By Tanya Faulkner
More than 500 unauthorised vehicles were detected in a recent road safety effort, with the help of Automatic number plate recognition (ANPR) technology.
The recent five-day Operation Amity saw an increased police presence on Victorian roads during the high-risk Australia Day period, with ANPR technology fitted to highway patrol and specialist police vehicles used to detect disqualified, suspended and unlicensed drivers.
Acting Assistant Commissioner Road Policing Justin Goldsmith said with school resuming thai week, and more people returning to work after the holidays, now is not the time to be complacent behind the wheel.
“Whilst it’s great that ANPR technology is helping police to detect and remove more unauthorised drivers than ever before, it’s also frustrating that we continue to detect an increasing number of these suspended, disqualified and unlicensed drivers on our roads.”
On average, Victoria Police detected an average of 100 unauthorised drivers during each day of Operation Amity; an increase on the 85 unauthorised drivers detected per day during the statewise road policing operation during the Christmas period.
Of all the infringements issued during the operation, over one third were for speeding, with the majority of them between 10km/h and 25km/h over the speed limit.
Police also caught 225 drink drivers and 198 drug drivers during the operation, with 117,703 alcohol and drug tests conducted across the state.
Across Victoria, a total of 6,728 traffic offences were detected during Operation Amity, including:
2,384 speeding offences – 1,876 of those for speeding between 10km/h and 25km/h over the limit
258 disqualified or suspended drivers
244 unlicensed drivers
225 drink driving offences from 114,973 preliminary breath tests
198 drug driving offences from 2,730 roadside drug tests
261 mobile phone offences
374 disobey signs/signals
168 seatbelt offences
186 vehicle impoundments
741 unregistered vehicles
Mr Goldsmith said we’ve also seen another tragic period on our roads that has resulted in six lives lost within four days.
“It’s been a particularly bad start to the year, and we’re really concerned about the high number of fatalities this month, particularly on rural roads across the state.
Victorian roads saw six fatalities between 25 and 28 January, with fatal collisions occurring in Berwick, Broadford, Halls Gap, Lilliput, Moutajup and Tatong – bringing the total lives lost to 30 this year, up from 21 at the same time last year.
More than 75 percent of fatal collisions this year have occurred on rural Victorian roads.
“Rest assured, our enhanced capability means we are stopping [unauthorised] drivers in their tracks and removing them from our roads, making it safer for all road users,” said Mr Goldsmith.
Operation Amity ran from 12:01am on Wednesday 25 January to 23.59 on Sunday 29 January.
