Dangerous bike route claims another victim
At 8:55am on Wednesday the 8th of May, a 28-year-old man riding to the city on the Dynon Road bike path saw a green pedestrian light and crossed the Citylink on-ramp. A truck turning right onto the on-ramp also had a green light. The young man was run over by the trailer of the truck and left with horrific life changing injuries; passers-by rendered CPR and saved his life. His first words after regaining consciousness were “It was green! It was green! It was green!”
The ‘simultaneous green lights’ are a dangerous setup all too common in the west.
BikeWest and other cyclists have been highlighting issues with this intersection for months, but our simple request to fix the traffic light sequencing had gone unheeded.
Documents released under Freedom of Information show that authorities at West Gate Tunnel & the Department of Transport & Planning were well aware of the risk at that intersection with one road safety expert commenting, “Even my wife who knows nothing about road safety is horrified at this setup”.
Within eight days of the crash, authorities commenced construction of a new portion of safe bike lane that avoids the conflict point altogether. While BikeWest is glad to see this resolution, we are dismayed that it took a horrific life-changing crash to spur the authorities into action.
We now ask that no more blood be spilled to fix the other dangerous parts of Dynon Road, top of the list is the 600m of missing bike lane outside of MoonDog/Franco Cozzo.
Pierre Vairo – BikeWest
No more black roofs please!
What is with the current obsession of black roofs on houses? It seems that everyday an old house in the west is demolished to be replaced by a duplex or McMansion which includes a black roof. I understand that medium density housing is the way of the future but we have a massive urban heat problem in the western suburbs. Every time these developers get hold of a block of land they remove every skerrick of vegetation increasing our lack of green canopy, and then they worsen the problem by including a black roof. Dark roofs increase the heat of your house, and make the urban heat island effect even worse in the west. Attention State Government and all councils!! Please ban black roofs.
Claudia, Altona North.
