Motorway bridge barriers on agenda

Barriers to prevent people throwing objects from bridges on to motorway traffic will be discussed at a high level meeting between police and Transit New Zealand next week.

Transit New Zealand said today it needed to know how often people threw rocks and other potentially deadly items from motorway overbridges before it could decide if it needed to add high fences to motorway overbridges.

Hilton Netterville from Transit New Zealand in Auckland said nothing had yet been planned and the suggestion of higher barriers was still in its very early stages.

Some bridges in Australia had been fitted with higher barriers after a woman was killed in an incident similar to a tragedy in Auckland last week.

Taupo motorist Chris Currie, 20, died instantly when a lump of concrete was thrown through his windscreen from a motorway overbridge in south Auckland.

"We don't have a definite programme...we are going to take is work it through with police," Mr Netterville said.

He said police should have data about which bridges attracted the most incidents.

He said if the decision was made to barricade bridges it would probably start in Auckland as part of a nationwide policy.

"It is still very early in the piece to say yes we are going to barricade all the bridges or no we are not. We haven't made that decision and have got to work it through with the police."

Mr Netterville said Transit New Zealand shared police concern about the safety issues.

"We are lucky there has been only one fatality because it is a busy motorway.

"We have to decide if it is a risk we can live with or something we need to batten off and work through with the police."

Yesterday in the second serious motorway incident within a few days a rock was thrown from an overbridge through the windscreen of a southbound car.

The badly shaken driver pulled off at a motorway exit but the thrower was gone by the time police arrived.

Police in the Auckland region are encouraging motorists to report any suspicious activity to identify anyone responsible for throwing objects at moving vehicles.

In the year ended June 2005 police dealt with 1425 pedestrians on the motorway and new legislation effective from June means police can issue an instant fine of $250 to any pedestrian unlawfully on the motorway.

Last year there were three pedestrians killed as a result of walking on the motorways.

- NZPA