Residents from Kritzinger Road are sick and tired of accidents in their street, especially the stretch from Verwoerdpark Centre to the Engen Garage in Grey Avenue.
They are looking for possible solutions to make motorists more aware of the sharp bend as well as ways which will compel motorists to stick to the speed limit on Kritzinger Road.
“Most of the accidents either result in the vehicles involved in the accident ending up in our yards or crashing into our walls.
“Every time, we are the ones who need to repair the wall or pay the excess amounts on our insurance,” said resident Warren du Toit.
Residents told the RECORD this road has been a problem for ages now.
According to them, it is a nightmare.
“We ourselves are too scared to drive out of our driveways and our children are not allowed to play in our front gardens as we fear for accidents,” the residents said.
To this, Rina Fouché added: “I even moved my bed to the other side of my room – just in case.”
Dead Man’s Curve
In December there were five accidents over one weekend and three accidents in one day.
To date, there have already been four accidents for the month of January.
Residents said that they’ve noticed that most of the accidents happen in rainy weather and speeding is one of the main causes.
According to one of the residents, if the weather is looking like it’s going to rain or if it is raining you can expect an accident.
“This is a 40km zone which nobody adheres to.”
On footage from one of the houses’s CCTV, one can see motorists speeding all the time.
Residents are all saying that this becomes like a racetrack over weekends.
“People misjudge that curve a lot,” said Martie van Rensburg.
The other day there was an incident where a driver lost control over his vehicle and hit one of the fire hydrants, and on the video you can see the driver just driving away. “For us as residents we then struggle to get people from the municipality to come and close off the water. The same with other accidents where a car would damage a water pipe. The water will just keep on running for days,” said Du Toit.
“We even have a name for the sharp curve; we all call it Dead Man’s Curve.”
There is a speeding camera in the street that does not work due to it being vandalised.
Not that it will deter motorist from speeding because residents say even when the camera worked there were still a lot of accidents.
Something needs to be done
In the past, residents have complained about the matter and nothing was done
They have asked for speed bumps, but due to the grading of the road there cannot be any physical speed restrictions.
Residents also said they think there should be more safety boards that says ‘high accident zone’ or ‘slippery when wet’.
Ward councillor Tiaan Kotze said that there was an official from the road and traffic department on site in 2019 and he investigated the road. “One of his points that he made was that the grip of the road is gone and that can be fixed by re-tarring the road,” Kotze said.
He also said that if motorists keep to the given speed limit there will not be any accidents.
Over the years, Kritzinger Road became a very busy road and a number of trucks now also make use of this road.
“We are asking for help. Something needs to be done about this. We can’t live in fear for the rest of our lives.”
Kotze is busy with a petition that he wants to hand in on February 27 during a council meeting and he urged residents to sign an online petition regarding Kritzinger Road.
*The RECORD is awaiting comment from EMM which will be published as soon as it is received.
The petition can be signed by following this link: https://www.petitions.net/make_kritzinger_road_m94_safe?u=317760&utm_source=whatsapp
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