Ignoring road works signs risking lives

Drivers ignoring a detour around a works site in Hastings city are putting themselves, workers on the site and other road users at risk of serious harm.

A small percentage of drivers are not following detour signs indicating they must turn left from Warren St South into Heretaunga St; instead turning into oncoming traffic.

Traffic management personnel have been advised to take photos of the car number plates of drivers disobeying the traffic signs and call the police immediately.

“This is unacceptable behaviour. It is putting people at risk of serious injury or even death, and it must stop,” says Hastings District Council Council’s Operations and Monitoring Committee chair Geraldine Travers. “If signs say detour ahead and then an arrow points to the left, that is the way you must go. You cannot turn right.”

Most at risk are pedestrians who, aware that traffic should only be coming from their right, might step out into the path of a driver travelling in the wrong direction. “To those people doing this, please think about how you will feel if you hit a pedestrian or a site worker and they don’t make it home.

“If you know someone who thinks it’s okay to do this, please ask them to consider how they will feel if it is a relative or friend of theirs who gets hit.”

At the site a drain laying team is putting in a connection that will link the new Hastings water treatment and storage plant (Waiaroha) to the existing pipe network. The work is expected to take two to three weeks, subject to ground conditions and weather.

“At most, obeying the signs means you have to go around the block. That’s a small price to pay to keep everyone safe,” said Mrs Travers.

15 November 2021

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