Council up to date with accident data

Cavan County Council is up to date with submissions to a national system set up to help identify accident black spots, a meeting of the Cavan Joint Policing Committee heard earlier this month.

Most local authorities return reports of fatalities under the 'LA16' within six weeks of an incident. However some have been criticised for not sending in the data for up to 12 months. This can lead to the failure to identify potential accident black spots for attention either by the local authority or Transport Infrastructure Ireland (TII), formerly the National Roads Authority.

TII review the road collision data collected, and analyse contributory factors to identify priorities for work to improve road safety.

The LA16 process was developed to improve the quality of information for fatal and serious road collision. This was driven by limitations in the previous system, especially in relation to location and comments on technical road related issues made by non-technical staff.

The LA16 process was also intended to improve and encourage relationships between the Gardaí and local authority engineers.

Director of Service, Brendan Jennings, explained that the data in the LA16 related to fatalities in the county: “In 2020 there were two fatalities in the county, while in 2021 there were five. The work with the municipal district engineers and the Gardaí is completed on those and that is fully up to date. Unfortunately we had another fatality this week, but the LA16 is not completed for that yet, it is a process and it will be completed in due course.”

Chairman John Paul Feeley noted the submission by the Director of Service.

TII data shows that, nationally, 133 people died in 120 fatal road collisions in 2021 compared to 146 road deaths in 135 fatal road collisions during 2020.