Phil’s work for cyclists’ safety is recognised
WEXFORD’S Stayin’ Alive at 1.5 campaign picked up a prestigious award on Sunday.
Phil Skelton, the driving force behind the campaign, picked up the Irish Road Victims Association’s (IRVA) Light of Hope award in Mulligan as part of the World Day of Remembrance activities.
Phil said he had been delighted to hear the campaign had won the award.
‘It was very welcome. It’s nice to get some recognition and nice to see the work of the Stayin’ Alive at 1.5 being celebrated. I think that everyone in Wexford is very familiar with the signage now and I’d like to thank David Codd, the road safety officer with Wexford County Council and Frank Burke, the cycling officer with Wexford, for their work on the campaign.
‘While it is hard to know if the signage has stopped motorists from making bad over- taking decisions since it was introduced around the county we do know that there hasn’t been a cycling fatality in the county in the past five years since the signage came into effect.
‘I think everyone has seen the signs now and the campaign is working but there is more work to be done. However it has certainly had a positive effect.’
Phil said that last week Fianna Fail lent its support to the campaign and it is hoped that it will be introduced nationwide in the future. ‘
Accepting the award Phil said: ‘We need to have a serious conversation around aiming our road fatalities towards zero in this country and I believe that we have simply got to stop trading off safety for time savings.
‘We in Ireland need to fast track evidence based road safety programmes. ‘One of these is the introduction of a cyclist-specific minimum passing distance law along with other working models of this from overseas.’
He said that since the campaign was introduced in England there had been a 20 per cent reduction in death and serious injury to cyclists while there was a 34 per cent decrease in cyclist fatalities in Australia.
‘When we transfer these figures into the Irish context for the 13 cyclists who have died on our roads this year, this translates to potentially two to four doors that the gardaí don’t need to knock on to inform a family of the loss of a loved one.’