or the District Court division covering the place of the crash; a Middlesex County case goes to Middlesex County Superior Court in Woburn or its own District Court divisions. The substantive law is identical in both. The Worcester County crash data and Middlesex County crash data articles set out the courthouses, their addresses and the amount-in-controversy threshold that decides between Superior and District Court.

Two crashes on the same highway, a few exits apart, can therefore be heard in different courthouses in different counties.

How to Look Up a Specific Town

Each corridor community has its own page with the full MassDOT figures: crashes, fatal, injury, bicycle and pedestrian counts, the town’s rank among all 349 Massachusetts communities, and its highest-crash roads by name.

The five corridor pages are Worcester, Marlborough, Auburn, Shrewsbury and Northborough.

The Massachusetts crash report covers all 349 communities. For Worcester specifically, the firm also publishes Worcester car accident and Worcester truck accident pages.

Other corridors in this series: Interstate 495, which I-290 meets in Marlborough; the Massachusetts Turnpike, which crosses the corridor in Auburn; Route 9, which runs parallel through Shrewsbury and Northborough; and Route 128.

What These Numbers Establish, and What They Do Not

They establish which communities recorded the most I-290 crashes in 2024, how the highway ranks inside each town’s own road list, and how the corridor’s fatality rate and injury share compare with the state across three years.

They do not establish that any road is more dangerous than any other. MassDOT crash records carry no traffic volume, so a road with more crashes may simply carry more vehicles. They do not describe 2025 or 2026, because the published data ends with 2024. They say nothing at all about fault in any individual crash: a statistic describes a pattern across thousands of collisions and has no bearing on who was responsible in one of them.

Frequently Asked Questions

Q: Which Massachusetts town has the most Interstate 290 crashes?

A: Worcester, at 178 in 2024, split 98 westbound and 80 eastbound. Marlborough is second at 65, Auburn and Shrewsbury are tied at 55, and Northborough is fifth at 44. Across the five communities the highway produced 397 recorded crashes that year.

Q: Is Interstate 290 one of the most dangerous highways in Massachusetts?

A: The data does not support that. Across 2022 through 2024 the five corridor communities recorded 1.69 fatal crashes per 1,000 against a statewide 2.68, and their injury share was 20.22 per cent against 22.89 statewide. No I-290 segment appears on the 2024 statewide top-fatal-roads list, which is led by Interstate 495 northbound at 9 fatal crashes. Separately, MassDOT crash records include no traffic volume, so they cannot distinguish a more dangerous road from a busier one.

Q: Why does I-290 matter so much in Northborough?

A: Because it is more than half the town’s recorded crash activity on its main roads. The two I-290 segments are Northborough’s number one and number two highest-crash roads at 24 and 20 crashes, and those 44 exceed the next six roads on the list combined, which total 38. That is 53.7 per cent of all crashes on the town’s eight highest-crash roads, against 23.2 per cent for Worcester and 17.4 for Marlborough.

Q: Does I-290 westbound have no crashes in Marlborough?

A: No, and the data does not say that. Each town’s list is capped at eight roads, and Marlborough’s eighth entry is Maple Street at 30 crashes. All that follows is that I-290 westbound in Marlborough recorded fewer than 30 crashes in 2024, which was not enough to make the list.

Q: What is the worst road in Worcester for crashes?

A: Main Street, at 171 crashes in 2024, ahead of Park Avenue at 101 and Interstate 290 westbound at 98. Worcester is the state’s second largest crash community overall, with 15,598 crashes across 2022 through 2024, and third in Massachusetts for fatal-crash count at 29.

Q: Who is responsible if a road defect on I-290 caused my crash?

A: I-290 is a state highway, so M.G.L. c. 81, sec. 18 governs. It makes the Commonwealth liable for injuries caused by “defects within the limits of the constructed traveled roadway,” but caps recovery at the lesser of one fifth of one per cent of the town’s valuation or four thousand dollars, excludes want of a railing, state highway sidewalks, and injuries during construction, reconstruction or repair, and requires notice to a member of the department. A defect on a city or town street instead falls under M.G.L. c. 84, sec. 15, with a five thousand dollar ceiling and thirty-day notice under sec. 18. The two are not interchangeable.

Q: How long do I have to bring a claim after an I-290 crash?

A: For an ordinary negligence claim against another driver, generally three years under M.G.L. c. 260, sec. 2A. If the claim is that the road itself was defective, the thirty-day notice period in M.G.L. c. 84, sec. 18 applies and is incorporated into the state highway section as well. Those deadlines run at the same time from a single collision and they are not substitutes for one another.

Q: Does it matter which town on the corridor the crash happened in?

A: For where the case is heard, yes. The corridor crosses a county line between Northborough and Marlborough. Auburn, Worcester, Shrewsbury and Northborough are in Worcester County; Marlborough is in Middlesex County. The substantive law is the same in both, but the courthouse is not.

Q: Is Jimmy Knows AI giving me legal advice?

A: No. This is general information about Massachusetts law and public crash data, not legal advice, and reading it does not create an attorney-client relationship. Crash statistics describe patterns across many collisions and say nothing about who was at fault in any particular one. To discuss a specific situation, call Jim Glaser Law at (617) JIM-WINS. The line is answered 24 hours a day, and the first telephone consultation is free.

Talking to a Lawyer

The detail on this corridor that costs people money is not the crash rate. It is that a stretch of state highway and the city street beside it are governed by two different statutes with two different ceilings and a thirty-day notice period attached to both, while the ordinary claim against the other driver runs on a three-year clock. A person who assumes one deadline covers everything can lose a road-defect claim without ever knowing it existed.

Jim Glaser Law takes calls about crashes anywhere on the I-290 corridor, in Worcester, Auburn, Shrewsbury, Northborough and Marlborough, and about crashes anywhere else in Massachusetts. The line at (617) JIM-WINS is answered 24 hours a day. The first telephone consultation is free.