Jennifer Horgan: If traffic remains the same, we must focus on punishing speed

In truth, these losses have come more gradually, but they have come. Some 150 people have died on our roads this year alone — 93 children in Cork were killed or seriously injured between 2014-2022.

The fact these deaths have happened over time should not dilute our horror that they have happened.

But it’s becoming worse than that really — it’s as if the drip feed of road deaths every week, if not every day, is becoming normal.

We cannot let that happen.

I walk to and from work every day. I am grateful for the exercise, the fresh air, my few moments every morning turning to follow the River Lee out to sea in sunlight, wind, and rain.

This year I also have a companion. My 13-year-old has started in first year at my school. You can imagine him, the bag bigger than himself, thin legs, and a mop of darkening hair.

I’m far more conscious of safety with him in tow. Yet, at times, I simply have no choice but to cut between cars that have blocked a pedestrian crossing in their efforts to nudge an inch forward in traffic. 

Beyond construction workers in bigger vehicles, who seem far more aware of what can go wrong, I see little concern for our safety from drivers.

Only a month ago, we missed a speeding car that careened across our road by less than an hour. I think about that collision every morning, every time we pass the severely damaged tree that took the blow of it.

I witness excessive speed every single day, cars revving up to get to the next red light — illogical dashes punctuated by beeping, hand gestures, and the occasional shouted expletive carried on the wind.

The numbers tally with my experience. The RSA ‘Driver Attitude & Behaviour Survey 2021’ found 57% of motorists admit to exceeding 50 km/h speed limits by up to 10 km/h.

Irish people love speed

Irish people love speed. We’ve been brainwashed to love it, by films and songs and advertising. There’s a reason car ads show us lone vehicles gliding into sunsets through deserts, or weightlessly passing over snowy peaks and rugged tracks.

Speed is power; it is man against nature; it is dominance. The same advertisements never show us wet narrow roads in Cork or Cavan, or the aftermath of speed gone wrong, the traumatised firefighter reaching under the carcass of a car to extract a terribly damaged body.

For decades, we’ve been shown one side of speed but we must now face the other.

We must stay with the action longer than the Hollywood cameras or advertising executives allow, and acknowledge the terrifying fact that speed kills.

The World Health Organization estimates a mere 5% reduction in average speed could result in a 30% reduction in fatal collisions.

If we’re looking at Cork, where myself and my son walk every day, that would mean going back in time and saving close to 30 children from death or injury over the last eight years.

The Love 30 Campaign (love30.ie) for 30 km/h speed limits is a growing movement.

Its website shares figures from the RSA outlining how a pedestrian hit by a car at 30 km/h will have only a one in 10 chance of dying; at 60 km/h, there’s a nine in 10 chance.

It also lists the many cities that have successfully imposed the limit, including London (20mph), Brussels, Milan, Santander, Bilbao, and Paris.

Deadly weapons

I believe Ireland needs a culture change, a national hypnosis, a re-programming to remind drivers they are moving around in deadly weapons and that without commensurate care, they have the potential to cause irrevocable harm to individuals and their families.

Drivers’ mindsets in Ireland are fixed on speed and convenience. Every morning myself and my son arrive at a school that sits on a hill with seven other schools, three primaries, and four secondaries.

Every morning I see parents in oversized cars, on narrow streets, with one child in the back. There is no effort being made to carpool or to keep the area around these schools clear.

The attitude is pervasive. I still receive text messages from people warning me that there is a speed camera around. I still see cars flashing one another in some sick pact against authority, as if they are school children themselves, avoiding the wrath of the principal.

As if this is all a game without consequences. Anyone who speeds on our roads is brandishing a loaded gun. They absolutely deserve to be punished for it. Fines should be excessive, as should penalty points.

Yes, infrastructural change could alleviate the pressure but that isn’t set to happen anytime soon. I live on the southside of Cork City and have hoped for change, to get fewer cars on the road, and to increase visibility in the hope of saving lives and reducing pollution.

BusConnects Cork promised “to provide a better, more reliable and more efficient bus service for everyone in addition to providing safe cycling and enhanced pedestrian facilities along key routes”.

A spokesperson tells me this week the “NTA has been engaging with various community groups, business groups and other stakeholders across Cork who have informed the design development process”.

The results of all this work, as it now appears to me, will mean very little will change where I live and walk. "Is no longer proposed" is repeated ad nauseam on the website.

Cork saying no to change

Cork residents are saying no to infrastructural change. Communities are blocking plans because they want to protect what is theirs. They want to protect their parking space, their garden, their life of convenience and self-interest.

They complain nobody uses the buses anyway, somehow not grasping the fact that the whole point of the exercise is to change behaviour, to increase walking, cycling, and bus usage.

And so, if our traffic is to remain the same, we must, we simply must, focus on punishing speed.

This is especially pertinent in Cork, the fastest-growing city in Ireland. Indeed, Cork City has been hailed the fifth overall best city in Europe for economic potential, according to the Financial Times FDI European Cities and Regions of Future 2020/2021 league.

What does any of it mean if we can’t protect vulnerable road users, and children trying to make their way to school?

Vision Zero, which looks to have no deaths or serious injury on Irish roads by 2050, is unachievable if we don’t radically change our relationship with driving and with speed.

It can take a little distance to see the truth of things — not everybody wants to go there, but it’s beyond time we all did.