Maurice Road safety concerns are valid, Murray Bridge council agrees
Maurice Road safety concerns are valid, Murray Bridge council agrees
Residents have earned sympathy from councillors after expressing their worries about heavy truck traffic.
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Safety concerns on one of Murray Bridge’s busiest roads need addressing, the city’s council has conceded.
The council will consider lowering the speed limit on Maurice Road, or directing B-doubles onto another route, after hearing from long-time resident Mario Grande at a meeting on Monday night.
Mr Grande told councillors that an outpouring of scorn on Murray Bridge News’ Facebook page last week, after he first shared his story, had been matched by a wave of support from his neighbours.
“We’ve had an unbelievable response of people ringing me and telling me that I’ve done well in speaking up,” he said.
“We’ve also had some ... people saying ‘try living next to the speedway’; my answer to that is I’ll live next to the speedway any day, any time.
“Speedway, that’s once a fortnight for five hours a night; we’re living in an area where it’s 24 hours a day, seven days a week of heavy vehicle noise.”
He took no issue with the semi-trailers which delivered goods to local shops, or carried local produce, he said; he was more worried about B-doubles which rolled straight through the district without stopping.
He also pointed out that residents living on Hindmarsh Road, Maurice Road and Cypress Terrace had never been given a chance to object to a $5.2 million upgrade of the freight route which brought more trucks past their houses from 2015.
Murray Bridge’s councillors were generally sympathetic, and council CEO Michael Sedgman agreed that the issue of heavy vehicle traffic through the populated area was “a matter we need to explore”.
Council staff will meet with Mr Grande and discuss his concerns in detail in the new year.
In the meantime, he and other residents plan to launch a petition about the issue.
“We’d like to see a change,” he said.
“Stop the danger, the noise, the congestion, the rattling of our houses, the destruction of our roads (and) the tailgating of arrogant truck drivers.”
In a story published last Thursday, Mr Grande told Murray Bridge News that semi-trailer and B-double movements on Maurice Road had increased significantly over the past few years, in part because Swanport Road was closed to heavy vehicles in 2020.
The problem would only worsen in the next few years, he predicted, when more houses would be built and a new Bunnings store would be completed.
I understand the concern raised by the larger trucks but everyone needs to always be vigilant on the road to avoid another tragedy like Daniel Thompson's death in 2018, which was caused by an ordinary car, not a truck. I walk past his memorial at the place where he was hit regularly and it always serves to remind me of the preciousness of life and of the care we must all take.