‘Decades’ to reduce deaths

It will be “many decades” before New Zealand sees a substantial change in the road toll, says Associate Transport Minister Julie Anne Genter.

Genter said the Government was in the process of implementing its road safety strategy — a strategy she said would save lives.

But this would take time, she said.

“[There’s] a huge amount of road upgrades that need to be completed.”

In December last year, the Government committed $1.4 billion to making roads safer.

The policy, called the Safe Network Programme, aims to make 870km of high-volume, high-risk state highways safer by 2021 with improvements like median and side barriers, rumble strips, and shoulder widening.

That policy strategy will be in place in 2020, but Genter said it would be a process of “many decades to substantially bring down deaths and serious injuries on our roads”.

In 2007, the road toll climbed to 421 people — that figure fell to 253 in 2013 before going back up to 380 last year.

In terms of how long it would take to bring the road toll back down, Genter said the Government would be working on setting those targets.

“The targets haven’t been set exactly, but we’re making the improvements to the roads and we’re building up safer speeds. I want to see this happen as soon as possible but we live in a democracy so there are certain approaches we have to take”.

National MP Nikki Kaye said her thoughts are with those that have lost loved ones on the roads.

“Every person who loses their life on our roads has loved ones who will be grieving. We hope that the investment made by the Government will lead to fewer people dying on our roads.”