Safer Roads - The number of fatal accidents on the
road again showS a decrease this week, as it did last week compared with the week before: Much more • important and satisfactory is the fact that this is the first normal year since figures were kept (i.e., since 1909) in which the ascending curve of road fatalities has been checked, and a decline been recorded. When it is recalled that even in the year§ immediately after the War the number of vehicles on the road Was considerably less than a million, • whereas this year it is approaching two and a half Million, the magnitude' of the achievement is more apparent: - The daily danger, as measured by-the number of vehicles on the road, has increased enormously, even 'since the Road Traffic Act was introduced, and it is therefore particularly Satisfactory that the upward curve should have been arrested at last. The • measures 'taken to accomplish this haVe been drastic. The authorities responsible for their application -have had the willing co-operation of most drivers, but the carelessness of pedestrians is still a cause of Many' accidents. So far as drivers are concerned, penalties such as the sentence of three years' penal servitude on a motorist found guilty of manslaughter when driving under the influence of drink will serve as necessary and salutary warnings.
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