Two local rural intersections are set to receive a major upgrade after Grant District Council successfully applied for Federal Government Black Spot funding.
The increasingly busy intersection of Mount Percy and McKay roads at Compton will be redesigned, with warning signage set to be increased at the intersection of Tillers Road East and Glenelg River Road at Wye.
The existing Compton crossroad intersection will be modified into a staggered intersection at a cost of $149,000.
The Wye intersection will get an overhaul with duplication of advanced warnings and upgrades to directional signage and rumble strips with improved delineation at a cost of $145,000.
Grant District Council Works Manager Adrian Schutz said council lodged the applications for Black Spot funding last financial year.
He said work will carried on the intersections between October and March.
“We have had several near misses (at Compton) we got a road safety audit done on the intersection from a consultant company … the recommendation was to offset the junction so people are not going straight through the junction,” Mr Schutz said.
“People have been going straight through the intersection, we installed rumble strips (and such) and tried several different remedies to address it but people are being inattentive.
“So we are putting this in place to try to prevent that.”
Mr Schutz said, at this stage, the 80kph speed limit would remain at the intersection once work had been completed.
“At this stage it’s 80kph, Department of Infrastructure and Transport needs to assess that and see if it is in the standards to do that.
“The more houses that go out there and the more built out it gets the chances are the speed limit could be reduced for sure – but it is not part of this project,” he said.
“The funding is good, we welcome it as Black Spot funding is pretty hotly contested throughout the nation, it meets the criteria put in for the application for a safety aspect of it and will be very welcome to improve the safety of motorists who use that intersection.”
The local Black Spots were announced late last week, with the Federal Government allocating $5.9m for upgrades at 17 “dangerous crash sites.”
The program funds safety measures such as traffic signals and roundabouts at locations where a number of serious crashes are known to have occurred or are at risk of occurring.
Assistant Minister for Infrastructure and Transport Carol Brown said the Black Spot funding was part of the Federal Government’s commitment to building safer roads, as it worked towards Vision Zero: no deaths on Australian roads by 2050.
“We have committed $110m per year to the Black Spot Program to work with state, territory and local governments to improve road safety across the nation,” she said.
“These 17 new projects in SA are another example of our commitment to keeping Australians safe on our roads, reducing the devastating impacts of road trauma while supporting local jobs and communities.”
