COVID-19 has caused tensions to rise, spike in road rage shootings

As students return to the classroom and people return to work, roads across the Triangle are getting busier.

Posted 11:00 p.m. Jun 15, 2021 — Updated 3:41 a.m. Jun 16, 2021

Brian Shrader

, WRAL anchor/reporter

As students return to the classroom and people return to work, roads across the Triangle are getting busier.

Officials said that as people are getting back on the road, traffic patterns are changing. That means fewer spikes of heavy congestion on roads like Interstate 40.

"The total volumes, if you were to count every car that goes through, is about the same as it was before," said Marty Homan, spokesperson with the North Carolina Department of Transportation.

People can thank work-from-home schedules and more flexibility from employers, officials said.

Homan said some changes to the Triangle's traffic patterns could be permanent, but it's still too early to tell.

Driver Alishia Harris-Moore said she's noticed that people are driving worse, and having more outbursts of road rage, since the pandemic began.

Data from the advocacy group Everytown for Gun Safety shows there's been a spike in road rage incidents since the beginning of the pandemic.

The average number of road-rage involved shootings is double the monthly average for the past four years prior.

The data is a testament to how tensions have been rising since the coronavirus pandemic. In the last 12 months, a U.S. driver shot another person with a gun once every 18 hours, the USA Streets Blog reports.

The pandemic has affected people's mental health and economic security, which could also affect their driving.

"They're being rude. Blowing off the horn. [It's] a little bit more road rage than what I'm used to," Harris-Moore said.

The Department of Transportation is considering restoring on-ramp signals along Interstate 540 — another sign that more people are back on the road.

The signals stop traffic on ramps to manage congestion on I-540 in north Raleigh.

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