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Alexander welcomes $20.5m in safety fixes By Susan Sandys
susan.s@theguardian.co.nz
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Grieving Ashburton dad Jason Alexander is welcoming $20.5 million of safety improvements announced for Dyers Pass roads. Alexander’s daughters, 17-year-old Tayla and 15-year-old Sunmara, were killed when the vehicle they were passengers in crashed off Summit Road on November 27. Alexander presented a 6000-signature petition to the Christchurch City Council in January, calling on authorities to improve the safety of the Christchurch road. He was happy to see the changes made to roads in the Dyers Pass area, and expected Summit Road changes would come on board at a later date considering the petition had been unanimously
received by councillors and was referred to the Urban Development and Transport Committee. “Even (Mayor) Lianne (Dalziel) said this is not just about Summit Road, it’s about the whole broader situation,” Alexander said. Alexander said he struggled every day with the tragedy of losing his daughters, and did not want to see any other families go through the same thing. “When I’m at home, I’m just waiting for them to walk in the door and tell me about their day,” he said. The council has announced $7.25 million of improvements along the busy Dyers Pass Road, including three kilometres of guardrails, and road width improvements for cyclists. The NZ Transport Agency is going to
meet three-quarters of the cost as it has decided to include the project in its Safer Networks Programme. The council’s transport planning and delivery manager Lynette Ellis said the council had increased the scope of the safety works so it could work with NZTA to take advantage of the higher-than-expected funding subsidy. In addition, the council had decided to increase the scope of planned safety improvements along Evans Pass Road and Reserve Terrace, totalling $13.3 million, as the project could also be included in NZTA’s Safer Networks Programmes. “Both the works on Dyers Pass Road and Evans Pass Road offer the opportunity to make significant safety improvements for all road users with only minimal impacts on rates,’’ Ellis said.
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