Call for 80km/h zone on highway

GERRINGONG residents are petitioning the Roads Minister to change the speed limit on the Princes Highway to 80km/h on the section past the town.

The petition was organised by Margaret Lester and Greg Ball after a community meeting in early March with the Roads and Traffic Authority, where residents were told the highway upgrade between Mt Pleasant and Bomaderry would not begin construction for at least five years.

"The reaction so far has been very positive, especially from the elderly in the community," Mrs Lester said.

"We have a lot of senior drivers in our community and many of them have got to go in and out of Belinda St (on to the highway) and this is a very dangerous intersection."

At present, the speed limit on the highway is 80km/h on the section going over Mt Pleasant and 100km/h past Gerringong.

The proposal would extend the 80km/h limit south to the Willow Vale intersection.

This stretch of road incorporates three intersections locals say are highly accident-prone: the Omega rail crossing on to Fern St, the Sims Rd intersection and the Belinda St one.

RTA statistics show there have been 87 accidents along this section of road since 2001. Four people died during this period.

"This is quite a dangerous section that could be made a lot safer for not that much money," Mrs Lester said.

"We know it"s going to be five years before anything physically happens on the highway. This is a commonsense approach to save lives."

Mr Ball has seen the results of many accidents through his work with Gerringong Rural Fire Service.

"What the RTA"s done at the Omega crossing has made it better, but there"s still a lot of near misses. I"ve had three close calls myself and everyone in town"s much the same," he said.

"20ks less has got to be better than it is now. It won"t stop accidents , well it might , but it certainly will give people more time to react.

"I figure, for every one vehicle that slows down to 80 is one more than we"ve got now."

Mrs Lester said the petition would still be open for signatures for a couple of more weeks before she sent it to the new Roads Minister.

Copies of the petition are available in a number of Gerringong shops.