THE PROGRAM THAT COULD SAVE VANNERS LIVES – IS THE GOVERNMENT FINALLY LISTENING?
Whenever the topic of dangerous highway stretches or bad roads comes up, there’s always countless stories to tell.
Just last week, two elderly caravanners were hospitalised after a truck collided with them on Queensland’s Bruce Highway, which is notorious for it’s high risk sections. A month before that, a woman suffered life-threatening injuries following a four vehicle truck, car and caravan crash on the same highway.
The Bruce Highway is so treacherous, that it’s even taken out five of the top 15 worst stretches of roads in the Allianz Australian Road Assessment graph – that’s one third of Australia’s worst roads, taken out by a single highway. Second and third place were reserved for the Bruce’s Sarina to Mackay and Childers to Miriam Vale stretches, which means that our lives are put at risk every single day!
Shouldn’t we be stomping our feet and telling council that we demand for these to be fixed? After all, the Government have the money there, don’t they? Well, it turns out they do!
The Government is finally listening to our cries of frustration, with their Black Spot Programme bringing road safety to the forefront.
“Black Spot projects target those road locations where crashes are occurring. By funding measures such as traffic signals and roundabouts at dangerous locations, the programme reduces the risk of crashes.”
Less crashes and deaths on our highway? That’s something every vanner can get behind!
The Government has even made it easier for councils by broadening the criteria, allowing more of them to put roads forward as a dangerous stretch – so what are they waiting for?
This program was introduced months ago and we still haven’t seen any admirable action from the councils, so I think it’s about time we told them that our lives do matter.
It’s time we took a stand as an RVing nation and told our councils that we need safety on our roads before more of us are tragically taken.
If you know a notoriously bad stretch of highway or road, email me at [email protected] and have your say.
