Three killed in two road crashes

Three people died in two separate road crashes in counties Wicklow and Limerick yesterday morning.

Shortly after 7.30am a woman in her 60s was killed when her car was in collision with a lorry at Annacotty in Limerick city.

The Limerick City Ring Road was closed between the Tipperary road roundabout and the roundabout behind the Roxboro swimming pool for a number of hours.

In Wicklow two men died shortly before 9am when the car in which they were travelling was in collision with another on a single carriageway stretch of the N11 known as the Ballinameesda bends south of Wicklow town. The road was closed until about lunchtime yesterday.

The Wicklow deaths bring to 16 the number of people killed on the 19km link between the Rathnew and Arklow bypasses in south Co Wicklow during the past nine years. The link is the last remaining single carriageway stretch of the N11 in Co Wicklow.

Compulsory purchase orders for the land required to upgrade the road to dual carriageway status were confirmed by An Bord Pleanála in January 2005, at which time Wicklow County Council said that it was ready to implement the scheme. But construction funding failed to appear in the National Roads Authority allocations in 2005, 2006 or 2007.

Last week, Minister for Transport Martin Cullen said that the N11 would be completed to dual carriageway status from Dublin to Rosslare by 2012.

Meanwhile, provisional statistics indicate that 301 drink-driving incidents were recorded during the seven-day period to last Sunday, compared to 447 the previous week.

The Garda Press Office said that its enforcement activities in this area of road safety would continue to be given priority.