Irish roads fare badly in new European report

SOME OF Ireland's newer, improved roads come in for criticism under a new rating scheme contained in the latest European Road assessment programme (EuroRap) report.

EuroRap, a sister organisation to EuroNCAP, the independent crash test programme that gives star ratings to the safety performance of new cars, is currently putting the finishing touches to its safety comparisons for European roads.

However, The Irish Times has learned that while EuroRap notes the reduced crash and fatality rates in Ireland's new dual carriageways and motorways, international comparisons give poor results for improved single carriageway roads in rural areas. According to EuroRap, there are notable differences in safety performances of a typical 12 metre-wide road in rural areas, across a range of countries.

In Ireland these roads would be typically wide, single carriageway routes with wide hard shoulders, but no crash barriers. This gives rise to a high level of head-on collisions and a corresponding high level of fatalities. In comparison, in Sweden such roads would typically be "two-plus-one", road where there are two lanes in one direction, and one in the reverse direction. The extra lane alternates, giving two lanes in the opposite direction every few kilometers, while good crash barriers separate oncoming traffic.

In Ireland the N52 in the midlands was identified as high risk in the last EuroRap report in 2005. Three remedial works were proposed: a new Mullingar bypass, Mullingar to Belvedere and the Tullamore bypass. These are wide, single-carriageway roads which perform poorly in terms of head-on collisions. In comparison, the N25 and N11 routes, which fared badly in crash statistics in 2006, are being replaced, mainly by new dual carriageways.

In addition to statistical information on routes and crash levels compiled for EuroRap, engineers from Germany and Sweden have monitored such Irish roads for items such as lamp posts and they have looked at junction design which can be a contributory factor in fatalities.