John MacDonald: I hope NZTA is listening

How shocking is it that a woman died on a stretch of State Highway 1, in South Canterbury, that NZTA had known was dangerous but hadn’t done anything about it?

I’ll run you through the details. But I hope NZTA is listening to the coroner who is saying today that a median barrier is needed where the crash happened.

I also hope NZTA wakes up to the fact that median barriers are desperately needed on a lot of other roads, as well.

In fact, there was supposed to be a median barrier where this crash happened. But it didn’t go ahead because the money for it was used on something else.

So in January 2018, Kellyanne Pattinson was driving south and was killed when a truck veered across the road and hit her car.

It was on State Highway 1, near Pareora in South Canterbury.

She wasn’t doing anything wrong. No excessive speed. No alcohol. The truck driver wasn’t in the wrong, either.

But he lost control, veered across three lanes and crashed into her.

That happened because it had been wet and excess bitumen had come up to the surface of the road, turning it into a bit of a skating rink.

Technically, it’s known as “flushing”. And, the thing is, NZTA knew about this problem, but hadn’t done anything about it.

In the six years before this crash, there had been five other crashes within 250 metres of where Kellyanne died. All of them involving northbound drivers losing control of their vehicles.

Not long before it happened, a contractor had raised concerns about this issue with the excess bitumen floating to the surface in the wet and making the road slippery.

I don’t know when the median strip that was supposed to have been installed on this stretch of State Highway 1 would have been installed if the funding hadn’t been pulled or spent elsewhere.

So I can’t say whether Kellyanne would still be alive if it had gone ahead, as originally planned.

But Coroner Alexandra Cunninghame is saying today that it’s still needed.

Apparently, there was also a plan to install one earlier this year. But NZTA told the coroner it didn’t happen because it didn’t “align with Government priorities”.

Which isn’t good enough, as far as the coroner is concerned. She’s saying today: “Had the project proceeded, I would have been satisfied that adequate steps had been taken by NZTA to ensure public safety and to reduce the chance of further deaths occurring at the crash site.”

Which is her way of saying that enough hasn’t been done and the road is still dangerous.

So a median barrier is needed there to stop head-on collisions.

But that’s just a start. Because I reckon they are the only way to prevent vehicles from crashing head-on and we should have them on a lot more roads.

The only other options are to keep our fingers crossed, as we do at the moment on most roads around the country, and hope some clown doesn’t do any dodgy overtaking.

Or keep our fingers crossed and hope it doesn’t rain and make the roads slippery.

Neither of those are good enough for me.

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