Corner causes concern
Waimate North residents are concerned someone is going to die on a corner on Old Bay Rd.
The corner, around 3.5km from State Highway 10 from the Kerikeri end, has a sign recommending a speed of 45kmh.
Don Annan who lives nearby, says there are going to be white crosses lining the road there in future.
This comes after a vehicle crashed through two fences of a nearby property on February 10 causing ‘‘significant damage’’.
‘‘It’s the speed that’s causing the accidents, not the road surface. We are urging people to slow down,’’ Annan says.
Annan and his neighbour Grant Anderson estimate it will cost around $2000 to repair the fencing.
Anderson says someone is going to be seriously hurt or killed at the site.
When visited visible tyre marks stretched over 100m, starting before the corner and ending at the second fence in the line of destruction. No one has come forward to claim they were involved in the accident.
‘‘Imagine if someone was coming the other way or sheep were in there, it could have caused more accidents,’’ Annan says.
Annan says he has repaired the fences near the corner around 15 to 20 times in the 22 years he has lived there and says there have been around 30 total accidents there, including cars and trucks.
Far North District Council spokesperson Jim Brooks says there have been two recorded minor injury crashes at the corner over the last 10 years (2008 and 2011).
‘‘That is not to dispute Mr Annan’s recollection of the number of crashes on that corner - it could be that if there were no injuries, crashes were not reported to police and therefore not reported to council.’’
Brooks says in order to meet the New Zealand Transport Agency funding criteria for minor improvements on roads, areas in question must be high risk, or have a serious crash history.
Brooks says while there are no improvement projects planned for the corner, council is assessing road signage improvements for all of Old Bay Rd.