Road deaths - We all have a role to play

MEMORIAL services were held around the country yesterday to remember the 22,646 people killed on Irish roads since 1959 when record keeping began.

As of close of business on Friday 204 people had died on our roads already this year but that toll increased in the interim.

In one horrific incident a woman was killed in Dublin when, it is alleged, an out-of-control car struck a group of people standing in a footpath.

There has been a vast cultural change in how we expect road users to behave, especially in the area of drink driving. There has been an unimaginable improvement in our roads system and in the safety features of cars. There have been campaigns on speeding, driving while tired and driving while using mobile phones yet more than one person a day still dies on our roads, and hundreds more suffer life-changing injuries.

Every road user has a part to play in reducing these heartbreaking statistics.