Come Thursday afternoon, many of the Central West's roads will be clogged with holiday makers wanting to get a head start on their four-day break, trying to pack in as many minutes into the weekend as possible.

And it's that eagerness to make the most of Easter that makes it the most dangerous weekend of the year on our roads.

It's the weekend when people tend to set off on their journey later in the day when they should, drive for longer periods than they should and even drive at higher speeds (when not caught in bumper-bumper jams) than they should.

And it's also the weekend when police are out in force trying to stop such bad behaviour, knowing all the while that there's only so much they can do.

It's one of the great frustrations of a police officer's job having to work on the holidays when the rest of us are spending time with our families so they can try and regulate the behaviour of those who should know better.

Ultimately, though, it's up to everyone to do their part to help bring down the road toll as we continue working towards the ultimate goal of zero deaths.

For its part, the state government has committed big money in recent to improving the quality of the state's roads and is introducing tough new rules to make drivers who do the wrong thing pay a higher price for their mistake.

The ignominy of having an interlock device installed on the car of every motorist convicted of a mid-range PCA [or higher] should serve as an extra deterrent and using the state's speed camera network to catch people on their mobile phone will also be effective.

But, history shows, no deterrent works in all cases.

In the end, bad driving behaviours come down to individual choices and there will always be drivers who take the wrong option.

The three chief killers on our roads remain drivers who are fatigued, drivers who are affected by alcohol or drugs, and, above all, drivers who are speeding. Road safety boffins and the police can do only so much to combat such idiotic, high-risk behaviour.

A zero road toll might be an impossible dream, but it has to be the target. Because zero is the only target that admits that every life lost on our roads is one life too many.