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Fair Go for our Regions: Regional leaders beg for balance as crumbling highways take their toll

Billions have been poured into Adelaide’s roads in recent years but it’s a different story in the regions, where 503 people have died on crumbling highways compared to 279 on city roads.

Fair Go For Our Regions: Murray Bridge

Regional leaders have joined forces with the South Australia’s Local Government Association and motoring body RAA calling for a fix to crumbling rural road network that they say is risking lives.

Since the start of 2011, 503 people have died on regional roads in South Australia — compared with 279 on metropolitan roads.

As part of a new campaign, Fair Go For Our Regions, The Sunday Mail and The Advertiser have spent weeks in rural and regional South Australia listening to community concerns and aspirations.

The Local Government Association of SA (LGASA) has told The Sunday Mail a key priority ahead of the Federal Election will be to lobby the Coalition and Labor for a consistent funding stream for South Australia’s regional roads — that have been consistently short-changed.

“Our State receives an unfair share of federal road funding, putting more pressure on South Australian ratepayers to fund the maintenance of safe local roads,” LGA President Sam Telfer told The Sunday Mail.

“The ‘top up’ payment that the Federal Government reintroduced in the 2017/18 budget is due to run out in five months’ time, and if not extended it will leave SA councils with a $20 million per year question mark hanging over their future roads and works budgets.”

A persistent concern has been the state of South Australia’s regional road system that mayors fear is struggling to cope with the addition of larger trucks, city commuters and tourists.

Mayors from across the state including the Fleurieu and Yorke Peninsulas, the Adelaide Hills, the Riverland and the Coonawarra wine region have called for help to improve roads.

In the Riverland, mayors say the issue has become more pressing after the former State Government approved road trains (B-Triples) on highways in the region.

Loxton-Waikerie Mayor Leon Stasinowsky said the heavy vehicles are causing the roads to crumble and become “unsafe for the average motorist.”

“A lot of our main bitumen roads, which are state roads, are actually crumbling away (at) the sides because of the bigger transport moving over the roads, so that makes it unsafe for the smaller vehicles that are going on them.

A B-triple truck. Picture: File
A B-triple truck. Picture: File

“So they need to be widened and some of them are getting more undulated because there’s more weight and a lot more of them going on them.”

The Renmark-Paringa mayor and Neil Martinson and Berri-Barmera mayor Peter Hunt share the concerns.

Both said the Sturt Highway needs more overtaking lanes and have raised concerns about a number of intersections that pose safety concerns.

Alexandrina Council has been calling for State Government funding for years, to upgrade Long Valley and Alexandrina roads — a major route used by people travelling to the Adelaide Hills or city.

In December, Playford Primary principal Dean Clark died in car accident on Alexandrina Rd.

It came just two weeks after Eastern Fleurieu School sweethearts Hayden Perkins, 17, and Mikayla Eastwood, 18, died on Long Valley Rd.

Alexandrina Council chief executive Glenn Rappensberg said the roads had become “busier and busier” as the region’s population expanded.

“The combination of retirees travelling, population increase, tourism and also parts of those transport corridors being B-double routes, means that a dual carriageway with no overtaking lanes become problematic,” Mr Rappensberg said.

Goyder Mayor Petter Mattey said the Barrier Highway, between Broken Hill and Main North Rd at Giles Corner, needs upgrading.

“The road needs to be widened so there’s a greater distance between vehicles and trucks aren’t going over the shoulder,”

“We’ve got a dangerous situation where vehicles put their wheels over the side of the bitumen,” Mr Mattey said.

“South Rd has had about $9 billion spent on it and if we had half that money spent in regional areas, it would make a big difference to the roads we’ve got.”

Yorke Peninsula Mayor Darren Braund said the area has a huge road network for the size of the region.

“Just keeping up to a good standard for our farms, our business and our tourists — and keeping people safe getting from one point to another — is very important.”

RAA Senior Manager Road Safety Charles Mountain said road safety was a crucial issue on rural roads, as each year more people died from collisions in the country than metropolitan Adelaide.

The motoring organisation have pulled together a list of the top ten road black spots in regional SA that need to be addressed.

“Motorists’ safety can be significantly enhanced by road maintenance and infrastructure upgrades, including shoulder sealing, removal or protection of fixed roadside hazards, installing overtaking lanes on high traffic routes and intersection upgrades,’’ Mr Mountain said.

Worst roads ranked:

RAA’s top 10 rural roads in need of an upgrade (based on traffic volumes, crash data, RAA member feedback and regional road assessment program)

1. Pt Wakefield – Port Augusta (Augusta Highway)

2. Tailem BendSA/Vic Border (Dukes Highway)

3. KeithMt Gambier (Riddoch Highway)

4. Gawler – Clare (Horrocks Highway)

5. Port Augusta – Port Lincoln (Lincoln Highway)

6. Old Noarlunga – Victor Harbor (Victor Harbor Road)

7. Wistow – Goolwa (Long Valley/Alexandrina Road)

8. Tailem Bend – Mt Gambier (Princes Highway)

9. Barmera – Berri (Old Sturt Highway)

10. Loxton – Pinnaroo (Browns Well Highway)

Mikayla Eastwood and Hayden Perkins died after a crash on Long Valley Rd, Gemmells, in November. Picture: Supplied by the family
Mikayla Eastwood and Hayden Perkins died after a crash on Long Valley Rd, Gemmells, in November. Picture: Supplied by the family

Hills crash victim’s mother pleads for safer regional roads

Kaye Eastwood will never see her daughter Mikayla wear the graduation cap after she was killed on a notorious regional road, which her mother said was partly to blame for the crash.

The grieving mother is urging for regional road safety to be taken more seriously, particularly on Long Valley Rd, Gemmells — the Adelaide Hills location where the 18-year-old girl and her boyfriend Hayden Perkins died on November 20.

This comes as a Nairne woman, 52, was died in a two-car collision on Thursday on the same road, less than 4km north of the teenagers’ crash.

Mrs Eastwood said Long Valley Rd was in need of urgent upgrade to make it safer for motorists, alongside other rural roads in the Adelaide Hills, Yorke Peninsula and Fleurieu Peninsula.

“I believe that the loose gravel and a large pothole on the side of the road where the accident happened were contributing factors to the accident,” she said.

“The embankments at the top of Castle Hill need to be cut away to allow for a left hand turning lane onto Gemmells Road.

Flowers are seen near the remnants of a car on the road where two teenagers died on Long Valley Road. Picture: AAP Image/ Morgan Sette
Flowers are seen near the remnants of a car on the road where two teenagers died on Long Valley Road. Picture: AAP Image/ Morgan Sette

“The road shoulders need to be bituminised instead of loose gravel … The surface of the road needs to be bituminised with a hot mix — not tar and then gravel put on top of that for cars to pack down.”

The teenage lovers were in a Mazda 323 when it hit a Hyundai i30, driven by a teacher from the Eastern Fleurieu School they attended.

The pair had just finished Year 12 and Mikayla was remembered as an animal lover who spoke her mind and dominated the soccer field.

Mrs Eastwood said turn out lanes should be added for all intersections along Long Valley Rd and more overtaking lanes in both directions — a suggestion that Alexandrina Council mayor Keith Parkes agreed with.

“The problem is increased traffic, more and more tourists are using this road than before and it’s getting hairy going up to Adelaide,” he said.

“Regional roads are seriously neglected.”

He said the road, which speed limit dropped from 110km/h to 100km/h a few years ago, is increasingly busy and dangerous even for locals or drivers familiar with the road.

— Josephine Lim

Fair Go For Our Regions- Yorke Peninsula

Police fear for busy YP highways

An upward trend of serious injury on Yorke Peninsula and Mid North roads has local police concerned.

They say extra tourism and shack-owner traffic could be a contributing factor.

“It’s been a big focus for us,” Superintendent Damian Powell, Commander for Yorke Mid North Local Service Area, said.

“While total road fatalities statewide have been the lowest on record, the number of people suffering serious injury on our local roads is rising.”

Supt Powell said 49 people were seriously injured on Yorke Peninsula and Mid North roads in 2016 compared to 45 in 2017 and 58 last year.

Serious road injuries have included brain and spinal injuries, broken bones and internal bleeding.

Supt Powell said a number of factors contributed to the increase in serious road injuries from excessive speed to inattentive driving, fatigue, drunk and drug driving and lack of experience on country roads.

But he said he believed increased traffic – particularly in the Yorke Peninsula – was adding to the rising trend.

“More people are coming through the region,” he said.

“From my own observations and talking with local police – Yorke Peninsula is one of the state’s fastest growing areas in terms of tourism visitors and people moving into the area.

“The increase in traffic is a likely contributing factor.” Other factors could include improvements in motor vehicles and upgrades of roads.

While traffic data for local roads is not available, Yorke Peninsula Council estimates the region’s population can more than triple from 11,000 residents over the Christmas and Easter holiday periods and long weekends.

Locals also say the number of shack owners has significantly increased and are now travelling more frequently to the region due to better cars and roads, including the roundabout at Federation Corner, near Port Wakefield, double lanes up to Port Wakefield and the addition of overtaking lanes along the highway.

Supt Powell said serious road trauma left a significant impact on victims and their families for the rest of their lives.

“Many will struggle to overcome the physical, emotional and mental challenges of a life changing, long-term road injury,” he said.

“It must be remembered that a driver’s licence is not a right – it is a privilege and that privilege is maintained by driving responsibly.

“Drivers need to realised that driving a vehicle at high speeds can turn it into a dangerous weapon that can harm the driver and other road users permanently.”

Yorke Peninsula 2015 – 2018 Crash Statistics Hotspots

Augusta Hwy (Pt Wakefied – Snowtown) – 6 Fatalities and 7 SIC (serious injury crash)

Augusta Hwy (Snowtown – Pt Pirie) – 6 Fatalities and 6 SIC

Maitland – 3 Fatalities and 3 SIC

Kadina/Wallaroo/Moonta – 2 Fatalities and 11 SIC

Port Wakefield – 3 Fatalities and 2 SIC

Foot of Yorke Peninsula – 3 Fatalities and 8 SIC

Source: SAPOL

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Original URL: https://www.adelaidenow.com.au/news/south-australia/fix-our-roads-regional-leaders-beg-for-balance-as-crumbling-highways-take-their-toll/news-story/65699da8c48876a7a752b0ce10e1574c