Toll target still under 300

The Government and road safety experts believe lowering the annual road toll below 300 is still possible, despite an official warning that the target for 2010 will be difficult.

On the first weekend of this month, 10 people died on the roads.

Transport Minister Harry Duynhoven said the bloodshed reinforced the importance of the Government's target of fewer than 300 road deaths a year.

"It was always an ambitious target, but if you look at 372 deaths today going back 12 months, versus 433 for the 12 months prior to that, we are making some progress.

"It's not as good as I would like. We do see some stupid activities on the road and some dopey driving. The major thing, I think, is that people lack patience."

The Automobile Association said a road toll below 300 was achievable and the Government should be setting its sights beyond that.

"Once we hit 300, we need to set a lower target," said Mike Noon, AA motoring affairs and policy manager.

"Three hundred road deaths a year is almost a person a day dying on our roads. You have much more chance of dying or being injured in a car crash than you have of winning Lotto."

Achieving the target of 300 would be a challenge, said a briefing paper for the Minister of Transport.

The paper said the Road Safety to 2010 strategy had only been partly implemented.

"An independent review of the strategy provided to ministers in February this year indicated that the goals will not be achieved unless implementation is completed."

After receiving that warning, the Government last month launched a new consultation round, See You There - Safe As, aimed at making the 2010 target a reality.

"We have to find, particularly from young people, what can actually make a difference," said Mr Duynhoven.

Crash reduction methods such as advertising campaigns, drink-drive and speeding blitzes and more police traffic patrols had already shown good results.

However, further possible methods of cutting the number of crashes such as raising the driving age or lowering alcohol limits had previously faced strong public and political resistance.

"I have to deal in what is possible," Mr Duynhoven said. "I'm hopeful that when that round of consultation is finished we will have some positive initiatives that we can take."

Police national road policing manager Superintendent Dave Cliff said cutting the number of crashes lay with the individual motorist.

"If we could pull 5 per cent out of our urban speeds, that translates into a 20 per cent fatality reduction and a 10 per cent injury reduction.

"It's really very simple: The faster people travel, the more injuries that result. So if you can pull more speed out of the system, you have major gains in death and injury reduction."

Robert Isler, from the University of Waikato traffic and road safety research team, said better driver education and raising the driving age could see the 2010 target met.

"We need to put greater emphasis on training of young drivers. Young people are over-represented in these statistics and we let them drive very early, solo at the age of 15 1/2 without supervision. That's a time when they are at great risk of having an accident."

Having just spent six weeks in England, Dr Isler had no doubt New Zealand drivers behaved differently.

"You look at the driving behaviour of people there, you realise they just drive differently from what we do.

"We need to create a safety culture, that it's not cool to drive fast and it's great to drive safely."

The AA's Mr Noon also thought a change in mindset could play an important role in lowering the number of deaths and injuries.

"We tend to feel more secure than maybe we should do, and we should maybe be thinking about the seriousness of the act of driving."

* Last year's toll: 404 killed.

* Toll so far this year: 233.

* Target for 2010: No more than 300 deaths and 4500 taken to hospital.