The worst crash toll in 15 years is being increasingly contributed to by an alarming rise in pedestrians including scooter fatalities.
The Austrlain Automobile Associations compiled year on year road toll found in the 12 months to 31 July 1,340 people died on the nation’s roads – 2.9 per cent more than last year.
The death toll included 205 pedestrians – up 44, or 27.3 per cent from the previous corresponding period and up 48.6 per cent since 2021.
In a separate study from the University of Melbourne By Associate Professor Milad Haghani has identified 37 fatalities from scooters in this period.
He found in his study of media reports that 13 of these deaths – more than one in three – involved children under 18.
Mobility devices that include recreation mobility devices and limited mobility devices, are classified as pedestrians in most state jurisdictions but insufficient data is collected and categorised.
This is why Professor Haghani has made his scooter specific study, published in Pursuit.
“In 2020 and 2021, there were just one or two recorded deaths each year. But by 2024, that number had climbed to 13. And in the first half of 2025 alone, there have already been ten confirmed fatalities – three of them children,” he says in his report.
“The vast majority of the fatal crashes involving children (11 out of 13, to be exact) were collisions with another vehicle, including cars, trucks and utes,” he says.
“In contrast, more than half of the crashes involving adults (13 out of 24) were single-vehicle incidents. These are typically cases where the rider loses control, crashes into a fixed object or falls off without the involvement of any other vehicle.
More information needed
The AAA has long argued that the 2021 National Road Safety Strategy which aimed halving national road fatalities by 2030 was failing due to a lack of information around each crash.
AAA Managing Director Michael Bradley said: “The National Road Safety Strategy is falling well short of its targets.
“Governments must look closely at their road trauma data to find out why, then take corrective action to save lives.”
WA worst
By state the rising rate of pedestrian deaths was driven by sharp increases in WA (31 deaths – up from 14 a year earlier) and Queensland (37 deaths – up from 23 a year earlier).
The AAA says it is concerned by the lack of clarity regarding the factors driving the increase but notes the nation’s transport and infrastructure ministers agreed at a meeting in Melbourne last week that the Western Australian Government would work with the National Transport Commission to produce a draft national integrated regulatory framework on pedestrian safety relating to personal mobility devices.