Subscribe to RSSWhen Motorways Go Bad
Incredible how many of the city’s roads can come to a standstill for hours because of one accident somewhere.
Southern motorway jammed this afternoon for hours
I can understand why the police serious crash section needs some time to analyse what happened, gather evidence, interview witnesses and clear the scene but the closedown of the motorway, when an accident occurs, does seem to take a very long time.
The disruption is always especially bad in Wellington along the coast road, such as happened near Plimmerton last week, as there are not workable alternatives.
This afternoon, I saw for myself what happens in such circumstances. The Auckland southern motorway came to a standstill for about three hours after an an eight-year-boy died. The van he was in rolled on the motorway, near Orams Road in Manurewa.
What i found interesting was that, for all the talk of better motorway communications, there were no signs to warn motorists, caught in the jam, of the problem or of progress in clearing the scene and Newstalk ZB which claims to be the information station, had no traffic reports and no mention of the issue in the 4pm news, some hours after it had begun.
STUCK: Nothing to do but cool off
At least it was pleasing to hear the sound of trains continue to be running, alongside the motorway!
2 Comments
Fortunately I wasn’t involved in this (didn’t have to go down south yesterday), but I agree that the radio stations should be better at notifying people. If a traffic incident doesn’t happen Monday-Friday, the radio stations don’t seem to report it. Maybe there’s actually no-one there live to report it?
I was travelling North on the southern motorway just after the accident happened and there several police cars there marking out the road plus a couple of tow trucks.I listened to the 4pm news on 105.40 Coast and they mentioned that the SM was closed due to a fatal accident.