New road safety plans for Maribyrnong

Published on 22 February 2021

At last week’s Ordinary Council Meeting on Tuesday 16 February, Council endorsed the new Road Safety Strategy and Action Plan 2021–2030 – a document that outlines our approach to improving and managing road safety throughout our municipality.

The vision of the Road Safety Strategy and Action Plan 2021 – 2030 is to work towards zero fatalities and a decrease in all crash injuries within the City of Maribyrnong by 2030. 

To support the goals in the Strategy we will be:  

• Working to ensure our roads, footpaths, public open spaces and road signage are compliant, maintained and kept in a safe, working order.
• Continuing to listen and engage with residents so that we understand road safety and accessibility concerns and can implement projects and programs that meet the needs of our growing community.
• Supporting active transport, such as walking and cycling, which is extremely important for a healthy and sustainable community and requires special consideration of the vulnerability of pedestrians and cyclists.
• Improving road safety by lowering the speed limits on Council-owned roads and implementing new traffic calming measures such as road surface changes or visual cues to drivers to enhance the safety of all road users. This includes reducing speeds to 40km/hour over the next two years in built up areas.  
• Continuing to advocate to State Government to improve the safety of main arterial roads in our municipality, such as improving the safety of public transport stops, along with improving pollution, and truck and traffic congestion and volumes on our roads.  
• Continuing to build relationships and work with external stakeholders and road safety partners such as the Department of Transport, VicRoads and Victoria Police to achieve more outcomes than we could in isolation. This includes investigating adequate physical separation of cyclists from drivers where speed limits are higher than 40km/hr.

The document reflects community input and has been developed using the Safe System approach to improving road safety – a national approach to road safety that caters the needs of all road users - pedestrians, cyclists, motorcyclists, passengers, drivers, and commercial and heavy vehicle drivers. It’s a holistic view of the entire road transport system that looks at creating:  

• Safer Roads – by making roads, paths, tracks and other transport infrastructure as safe as possible
• Safer Speeds – by encouraging people to travel at safe speeds
• Safer People – by encouraging safe travel behaviour to minimise personal risks and risks to others
• Safer Vehicles – by promoting the use of vehicles that are safer for drivers, passengers and other people.

To access a copy of the Road Safety Strategy and Action Plan 2021 – 2030, click here to visit the webpage.

We’re currently undertaking an LATM Study in Braybrook (south) – visit Your City Your Voice to read more about the project and to have your say.  

Message from the Mayor, Cr Michael Clarke

Ensuring our roads are safe and accessible for all road users – pedestrians, cyclists and drivers – is a key priority for Council, and this Strategy and Action Plan highlights our commitment to helping keep our diverse community safe. Council is proud to endorse the Road Safety Strategy and Action Plan 2021-2030, and we look forward to now delivering the actions over the coming years to support the needs of our growing community.

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