Two people have died in separate road crashes in Dublin and Kildare.
It brings to ten the number of people killed on Irish roads since the start of this year.
In Dublin, a male pedestrian died after he was hit by a car at around 4am this morning.
The man was pronounced dead at the scene and no one else injured.
The incident happened at around 4am near Lusk.
The stretch of road on the M1 between Junction 4 and 5 northbound - which had closed following the incident - has since reopened.
The scene had been sealed off for forensic examination.
Gardaí have appealed for anyone with information or dash cam footage to contact them.
It came after a man in his 40s was killed in a single-vehicle crash in Kilcullen, Co Kildare yesterday evening.
The incident happened on the R448 at Halverstown around 6.15pm.
The man, who was driving a SUV, was pronounced dead at the scene.
His body was brought to Naas General Hospital where a post-mortem will take place.
The road was closed to facilitate a technical examination, but has since reopened.
Anyone with any information or dash cam footage is asked to contact Naas Garda Station on 045 884 300, the Garda Confidential Line on 1800 666 111, or any garda station.
Speaking on RTÉ's This Week, Minister for Minister for Environment, Climate and Communications Eamon Ryan said that a number of measures will come into effect this year to improve road safety.
Mr Ryan said extra resources are being put in place as part of efforts to reduce road deaths.
'Extremely worrying'
Road safety campaign groups have expressed concerns about the number of deaths so far this year.
Susan Gray from the PARC Road Safety Group described the figures as "extremely worrying".
She said "10 precious lives were lost on the roads" during the first 14 days of January, which she said equates to almost one death every day.
Ms Gray said the Government needs to "go back to the drawing board" to come up with measures to reverse the trend.
She said PARC is particularly concerned that three of the deaths were in Kildare, a county which she said recorded only three deaths in entirety of 2023.
The Irish Road Victims Association (IRVA) has also described the number of people killed on the roads as "very worrying".
Leo Lieghio, the vice-President of the IRVA, believes road users have become complacent.
"Absolutely, definitely going in the wrong direction. It's a very worrying figure."
He said the death of a loved one in a road incident is something family and friends of a deceased person "will never get over".
"Eventually they will learn to get by, just learn to cope and carry on. But you don't get over something like that, family, friends, it's a heartache that no one should have to go through."
Mr Lieghio said roads deaths "are preventable, the vast majority are preventable."
He said he would "love to see the Government start taking action immediately, urgently" and he called for the introduction of double the current number of penalty points for offences.
More investment
Mr Ryan said the Government is changing the laws "so that we reduce the default speed limits, so that they actually help reduce deaths."
He said enforcement needs to be increased "through An Garda Síochána but also installing more cameras to catch speed and to try and make sure that the areas where it's most dangerous, the highest accident rates, that we can bring it down."
"We'll help them do that by introducing rules around the use of cameras, to make it easier for us to use speed cameras both in urban areas and on the national roads," he said.
"That'll help the gardaí to do their job without always having to have a member of the force there in every place," he added.
Mr Ryan also said there will be more investment to improve road surfaces, dangerous junctions and dangerous sections of roads.
The minister said the road deaths trend is going in the wrong direction, saying "we need to respond to that with more enforcement, better education and better engineering, and we will do all three."
Additional reporting Fergal O'Brien
