Moira’s road safety priority

With the anniversary of the tragic Strathmerton accident that saw five people lose their lives coming up in April, Moira Shire Chair Administrator John Tanner said this stark disparity underscores the disproportionate impact of road trauma on our community and highlights the urgent need for targeted road safety measures.

“The cost of road trauma is inclusive of fatalities and serious injuries, and the government has a costing that they put on that, but I'm not privileged to know what that costing is,” Mr Tanner said.

“The important and really relevant fact is that ours (Moira Shire) is 332% higher than the state average.

“That's a cost that the community actually wears as a result of road safety and as a result of accidents.

“That's highly disproportional. My point is that we need to do something about it.

“There's a lot of work being done by the state and federal governments on road safety. But we as a community, I think can be a lot more proactive in this regard.

“We're working closely with the state government and TAC in regards to what we can do to improve the issues here in Moira.

“This is an initial, but pivotal body of work that will consider a road environment that promotes Safe Roads, Safe People, Safe Vehicles and Safe Speeds.

“We want to work closely with the Moira Shire community as we work towards a road system where there is no road trauma.”

In December, 2023 TAC revealed that one in five people who were killed on the state’s roads weren't wearing seatbelts, a trend that has been on the rise in Victoria in recent years.

Speed, drugs and alcohol were also blamed for the 2023 high death toll, with many of the deaths could have been avoided.

“All the issues as far as dangerous intersections, we're applying for funding for, like the Labaun Road (Strathmerton),” Mr Tanner said.

“Whilst that's a state government intersection we're assisting with advocating for all those issues and upgrades. But on top of that, what we're trying to do is launch an engagement with the community on what we can do locally.

“As part of that we’ll be being more active on social media regarding road safety.

“We put together a video to show the Minister for Roads Melissa Horne, and as a result, we were provided with $30,000 in funding just to develop a Road Safety Strategy and Action Plan.

“What we want to do with the community engagement is to engage with some local champions coming up and making personalised sort of statements. Getting involved and sending a message.

“It might be an older person in town that talks about being a grandparent and their family or it might be the local football captain.

“We'll also do more videos in regards to engagement around schools and so forth.

“I think it's really important because kids are the ones that can actually nag their parents about drivers’ safety.

“There's also an opportunity with football clubs through TAC and the AFL to run programs.

“We're well advancing with the clubs and encouraging them to take that up as these programs have been shown to have positive impacts.”

While council is advancing in the implementation of the program, Mr Tanner said that the current state of the program is looking into how to get the community involved further and what more council can do in a physical sense than the community engagement component.

“There's quite a bit of community engagement that needs to happen, but this is all about awareness, and this is all about asking people to do the right thing,” Mr Tanner said.

“We are also creating an action plan on what we do next. Things that we can do straight away, and we can all play a role in that.

“Some of the roads are not in good condition but the maintenance on those need to be confirmed.

“The other thing is that even though some of the major incidents are not necessarily caused by locals however road safety for our area is a role for the locals to play.

“Late last year some in the community were concerned about us dropping the limit of Labaun Road from 100 to 80. Within two weeks of dropping that speed limit there was a person who was booked for doing 168km/h on that road.”

With Moira Shire one of the first to undertake a pilot program into road safety in their municipality, if the council, road authorities and the state government see the program having an effect, it may be broadened across the state.

“We've got really good support to be doing this work in Moira particularly by TAC and the state government,” Mr Tanner said.

“TAC will be doing a lot of research in Moira, in regards to historically what's happened as far as accidents are concerned. They will heavily be putting resources into that as well.

“Out of the pilot program, we'll be able to measure the results of things like the community engagement and community participation in a program.

“If it's successful, it can be rolled out across all Victorian municipalities.”