COLUMBUS, Ohio (WCMH) – A new study named Ohio as one of the states that has seen the biggest improvements in road safety since the COVID-19 pandemic. Personal injury lawyers at North Carolina-based Whitley Law Firm collected data on 14 key road safety factors, such as crash statistics, alcohol-related incidents and cyclist deaths, from 2019 through the end of 2022. The firm then analyzed and weighted the data, with the number of crashes holding the most importance, to discover which states saw the greatest improvements in road safety since the pandemic. Data was sourced from the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, U.S. Census Bureau and Department of Transportation. Ohio ranked at No. 10, seeing a nearly 62% decline in cyclist deaths on state roads, as well as drug (-26%) and alcohol-related crashes (-12%) since the pandemic. The state did, however, see an increase in deaths caused by car crashes (+10%).  "While it seems like [Ohio's] crash counts have risen, they have risen less than other states, making it still one of the safest ones post-pandemic," a spokesperson for the law firm said. "This is even more impressive if we consider that as a whole the U.S. has not become safer since the pandemic, with numbers growing throughout all factors." Idaho topped the rankings, showing a decrease in deaths caused by car crashes (-4%) and crashes in urban areas (-4%), among other improvements.  The top 10 was completed by West Virginia (No. 2), Oklahoma (No. 3), Pennsylvania (No. 4), Nebraska (No. 5), Maryland (No. 6), Hawaii (No. 7), North Carolina (No. 8) and Wisconsin (No. 9).