Abel Losada warns that speed is behind 30% of fatal accidents that occur on the roads

The subdelegate of the Government in Pontevedra, Abel Losada, presented this morning a speed control campaign promoted by the General Directorate of Traffic (DGT) with which road safety will be strengthened between now and Sunday, 21. The campaign, which will have a special impact on conventional roads (those with only one lane in each direction) and urban roads in the province, is part of the annual DGT programme and aims to raise awareness of the need to respect speed limits. Interurban roads accounted for 74% of the registered accidents in the province during the first quarter of 2024.
Abel Losada explained that this campaign seeks to inculcate the people who use the roads to a close relationship between excesses with the accelerator and accidents and recalled that approximately 30% of fatal accidents are directly related to the lack of respect for the limits. “Speed has to be adapted not only to regulations, but also to road conditions and weather conditions, because proper speed saves lives.”
The campaign is coordinated by the Provincial Traffic Headquarters of Pontevedra and will use the maximum possible means, with the notification, when possible, of the existence of controls through the variable signage panels and on the alphanumeric screens of the vehicles of the Traffic Group located in the vicinity. In the presentation, which was made at the foot of the N-550, Abel Losada was accompanied by the provincial head of Traffic, Paula Yubero, and the captain of the Subsector of the Civil Guard, Antonio Pérez Piteira.
The controls, which will ensure compliance with the generic and specific limits of speed, overtaking speed and distances between vehicles, will be reinforced on those more dangerous sections of conventional roads. In this regard, the subdelegate evidenced his concern about the data on road accidents in this year 2024, in which 1,435 accidents and 10 fatalities have been registered, “which means a significant reinstatement, greater than 10% in the case of accidents and 30% in the case of deaths,” he warned. “It’s been a worrying start to the year.”
70% of accidents are on regional and local roads
Abel Losada criticized the politicization of road safety and the use of traffic accidents as a weapon of partisan confrontation. This respect highlighted that of the 10 people who died in traffic accidents in the province so far this year, 6 died on regional roads, 3 on state roads and 1 on a municipal highway. “These people, who are in public positions of responsibility, who in these days are trying so hard to focus on the state network all the problems of road safety in the province should reflect on this data, since 70% of the accidents that occurred in the first quarter of the year occurred on roads of regional, provincial or municipal ownership,” he said, before making a “call to wisdom.”
The deputy delegate also highlighted the commitment of the Government of Spain to the maintenance of state-owned roads, recalling that the General Budgets of 2023 reserved 1.4 billion euros for conservation. “The current government not only increases the amount, but is the first to devote more funds to conservation than to the construction of new infrastructure,” he added.
Losada insisted that the deterioration of the firm is the result of the cuts of the Government of Mariano Rajoy. “Pavements have a useful life of about 15 years, so today’s potholes are the legacy of PP cuts in the past,” he explained. The subdelegate recalled that the last budget of the Government of Zapatero, in 2011, allocated 1,079 million euros for the maintenance of the roads, while the last budget of Mariano Rajoy, in 2018, allocated only 755 million euros, which means a reduction of 25%. “In order to reverse the cuts and make up for lost time, the Ministry of Transport has doubled the allocation for conservation since 2018, but it will take some time.” He insisted that “regardless of the work of each of the administrations, institutional cooperation is fundamental to achieve the shared goal of improving road safety, because there are accidents on the roads of all administrations.”
4% of infringements in the previous campaign
The campaign that begins today is a central part of the annual programming of the General Directorate of Traffic. Data from the seven days of last year’s campaign, held between April 17 and 23, 2023, show that the agents of the Traffic Group of the Civil Guard carried out a hundred checks, registering the passage of 27,105 vehicles. Of the total number of vehicles checked, 4% of the drivers were reported as having exceeded the limits.