People in regional Australia were almost five times more likely to die in road crashes than those living in cities in 2022, new data shows.
It comes as a report from the Australian Automobile Association (AAA), released this week, showed the national road toll had increased by 5.9% in the 12 months to March 2023, with every state and territory except New South Wales and the Northern Territory recording more deaths than the previous year.
The managing director of the AAA, Michael Bradley, said the disproportionate number of fatal crashes in regional areas was of “great concern”.
He urged all governments to take urgent action to address the rising road toll, saying that Australia was not on track to meet its National Road Safety Strategy target of halving the number of road deaths by 2030 and reducing serious injuries by 30%.
Even in NSW, where the road toll has remained steady, the number of deaths on regional roads remained high.
In 2022, the regional NSW rate was 9.3 road deaths per 100,000, which was more than five times higher than the metropolitan rate of 1.7.
“These numbers present a picture that should be of great concern for people and families living across regional Australia,” Bradley said.
“We need to understand the factors causing this metro/regional disparity and greater commonwealth road safety leadership through improved data collection is the key to making this possible.”
Transport for NSW’s deputy secretary of safety, environment and regulation, Sally Webb, said the department welcomed “any recommendations to help us achieve zero road trauma”.
“Any death or serious injury on our roads is one too many, which is why we are committed to reducing road trauma in New South Wales,” she said.
Webb said that while only a third of the population of NSW lived in regional areas, crashes on regional roads accounted for 69% of the road toll.
“We know we need a sustained focus on improving safety in regional areas to achieve our new road safety targets,” she said.
Prof Max Cameron from the Monash University Accident Research Centre said car crashes in rural areas were more likely to be fatal because of the higher speeds involved.
He said Australia should consider lowering speed limits on rural roads that are not of “high quality”.
“Your typical rural Australian road is one lane in each direction,” he said. “Very quickly, you’re off the edge and there’s nothing really to stop you skidding or losing control.”
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Cameron praised a change introduced by the Victorian Andrews government to reduce the speed limit on country roads deemed to be a high crash risk to 80km/h, with unsealed roads as low as 60km/h, but said actually obeying the new limits was “a big ask for your typical rural Victorian motorist”.
“We’ve got the mindset that we’ve got to get from A to B as fast as we can,” he said.
Bradley said the report also raised concerns about the “unwillingness” of governments to collect data on road trauma.
“Collecting this data is important, as we know deaths are continuing to rise, but we have no national data regarding serious injuries, road quality, crash causes, or details regarding the people and cars involved,” he said.
“You can’t improve what you don’t measure, and when it comes to Australian road trauma, the commonwealth government measures very little.”
Bradley said the families of those who died on the road deserved to know that governments were learning from each crash.
“Until governments report against the targets they set, Australian road spending will continue to be a political football,” he said.
“Motorists deserve data-driven funding decisions, because saving a life is more important than saving a marginal seat.”