Nepean 'Highway robbery"

VicRoads and Frankston Council have a massive PR disaster on their hands after mismanaging the installation of a 40km/h speed zone on the Nepean Highway. This is the opinion of more than 1000 motorists who have been caught on a fixed speed camera and incurred hundreds of thousands of dollars in fines and the loss of licence points.

Some drivers have been fined multiple times on the same day but did not receive fines in the mail for three weeks or more so were unaware of their errors. Others have lost their licences, which has triggered financial, medical and transportation hardship.

Their tales of woe are told on a Facebook page started on May 30 especially to cover the problem. Within three weeks it had more than 1800 members who had collectively received 840 fines worth $340,000 – money that is lost to the local economy for ever. Page founder Maria Davoren, who was fined twice in May, said members joke cynically that the page is the fastestgrowing club on the Peninsula.

Up to 200 people a day are joining as more fines arrive in the mail and word spreads about the page and its increasing list of suggestions that include how to appeal the fines as well as rumblings about starting a class action. Some members have consulted one of Melbourne’s top traffic barristers and others have started a media campaign. The issue has been covered by Channel 7 news and Neil Mitchell on his popular 3AW radio show.

Most people are ropeable the speed was changed with little or no warning and an inadequate public education campaign. Flashing 40km/h warning signs were supposed to be switched on when the limit changed but remained off as late as the third week of June. A bulletin was issued by VicRoads in June last year but was seen by very few people. Since the speed camera was switched on at the end of April and fines started pouring in, dozens of protest letters and emails to VicRoads, Frankston Council and local politicians have been ignored or fobbed off.

Frankston councillor Liam Hughes has gone in to bat for the speed camera victims but posted on Facebook that while he believed it was “time to act and right this wrong, the issue falls under VicRoads, therefore council does not have jurisdiction over this issue. However, council can most certainly advocate to VicRoads”. By late June, the council had not made contact with the group.

The speed has been dropped at several places in Frankston’s CBD, including where outdoor dining areas were installed after the six pandemic lockdowns between April 2020 and October 2021.

Last June, VicRoads stated it would “make the road environment safer for pedestrians, cyclists and motorists by introducing a safer speed of 40km/h on the Nepean Highway between Fletcher Rd and Plowman Place, and installing six new electronic speed limit signs to ensure the speed change is clearly visible to motorists”.

The flashing signs were never switched on, as happened at Carrum and Mornington. It is believed VicRoads could not access power for the signs, although as one Facebook poster cynically remarked: “They managed to find power for the speed camera at the intersection of the highway and Davey St.”

Oddly, the 40km/h zone only applies to the southbound lanes of the highway between Fletcher Rd and just past Davey St at Plowman Place, next to Frankston Mechanics Hall on the hill. The northbound side is 60km/h – as is Davey St at the intersection, where the camera is placed.

The Facebook page contains some poignant posts. One woman said she would be forced to cancel outings with her grandchildren on the school holidays because the money she had saved from her pension would have to pay her fine. Several posters lamented that their fines were the first they had ever incurred in a long life of driving. A mother who drives her children from Seaford to Mornington for school has lost her licence and is devastated. A nurse who was doing 65km/h – 25km/h over – also has lost her licence. Others are concentrating so hard on their speed after being fined that they are going through amber and red lights at the intersection and getting new fines.

The Facebook group is at https://www.facebook.com/ groups/5406922676037716