The officer in charge of roads policing has said up to 80% of road deaths occur on roads with speed limits of 80-100km/h, where very often speed vans cannot park.
Assistant Commissioner Paula Hillman told the Policing Authority that gardaí monitor trends in road deaths and while last year there was a significant increase among drivers who were 60 and older, this year the increase is mainly in passengers and young people.
She also challenged claims that gardaí are not putting sufficient resources into roads policing.
The Assistant Commissioner said 5% of the resources of the Garda organisation were allocated to roads policing, the highest to any area of policing.
The Deputy Commissioner said it had been "a horrendous year for fatalities on the road" for victims and their families and for gardaí who had to attend these scenes.
She insisted that, in general, the resources for roads policing were "holding strong" and that it was not necessarily "the areas where there's a reduction in roads policing where the problems are".
The senior garda officer also told the Policing Authority that "a lot more needs to be done in relation to technology."
Assistant Commissioner Hillman said a team of gardaí have gone to Scotland to look at the safety camera network there, with a view to the possibility of introducing more static traffic cameras on Irish roads.
She said there are just two static average speed cameras in Ireland, on the M7 and at the Port Tunnel, which slow people down, adding that there could an opportunity here.
She also said there were issues for other agencies who deal with traffic management issues such as the National Transport Authority and the County and City councils, and issues like bus lane enforcement, mobile phone usage and not wearing a seat belt could be dealt with by other agencies without Garda input.
She also said that driver behaviour was a huge concern, and 75% of drink and drug driving was detected by frontline members.
Gardaí, she said, had prioritised the top seven areas where road fatalities are highest, with Mayo one of them.
The Policing Authority meeting is being held in Ballina.
Fears of 'ongoing uptick' in road deaths over winter
Meanwhile, Minister of State at the Department of Transport Jack Chambers has said he was "concerned that as we enter the winter period there could be an ongoing uptick in road fatalities" and that enforcing road traffic laws has to be "prioritised" if the trend is to be reversed.
He made the comments after a man in his 50s died when an e-scooter he was travelling on was struck by a car in the Sligo village of Riverstown yesterday evening.
His death brings the total number of people killed on our roads so far this year to 155, the same as the total number killed in fatal road incidents last year.
Mr Chambers said there was a "worrying and shocking rise in road deaths this year, on the back of increases last year".
The Minister of State said Government was working with An Garda Siochana and the Road Safety Authority "to reverse that trend"
Following a drop in the number of gardaí assigned to the Garda National Roads Policing Bureau, Mr Chambers said he "strengthened enforcement" was "a central component" in reversing the recent increase in people killed on our roads.
"We have reflected the concerns of campaigners to An Garda Síochána and I want to see strengthened enforcement through our roads policing units and I have said that directly to both the Minister for Justice and An Garda Síochána, and that has to be prioritised from a policing perspective over the coming weeks and months."
The death toll in road incidents to date in 2023 is just over 30% higher than the same time last year.
According to data compiled by An Garda Síochána, 119 people had been killed by 26 October 2022, compared to 155 so far this year - an increase of 36.
Of the 155 deaths since the start of the year, 53 were drivers and 32 were passengers, while 38 were pedestrians.
22 motorcyclists are among those who have lost their lives on the roads, along with five cyclists, four e-scooter drivers or passengers and one pillion passenger.
Amid the alarming rise in road deaths, the Road Safety Authority and gardaí yesterday appealed to all road users to be extra vigilant ahead of the October Bank Holiday weekend.
Additional reporting: Paul Reynolds, Fergal O'Brien
