An accident waiting to happen

Fri, Dec 30. 2011

Editor: Last Tuesday evening, I took a drive with my family to look at the lights in the various communities on the Windward side of the country.{{more}}

As we got to South Union, just before the deep corner, we encountered a large piece of heavy equipment parked on the right hand side of the road.

Editor, the equipment took up the entire right lane and was not fitted with reflectors or anything else which would alert persons driving at night to its presence in the road. Vehicles travelling into town are at great risk of colliding with the equipment, given its proximity to the deep corner.

My mind went back to an accident which occurred a few months ago at Campden Park. In that incident, a man was injured when he ran into a container trailer which was parked in the Industrial Estate. At the time of that accident, we were told by the police that trailers and other large pieces of equipment which travel on the road are required by law to be fitted with reflectors and a licence plate.

The piece of equipment at South Union has neither. I hope by the time this letter is published that the equipment has been taken off the road. It is an accident waiting to happen.

I call on the police to be more vigilant in safeguarding the safety of road users. I also call on the persons who own and operate equipment of this type to be more responsible when parking their equipment.

Robert