TOLL OF THE ROAD

Chronicle (Levin), 20 August 1947, Page 4

TOLL OF THE ROAD

NEED FOR PROPER SENSE QF DANGERS

"The road safety campaign npw being conducted throughout New Zealand is designed primarily to impress on all road users the vital necessity of using the utmost care at all times,'' ' the New Zealand Junior Chamber qf Commerce stated tpday when explaining the purpose qf the campaign it" is conducting this week and next week. "The true imp'ort 6f ^thb 1 'Campaign can perhaps best be judged - from the slogan chqsen for use on all our publicity— 'Have a Care, Danger's There'. "Altogether some 3000 young men, all members of the Junior Chamber of Commerce, are participating in the campaign. Our activities are, in the main, confined to publicity, for we f.eel thaj; our greatest contribution to ensuring safety on the roads is to inculcate ihto children and adults alike a proper sense of the dangers of road use and at the §ame time show that, by the obs.ervanGe of simple rules, these dangers ca'p be ayert'ed. "We have been cpncerned at the evidence of increasing road accidents in recent years, and especially since the removal of pqtrol restrictions. Figures pbtained frpm the Transpprt Department shew that in 1938- there were 254 fatalities on the' rpads. In 1939 the number of persons kjlled was 251, -but in the war years, with Su'rtailpd private' motoring, there was a rapid drop to 204 in 1940 to 176 in 1941, 167 in 1942, 145 in 1943, 140 in 1944 and 129 'in 1945. The retiirn 'to normal traffic brought with it a steep rise in the number of fatalities no less thsn 188 persons being killed in road accidents in 1946. Figures so far this year suggest that the 1946 total may be exceeded.