Record regional road toll hits 1,000 due to complacency, report finds

Peter Kalbfell remembers the outback road as miles of emptiness. In January 2000, that familiarity helped create the conditions for a crash that left him an incomplete quadriplegic.

Kalbfell had driven through the night while returning to Alice Springs after a Christmas trip to Maryborough, north of Brisbane. He and his girlfriend had made the journey many times, he said, and became more complacent about fatigue. While she drove, he removed his seatbelt to get comfortable. He does not remember the crash itself.

Police later told him the car left the road and rolled seven or eight times, crushing him underneath. He suffered paralysis from the neck down, with only minimal movement in his arms and legs. His girlfriend sustained minor injuries.

“

There is a lot of nothing out there, you know. Miles and miles and miles of nothing.

His experience comes as a new Australian Road Safety Foundation report records a sharp rise in deaths outside the capital cities. It found that 906 people died on rural, regional and remote roads in 2025, up 10.5% from 2024 and the highest figure since 2020. Those deaths made up nearly 70% of the national road toll, even though only about a quarter of Australians live in those areas.

The report identified complacency as a major source of risk-taking. Many drivers said they broke road rules because familiar roads felt safe. ARSF president Russell White said drivers needed to reclaim responsibility for their safety rather than leaving it to governments, police, road builders or car manufacturers. Driver psychology expert Ioni Lewis said the findings reflected the longstanding overrepresentation of road trauma in regional and remote Australia.

“

We've somehow outsourced that responsibility; whether it's to government, or it's to police, or it's to road builders or car manufacturers.