Gardaí this afternoon set up a high visibility motorway operation on the M1 targeting drunk drivers, criminal gangs and those who commit motoring offences. The operation which was part of the Garda Christmas enforcement campaign was designed to increase public awareness of the ability to easily set up mobile motorway roadblocks and detect impaired driving, speeding, lane discipline and breaches of the Road Traffic Act.
It was also designed to restrict the movement of criminal gangs, denying them ability to move freely across the road network.
During the event assistant Garda commissioner John Twomey said 677 people were arrested for drink-driving in November. More than 400,000 drivers have been breath-tested this year.
“The main objective of this operation is to increase the awareness of fatal and serious injury road traffic collisions. Within the Dublin Metropolitan area a total of 18 lives have been lost in fatal road traffic collisions to date in 2013, an increase of eight on this date last year” he said.
Referring to the total number of people killed on the State’s roads this year Mr Twomey said the ‘tragic fact’ was that “177 people won’t get the opportunity to sit down and enjoy the Christmas festivities with family and friends this year”.
In addition to the road traffic aspect, he said gardaí knew criminal gangs use the motorway network to travel around the country.
“High visibility operations such as this on the M1 today will increase over the coming weeks. By policing motorway routes leading to/from high residential areas, we will be denying criminals unchallenged use of the motorway network” he said.
