Published on Tuesday, 11 March 2025 at 2:21:11 PM
The Peppermint Grove Beach local community have been advocating and liaising with the Shire of Capel to create a safer and more liveable street by addressing local safety and inappropriate speed concerns.
The road safety concerns were raised to Council with the community requesting improvements along Peppermint Grove Terrace to manage speed and improve safety along the road.
The concerns raised several issues on the default 50km/h road including vehicles speeding, vehicles crossing into oncoming traffic and the blind curves.
The Shire investigated the concerns, through the placement of traffic counters, to gather data and information to identify the actual issues. The data obtained determined that majority of vehicles were travelling within the speed limit which suggests that “speeding” may not be the issue. However, the concerns raised also indicated a higher risk for pedestrians or cyclists using the area which may instead support that the current speed is not appropriate for the environment and context.
Possible traffic calming treatments to address the issues were investigated and presented at a community workshop in 2024. The workshop provided information to the community and an opportunity to work together to identify strategies and develop a plan of actions to present to Council.
The resolution from the community engagement resulted in a plan for the Shire to apply a variety of speed management measures to improve the safety in the area as well as improving the accessibility and safety of vulnerable road users who regularly use the area in active modes of transport.
The plan included short and medium term measures and was approved by Council during the November 2024 Council meeting. Installation of the high priority interventions have already progressed with advanced warning signs for the blind curves and advisory speed limits being installed. Additional treatments in the plan include:
- installation of permanent curtesy speed display signs
- wide centre lines with raised markings on bends
- applying for a precinct wide 40km/h zone for the Peppermint Grove Beach area, and
- reviewing the need for physical devices, such as speed humps, platforms, raised intersections and kerbed mediums.
The Shire will monitor the safety performance for the area and will review and determine if further actions are required to improve safety.
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