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Road safety goes hi-tech

By Nkuli Mngcungusa
Johannesburg, 23 Mar 2005

Arrive Alive and the transport department have turned to technology to minimise road accidents this Easter. The campaign is set to cost the department R6.29 million.

Transport minister Jeff Radebe says road fatalities increased from 12 348 in 2003 to 12 709 last year.

As part of this year`s campaign, traffic police cars countrywide have been fitted with video cameras, tracking systems, breathalysers and scanners. These scanners will read the barcode on licence disks and drivers` licences and feed the information to the National Traffic Information System.

The department has identified the 86 most hazardous sections of road countrywide, covering a combined distance of 10 730km.

Eighty patrol cars have been set up to guard the traffic at these points, of which 18 will be shared between Gauteng and KwaZulu-Natal.

"The current level of road law enforcement on SA`s roads is not effective in curbing the continuing, general high level of lawlessness and the increasing number of road traffic crashes and resulting fatalities and injuries," says Radebe.

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