Road deaths rise in 2020 despite drop in distance covered by vehicles

In 2020, Irish vehicles drove more than 36 billion kilometres when combined, compared with just over 47 billion kilometres in 2019. Picture: Colin Keegan

Irish cars, lorries, vans, and buses saw a 25% drop in the number of kilometres travelled in 2020 as Covid-19 gripped the country, but more people died on the roads than the year previously, while penalty points rose.

Those are just some of the findings of the Central Statistics Office (CSO) transport omnibus for 2020, which looked at air, rail, road, and sea travel data, as well as patterns such as cars being bought.