Almost one fifth of NSW’s extreme speed camera fines for WestConnex tunnel drivers

Hoon drivers are using the multibillion-dollar WestConnex tunnel as their personal racetrack, posting shocking videos online of their idiotic escapades.

Hoon drivers are using the multibillion-dollar WestConnex tunnel as their personal racetrack, posting shocking videos online of their idiotic escapades, as new statistics reveal nearly a fifth of NSW’s extreme speed camera fines come from the same stretch of road.

Last financial year, the fines from cameras detecting speeding more than 45km/h over the limit totalled $6.9m statewide, but more than $1.3m of that came from within the 33km-long WestConnex tunnel system, which has no traffic lights.

Urban tunnels like WestConnex have become illegal race tracks, with hoons using social media and online forums to boast about their dangerous driving.

In one video, a YouTuber uploaded a 42-minute clip dedicated to Sydney street racers who push their cars to the limit in Sydney tunnels, hitting speeds nearing 200 km/h.

The drivers use their local knowledge to avoid speed camera detection.

In one video where a driver races through WestConnex, he says: “Another Mexican (speed) camera coming up.”

“How do you know?,” the cameraman replied. “If you know, you know,” they laugh before dropping down to the speed limit.

In another video, the cameraman shakes the driver’s hand at the end of the high-speed joy ride and says: “I can’t believe we are alive.”

The hoons’ videos claim they try to be safer by speeding late at night.

A NSW Police spokesperson said police regularly targeted known hoon hotspots and urged people to report dangerous drivers.

“Penalties for street racing include large fines, demerit points, loss of licence, prison, or impoundment – taking away your vehicle for up to three months before storage fees must be paid to have the vehicle ­returned. On a second offence, your vehicle may be sold,” they said.

A screenshot of a video posted to YouTube show Sydney drivers racing down popular public roads. Picture: Supplied

Hoons discuss their dangerous exploits on camera. Picture: Supplied

Sounds of revving engines and echoing exhausts are reaching the surface in some suburbs across the inner west, with residents in Roseberry worried about dangerous draggers entering the WestConnex.

“They just fly through. I am sure they are getting fines, they just don’t care,” Sydney dad Kane Williams said.

Mr Williams said his wife had started avoiding certain roads late at night because the hooning has gotten so bad.

“My wife doesn’t even want to get on the M5 because it’s so bad. They are just charging in and out and they are going to have a massive accident inside those tunnels,” he said.

Kane Williams with his son Benjamin. Picture: Jonathan Ng

Rosebery mum Louise said that she hears the speeding drivers constantly and worries for her two young boys’ safety.

“I have two little ones. If they are doing that when they get to those kinds of ages, I’d be as devastated as their mum,” she said.

“I’m terrified for them and for anyone around them.”

In NSW, hoon offences include speed racing, doing burnouts or doughnuts, extreme speeding and drag racing.

Data prepared for The Sunday Telegraph by the Bureau of Crime Statistics and Research (BOSCAR) shows that last year police laid 304 burnout charges and Revenue NSW issued 557 fines for the offence across the state, totalling $422,000.

The BOCSAR statistics show that in the past 10 years, 580 charges have been laid against people who organise or promote a race between vehicles – 43 of those were laid in the 12 months to June this year.

Almost $1 million in fines were handed out last year for drivers caught driving noisy or modified vehicles, up from $600,000 the year prior.

Specialist cameras aimed at catching noisy hoons are set to be rolled out in Bayside and Wollongong by the end of this year as part of a trial involving the Environment Protection Agency, Transport for NSW and NSW Police.

The technology will target “anti-social behaviour and noisy vehicles”, according to a NSW government tender, following similar efforts in New York, Paris and London.

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