A community survey mapping the Northern Territory’s most dangerous roads and intersections has produced a publicly available, crash-data-backed dataset with direct relevance to motor underwriters, fleet brokers, and risk managers – in the jurisdiction that records Australia’s highest road fatality rate by a substantial margin.
The Automobile Association of the Northern Territory’s (AANT) 2026 Risky Roads Report, based on 824 submissions collected between February 12 and March 31, 2026, identifies specific roads, intersections, and recurring hazard types across Greater Darwin, regional NT, and the Stuart Highway corridor. The NT recorded a road fatality rate of 12.0 per 100,000 people for the 12 months ending June 2026 – the highest of any Australian jurisdiction, and nearly double that of Western Australia, which recorded the second-highest rate at 6.3 per 100,000. That trajectory runs counter to national targets: by the end of 2024, Australia was 46% behind its target trajectory under the National Road Safety Strategy 2021-2030, which aims to halve annual fatalities by 2030, and the fatality rate continued to rise in 2025, according to a November 2025 submission to the strategy’s mid-term review by Engineers Australia and the Transport Australia Society.
For brokers advising clients with commercial fleets, transport operations, or employees who regularly drive NT roads, the AANT report translates that jurisdictional risk profile into a named, street-level, crash-data-verified map – directly applicable to fleet policy structuring, duty of care obligations, and workers’ compensation exposure.
The most significant finding for risk professionals is the dominance of Stuart Highway across the dataset. The highway appeared in 143 unique submissions – more than any other road. Crash data provided to AANT by the NT Department of Logistics and Infrastructure for 2021-2025 recorded 964 crashes, involving 1,762 people, resulting in 52 deaths and 286 hospital admissions. The highway’s exposure spans 54 distinct intersection locations from Darwin to Alice Springs. Within 30 kilometres of the Darwin GPO, it attracted 89 nominations. Intersections at Goyder Road, Parap, and Virginia Road, Virginia each drew 14 nominations – the second-highest intersection tallies in the entire survey. Bagot Road, Dick Ward Drive, and Arnhem Highway (Humpty Doo) followed. Together, these four roads accounted for 128 nominations, or 15.5% of all submissions, and the report recommended them for priority safety assessments.
The road risk picture carries a parallel workers’ compensation dimension that broadens the broker exposure. Vehicle incidents were the leading cause of work-related deaths in Australia in 2024, accounting for 42% of all workplace fatalities – more than triple the next most deadly mechanism, falls from height at 13%. Machinery operators and drivers recorded the highest occupational fatality rate at 6.7 per 100,000 workers, more than five times the overall rate, according to Safe Work Australia’s Key Work Health and Safety Statistics Australia 2025.
The Stuart Highway and Arnhem Highway are key transport corridors for freight and heavy vehicles supporting industries including mining, logistics, and construction. Where employees travel these routes as part of their work, employers have duties under work health and safety laws to manage driving risks. For brokers advising on fleet, workers’ compensation, and liability insurance, the report provides location-specific information that may help inform risk management discussions and underwriting submissions.
Several flagged roads carry AusRAP star ratings – assessed by the International Road Assessment Program (IRAP) on a one-to-five scale – at the lowest end of the range. The AusRAP methodology estimates an average 40% reduction in fatal and serious crashes for each incremental increase in star rating. Kirkland Road in Marlow Lagoon and Durack carries a 1.3-star rating and recorded 47 crashes, 89 people involved, 14 hospitalisations, and two deaths. Dorat Road in the Robin Falls area carries a 1.4-star rating and recorded eight crashes involving 22 people and 12 hospitalisations. Bagot Road in Eaton and Ludmilla, rated between 2.5 and 3.4 stars, recorded 165 crashes, 322 people involved, 30 hospitalisations, and two deaths – the highest crash volume of any Greater Darwin road in the report. These ratings were last published in 2019 with no publicly available updates since.
The NT data arrives against a national motor insurance market under sustained cost pressure. The Insurance Council of Australia’s (ICA) March 2025 Motor Insurance Policy Paper found that comprehensive motor premiums rose 42% between 2019 and 2024, reaching an average of $1,052 per year, while average claims costs tracked the same increase. Insurers’ motor insurance costs as a proportion of premiums collected rose from 89% in June 2019 to 94% by June 2024 – reflecting declining underwriting profitability even as premiums increased. ICA CEO Andrew Hall stated in the paper: “Insurers are doing their bit to reduce costs – such as streamlining operations, negotiating better repair arrangements, and investing in the repair workforce – but the reality is many cost drivers are outside the industry’s control. We need governments to step up with targeted reforms.”
The ICA’s paper called on state, territory, and federal governments for coordinated action across repair supply chains, labour shortages, and fraud. The AANT report’s findings add a further dimension to that argument: publicly documented, community-validated evidence of specific high-risk infrastructure that governments have been called upon to address, and that now sits on the record as a reference point for underwriters assessing fleet risk in the territory.
Of the 824 nominations, 55% identified intersections as the primary concern against 45% for road segments. Combined nominations citing a lack of signals (144) and inefficient or ineffective existing signals (107) totalled 251 – the single largest issue category across all four types tracked. Poor or confusing road and intersection layout drew 156 mentions; inadequate crossing or turning opportunities accounted for 147. AANT has called on all levels of government to act on the findings, citing the safe systems approach to road safety.
For brokers, the practical implication is direct: a publicly available, crash-data-backed risk map of NT roads now exists. Clients operating commercial vehicles on the identified corridors sit within documented high-incident geographies – relevant to fleet policy submissions, excess structuring, and duty of care conversations conducted under applicable workplace health and safety frameworks.
