A total of 4,073 traffic accidents were reported in the second quarter of this year, with 313 casualties (including three deaths). Traffic accidents happen for various reasons. However, one important factor is the physical state of the road.
It is unbelievable that in 2008, and after four years as a member of the European Union most of our main roads are in an abysmal state. A lot of work has been done by local councils and the government on residential roads (perhaps to win votes).
The last serious attempt at upgrading our main roads was with funds from the fifth Italian financial protocol (i.e. the 'CHOGM' roads). However, many main roads are still in need of major surgery, all hungrily awaiting EU funding.
Many roads are riddled with cracks, holes (sometimes craters), humps and bumps. So motorists are obliged to slalom to avoid damaging their car or worse suffering a slipped disc (no wonder low back pain in Malta is rife). The fun does not stop here. Motorists have to navigate roads with no or wrong camber on perilous bends, in summer on dangerously slippery roads and in winter ford through rain-bogged roads.
Cars may be fitted with advanced braking systems without the road surfaces to match them. Extra wide pavements stick out into main roads which give motorists a very small margin of error. I once witnessed a car hit the not-too-narrow pavement on the Mġarr road and fly before my very eyes into a field on the other side of the road.Good thing I was not there a second earlier. Main roads connecting the various towns should not have pavements but cycling lanes (anyone remember the environment, spiralling fuel costs, obesity?).
Most road markings are faint or non-existent. Where have all the stop, give way, carriageway, lane and zebra crossing markings gone? Maybe in the next Budget, the finance minister can allocate money for a couple of pots of white paint and paintbrushes.
What is amazing is that even newly built roads do not get a dab of paint. Birbal Street in Balzan never received markings to the centre carriageway marked, while motorists zigzag between sunken manholes (why can't contractors ever align the manhole lid/drain grate with the road surface?) a head-on collision is just waiting to happen.
It is incomprehensible that although motorists fork out millions of euros through road licences, taxes and traffic fines, very little seems to find its way into road maintenance.
Why isn't there regular road resurfacing? A very bad road is the stretch in Mrieħel between the MFSA and the Fleur de Lys roundabout with a horrendous junction near the St Theresa junior lyceum. It has been ages since this road was resurfaced.
So will EU road funding coupled with a strong local political will and leadership solve our road ills? Time will tell. Until then, death and injury continue unabated on our treacherous roads.