I don’t like speeding and I suspect anyone who has ever worked for the emergency services will have a similar outlook. Attending to victims of serious road collisions is never easy and much of that carnage could be reduced if we all slowed down a little. I’m in favour of the enforcement of our speed limits but I’m not sure we always get it right.
I sometimes do a school run for the grand kids and every time, without fail, I see examples of driving that make my blood run cold. Anyone who makes these journeys will be familiar with the scenes outside the school gates in the morning.
Cars going in both directions, cars parked on either side of the road and in places that are clearly marked as no-parking zones, double parking, children everywhere, stepping out from behind parked cars and running to catch up with their friends.
Add the normal passing traffic to the mix, with many driving as if they are on an open road, and you have a recipe for chaos. If one of those kids suddenly breaks free of its parent or trips while running and falls into the road, those cars will have little chance to stop suddenly. In bad weather it’s even more dangerous with reduced visibility for everyone, and I have yet to see speed enforcement near any of the schools.
GoSafe vans get a lot of stick and I reckon much of that comes down to the fact the many people consider them to be in the wrong locations most of the time. The GoSafe company would probably argue that they are advised by An Garda Siochana on the areas they need to target.
According to the Garda Siochana official website, 61 new safety camera zones became operational on 26th July 2022, bringing the total number of safety camera zones nationwide to 1,373. The primary purpose of safety cameras is to reduce speed-related collisions, lessen injuries and save lives.
Safety cameras operate in areas where there is a history of speed related collisions known as speed enforcement zones. All zones are available on the Garda website and available for GPS Navigation providers to download.
An Garda Síochána has completed an updated collision analysis of the road network based on recent available collision statistics. New locations were selected following an analysis of the data acquired from fatal, serious and minor road traffic collisions and from further consideration given to locations of concern highlighted by local communities through local Garda Community engagement.
So, just to be clear, safety cameras operate in areas with a history of speed related collisions, but they can also be deployed in school safety zones and locations of concern highlighted by local communities.
There’s also an interactive map on the Garda website that enables users to zoom into their locality or any region in the country to see where safety cameras may be enforcing speed limits. By clicking on a highlighted zone, you can see how many speed-related minor injury, serious injury, and fatal collisions have occurred on that particular road.
I did that for the section of roadway near the site of what was once IFI, opposite the entrance to Cobh Golf Club to see the statistics for that area. These statistics have determined that a GoSafe van should be located there and bearing in mind that the GoSafe monitoring began in 2010, I would assume these statistics are covering a twelve-year period.
In that twelve-year period from 2010 to 2022 these are the accidents that occurred on that stretch of roadway according to official data on the interactive map: Fatal Collisions: 0. Serious Collisions: 1. Minor Collisions: 5. Total Number of Collisions: 6. Six accidents in 12 years on the main road out of Cobh.
I fail to see how that road fits the criteria for a hot spot, but it’s a regular parking area for a GoSafe van. As you drive out of Cobh heading towards Cork, you have to accelerate up the hill towards the golf club. It’s a 60k per hour zone and as you breach the top of the hill, the speed van awaits. Like shooting fish in a barrel.
A new location in Cobh, Spy Hill, has now been added to the list of GoSafe areas. It is known locally as the Bishops Road, due to the fact that the Bishop resides there. I have never heard anybody expressing concern about this being a dangerous patch of road so, I clicked on the interactive map to see what damning statistics designated this area suitable for enforcement. The search revealed one serious collision and one minor one.
I wonder then why a road like the Tay Road for example, is not included despite numerous complaints by residents over many years about speeding. It was resurfaced a few years back by the Cork County Council and unfortunately that encouraged some drivers to treat it like a racetrack.
Originally designed to allow the horse and cart to get from one side of the island to the other, the Tay Road was never intended to cater for the volume of traffic it currently experiences. There were many accidents over the years when I lived there. My garden wall was struck by a car on one occasion and more recently a driver went through the garden wall of another property on that road.
If the statistics for that area were examined over the last twelve years, I reckon they would present a strong argument for inclusion as a GoSafe location, and I would prefer to see a speed van there rather than have it lying in wait over the brow of a hill like a sniper.
With winter coming, school safety zones might be worth considering as suitable locations too.