In the seven-year period from 2015 to 2021, the NRMA reported that more road fatalities were recorded in the regional areas of NSW and the ACT than in the major cities.
And as innocuous as it appears, the Monaro Highway heading south from Canberra is one such perilous zone.
The annual Crash Index compiled by insurer AAMI regularly ranks the ACT section of the Monaro in its top one or two crash sites across the territory.
AAMI described it as "a well-known speeding hotspot that frequently gets into the headlines for all the wrong reasons".
Further down as the highway winds in and out of the ACT on its route south, multiple memorial crosses begin to appear on the side of the road where high-speed fatalities have claimed one life after another.
Huge B-double semi-trailers increasingly ply this highway as the new Snowy Mountains Special Activation precinct begins to bring more development and heavy transport movements into Cooma and Jindabyne.
Acting Superintendent Matt Craft used to live at Royalla and knew the location of the crosses because he drove past them on his way to work. He also saw a lot of risky driving behaviour.
"This is a dangerous stretch of road and that's why we are focusing on it and other highways around Canberra over the next few days as part of National Road Safety Week," the head of the ACT's Road Policing Team said.
"What we see a lot down this way is casual speeding; the speed limit is generally 100km/h but people see the highway ahead and push that speed a bit higher, which further increases the risk.
"But there are other risks, too, and wildlife is one of them. A lot of kangaroos get hit by vehicles on this highway.
"We also know that with the snow season just a few weeks away, there's going to be a lot more traffic."
The same section of the Monaro Highway was also the focus of a case being heard in the Queanbeyan District Court this week where Marc Jessop had pleaded guilty to charges of guilty to charges of manslaughter, dangerous driving and not stopping during a police pursuit in December 2021.
Just south of the ACT, the stolen Commodore Jessop was driving had a head-on impact with a Mitsubishi, driven by blameless victim, 56-year-old Harri Jokinen, who died at the scene.
Court documents revealed that the stolen vehicle was travelling at more than 188km/h in the seconds before its airbag was deployed.
