Lower speed limit could cut specialist healthcare
Reducing the speed on State Highway 6 could affect the number of patients specialists travelling over from Nelson could see in Blenheim, a doctor says.
Nelson Marlborough District Health Board urologist Dr Patrick Meffan said the number of patients he could see in a day at Wairau Hospital could be reduced if the proposed speed limit reduction to 80kmh went ahead on the Nelson-blenheim highway.
‘‘(A) significant unintended consequence of the proposed changes is the impact on the health service provision for Wairau patients,’’ Meffan said.
‘‘An important component of Wairau’s service is provided by Nelson specialists who travel over to provide surgery and patient consultations.’’
Meffan, who has travelled the route for more than 20 years, said he had not timed it at 80kmh himself but believed the 9-minute NZ Transport Agency estimate of the extra time for a one-way journey was ‘‘totally naive’’.
Meffan estimated it could take up to 30 minutes of extra driving time each way. At 80kmh it would not be possible to pass trucks on passable bits of road without illegally exceeding the reduced limit, meaning a car trip ‘‘would be the same as a truck which is dictated by the speed they crawl over the windy bits’’, he said.
Meffan said a 30-minute delay each way could reduce available patient contact time by an hour.
In that time up to five followup patients could be seen or one operation performed.
Meffan said he believed the greatest issue on the road was the high density of truck traffic, ‘‘compounded by the geography and road design’’ that limited safe overtaking opportunities. It led to long queues of ‘‘very frustrated drivers’’ who were stuck behind trucks on hilly sections.
He said it was frustrated drivers that led to dangerous driving and this was even more evident in wet conditions.
Meffan said the difference in crash outcomes between 100kmh and 80kmh, particularly when head on, was ‘‘very modest and the likelihood of survival of a crash at 80kmh is both low and quite random’’.
‘‘The focus on this road should be to reduce the likelihood of accidents rather than survivability of accidents.’’ The best way to achieve this was to provide more passing lanes, Meffan said.
The Nelson Marlborough District Health Board submission to NZTA said it supported the proposed speed reductions. It said small reductions in impact speed greatly increased the chances of surviving a crash. The board submission said a Ministry of Transport report found a 10 per cent probability of death for car drivers in head-on crashes at 70kmh, compared with 30 per cent at 95kmh and 50 per cent at 105kmh.
In its submission, the Automobile Association (AA) felt the information NZTA had given the public on the time it would take to complete the journey at the new speed was wrong.
AA said its members had tested the journey in trucks and cars. Car journeys took ‘‘considerably longer’’ at 80kmh and truck drivers would possibly have to reduce their number of trips from four to three a day due to the extra time it would take at a lower speed.
The Road Transport Association NZ and NZ Trucking Association made a joint submission to NZTA last week.
Their members who make multiple trips a day on the stretch of road were advising it would take an extra two hours in driving time to do the same business.
This created the possibility that the cost of goods and services might increase.
NZTA wants to lower the speed limit to make the road safer. It says that between 2009 to 2018, 20 people lost their lives on the section of road between Nelson and Blenheim, and 92 people were seriously injured. Nineteen of the deaths occurred on 100kmh stretches of road.
NZTA’S director for regional relationships, Jim Harland, said last month: ‘‘We are investigating other improvements such as safety barriers but one of the immediate actions we can take right now to prevent people from dying or being seriously injured is to reduce speed limits, so they are safe and right for the road.’’
‘‘The focus on this road should be to reduce the likelihood of accidents rather than survivability of accidents.’’
Dr Patrick Meffan