Perth Voice Interactive

FOLLOWING widespread discontent Vincent council has steered away from a plan to partly block off a Beaufort Street side-road. 

It may be a sign the council’s learned the lesson of not diverting traffic from one street onto others, following the vexed Alma Road/Leake Street traffic diversion saga that caused local uproar earlier this year by cutting a North Perth neighbourhood in half.

The Beaufort/Harold Street intersection averages about one crash a year, with two hospitalisations in the past 10 years, enough to qualify it as a “Black Spot” under Australian government standards.  

Main Roads has offered up cash to fund a project to reduce crashes by banning right turns out of Harold Street. 

The change is predicted to prevent 0.6 of those crashes per year, on average, and council staff had recommended going ahead with it.

Main Roads funding is often too tempting an offer for councils to refuse, but Vincent councillors voted not to take the cash after so many locals said this would be a bad move for the Beaufort strip. 

Many objectors said it simply “moves the problem”.

Mayor Emma Cole said: “I think that what we’re seeing is when we put in place traffic interventions that alter traffic flow and see a diversion of traffic to other street, I think our community is really starting to speak up quite strongly on these issues and feeling a little bit frustrated about the types of strategies that we’re looking to adopt.”

Ms Cole was one of three councillors who had voted against the Alma/Leake diversion, concerned about simply moving traffic from one street onto others. But a majority voted for a six-month trial only to later end it early after three months due to public opposition. 

Feedback

Ms Cole said, “there’s been significant feedback from the community that they’re not in favour of this treatment… I’d much prefer we address the issue of Beaufort Street more comprehensively” rather than tackling one turn-off road at a time.”

Instead the council backed an alternative idea from Cr Susan Gontaszewski to look at an overall plan to slow down speeds on Beaufort Street and find ways to improve pedestrian and cyclist safety – and to bring in Beaufort locals from the start to get their input. 

Beaufort is one of the few town centres that doesn’t have a consistent 40kmh speed limit. 

She also proposed they investigate turning Harold Street one-way to lessen its interference with Beaufort Street, a measure supported by many of the street’s residents.

by DAVID BELL