thanks people!, I now have this working(as far as code is concerned)
now, I have a hardware issue 
ok, i have a tactile switch with 2k2, pulldown resistor attached to D2, and another wired the same on D3,
there is a yellow led indicator attached to pin D5, red to pin D7, and green to D9.
now when i press switch 1, pin 5 lights the yellow LED
when i press switch two, pin 7 lights the red LED
when i hold one switch, and press the other, the code deciphers which was the first to trigger, modifies the counter(for total entries/exits) and pin 9 lights the green LED
these result are mirrored to the web server which can be viewed from a browser. until......
THE PROBLEM
when i press both buttons at once, the ethernet portion of the board drops out.
code is as follows:::
#include <SPI.h>
#include <Ethernet.h>
// For MEGA2560 with IEsheild v1.01 only
// #include <enc28j60.h>
// #include <ethershield>
byte mac[] = { 0xDE, 0xAD, 0xBE, 0xEF, 0xFE, 0xED };
IPAddress ip(192,168,1,100);
const int IRTrigger1 = 2; // the number of the pin used to read IR beam status
const int IRTrigger2 = 3;
const int CounterChange = 9; // the number of the LED pin
const int IR1Triggered = 7; // to show beam one is broken
const int IR2Triggered = 5; // to show beam two is broken
// variables will change:
int IRState1 = 0; // variable for reading the pushbutton status
int IRState2 = 0;
int totalcars =0;
int IRvalue1 = 0;
int IRvalue2 = 0;
int entering = 0;
int leaving = 0;
int webserver();
// Initialize the Ethernet server library
// with the IP address and port you want to use
// (port 80 is default for HTTP):
EthernetServer server(80);
void setup() {
// initialize the LED pin as an output:
pinMode(CounterChange, OUTPUT);
// initialize the pushbutton pin as an input:
pinMode(IRTrigger1, INPUT);
pinMode(IRTrigger2, INPUT);
pinMode(IR1Triggered, OUTPUT);
pinMode(IR2Triggered, OUTPUT);
Serial.begin(9600);
Ethernet.begin(mac, ip);
server.begin();
Serial.print("server is at ");
Serial.println(Ethernet.localIP());
}
void loop(){
EthernetClient client = server.available();
if (client) {
Serial.println("new client");
webserver();}
// read the state of the pushbutton value:
IRState1 = digitalRead(IRTrigger1);
IRState2 = digitalRead(IRTrigger2);
Serial.print("IRvalue1= ");
Serial.println(IRState1);
Serial.print("IRvalue2= ");
Serial.println(IRState2);
Serial.println(" ");
Serial.println(" ");
if (IRState1 >0){
IRvalue1=1; digitalWrite(IR1Triggered, HIGH);
Serial.print("IRvalue1= ");
Serial.println(IRvalue1);}
else digitalWrite(IR1Triggered,LOW);
if (IRState2 >0){
IRvalue2=1;digitalWrite(IR2Triggered, HIGH);
Serial.print("IRvalue2= ");
Serial.println(IRvalue2);}
else digitalWrite(IR2Triggered,LOW);
if(IRState1 > IRState2){
entering = 1;} else if (IRState2 > IRState1){
leaving=1;}
if ((IRState1 + IRState2) ==2){
if (entering == 1){
totalcars = totalcars + 1;
digitalWrite(CounterChange, HIGH);
delay(1000);
digitalWrite(CounterChange, LOW); }
else if (leaving == 1){
totalcars = totalcars - 1;
digitalWrite(CounterChange, HIGH);
delay(1000);
digitalWrite(CounterChange, LOW);
}
entering=0; // reset everything
leaving=0;
IRState1=0;
IRState2=0;
}
}
int webserver(){
EthernetClient client = server.available();
boolean currentLineIsBlank = true;
while (client.connected()) {
if (client.available())
//{
char c = client.read();
// Serial.write(c);
client.println("
");
// if you've gotten to the end of the line (received a newline
// character) and the line is blank, the http request has ended,
// so you can send a reply
// if (c == '\n' && currentLineIsBlank) {
// send a standard http response header
client.println("HTTP/1.1 200 OK");
client.println("Content-Type: text/html");
client.println("Connnection: close");
client.println();
client.println("<!DOCTYPE HTML>");
client.println("<html>");
// add a meta refresh tag, so the browser pulls again every 5 seconds:
client.println("<meta http-equiv=\"refresh\" content=\"5\">");
// output the value of each Digital input pin
client.println("
");
client.print("Beam 1 is ");
client.println(IRState1);
client.println("
");
client.print("Beam 2 is ");
client.print(IRState2);
client.println("
");
client.print("Total cars in carpark is ");
client.println(totalcars);
// }
client.println("</html>");
break;
}
// if (c == '\n') {
// you're starting a new line
currentLineIsBlank = true;
// }
// else if (c != '\r') {
// you've gotten a character on the current line
currentLineIsBlank = false;
// give the web browser time to receive the data
delay(5);
// }
delay(5000);
//}
//close the connection:
client.stop();
Serial.println("client disonnected");
}
//}
sorry to be such a pain, any help is muchos appreciado