Bruce Highway horror: ‘Too often, lives are the price of change’

The Bruce Highway is one of the most unforgiving roads and we need to keep investing to make it safer, but we also need to be much better drivers, writes Carlie Walker, who has been to more fatal accidents than most of us.

The scenes of two horror crashes on the Bruce Highway near Maryborough.

In the days after reporting on the horrific scenes on the Bruce Highway at Maryborough this past week, it didn’t take long for my mind to turn to another fatal crash about 13 years ago.

When you’re a journalist, there are some days in the newsroom you never forget.

Usually those days are for all the wrong reasons.

One of those days was June 30, 2011, when we received reports of a serious truck crash off the overpass where vehicles exited the Bruce Highway to come into Tinana.

When then-Chronicle photographer Alistair Brightman got to the scene, it was nothing short of horrific.

A truck was hanging off the overpass and onto the Bruce Highway.

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Two men lost their lives that day and they were just kilometres from reaching their destination, the Brolga Theatre, having come all the way from Brisbane.

When the photos started coming into our system, the only reaction I could describe among myself and my colleagues was one of stunned horror.

In the years following that terrible day, a massive $38 million upgrade of that overpass was carried out, a joint effort by the state and federal governments.

Then Wide Bay MP Warren Truss was the federal member at the time, but when it opened, Llew O’Brien was the new MP and Bruce Saunders was the state MP for Maryborough.

I was there the day the new interchange opened and well remember seeing the vast difference between the old bypass and the new structure.

The original bypass was dangerous and in need of an upgrade, and two levels of government came together to make that happen.

So it’s only natural that now, in the wake of Friday night’s terrible crash involving two trucks and three other vehicles, the community’s mind has swiftly turned to the safety of the Walker St intersection.

Getting off or on a national highway can be an alarming experience and it’s not just because of the safety of any given road or intersection.

An aerial photo shows the devastating scene in which at least three people died in a five vehicle crash on the Bruce Highway near Maryborough. Photo: Michael O'Connor

It’s also because of the behaviour of drivers.

I’ve been with the Chronicle for 17 years and there’s not a single fatal crash I have attended that was not caused by driver error.

The same is true of the horror crash at the Walker St intersection.

Police have said Friday night’s crash was caused by the tragically simple act of failing to give way.

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I say this not to heap blame on one driver, because we are all guilty of mistakes behind the wheel.

The bottom line is we need roads, intersections and overpasses that leave some room for human error.

We need dividing lanes and barriers between the north and southbound lanes so that there are fewer multi-vehicle crashes.

There’s a third exit to Maryborough at Alice St where a roundabout and overpass sit over the Bruce Highway.

The scene of a horror crash on the Bruce Highway at Tinana in 2011.

It’s safe - as long as everything goes well.

But too often, while driving around it, I’ve imagined being rear ended and crashing onto the highway below.

The Bruce Highway is one of the most unforgiving and busy roads in the nation and we need to examine every part of it and keep investing in making it safer.

Too often, lives are the price of change.

As the circumstances around this latest horror are examined, I hope, like the Tinana interchange, real improvements at the Walker St intersection can be achieved and lives can be saved.