The 20-year-old was sending a text message before her car hit a tree on the Murray Valley Highway near Cobram in December 2012.

Now, Brooke’s mother Vicki is determined to highlight the dangers of using a mobile phone while driving following her daughter’s death.

She wants the “don’t text and drive” message to become as prominent as speeding and drink-driving campaigns in Australia.

The Don't-txt-n-drive Foundation has been awarded a $30,000 grant from the NSW Centre for Road Safety for five billboards to go up around Sydney.

“It’s not a subject that is really pushed in the public – governments have touched on it but still their main messages are speeding and drink-driving,” Ms Richardson said.

“Until it’s as popular as those messages, we are just going to keep going with this.”

NSW Centre for Road Safety data from 2010 to 2014 showed there were 236 crashes where hand-held mobile phone use by drivers was identified as a contributing factor. This included seven fatalities.

From July 2014 to June 2015, more than 35,300 fines were issued to drivers in NSW for using hand-held mobile phones.

“People say they see it so much in the city, people sitting at traffic lights using their phones – it becomes habit,” Ms Richardson said.

“Once you start that habit it becomes hard to stop.

“I know Brooke had been texting and driving and I spoke to her about 12 months before her accident.

“I sat her down and told her to stop. She might have stopped for a couple of weeks but then she started again – it’s the habit that is the problem.

“Because you do it and get away with it, you think it’s safe but it only takes one time to go wrong – you never know when that could be.”

The billboards simply read: “At 20, Brooke’s life was taken by a text”.

“We wanted to try and get the public to realise that these are real people,” Ms Richardson said.

“Brooke would be so excited. She always wanted to save a life. About six weeks before the accident she wanted to donate a kidney. Now I know what she was supposed to do.”