New guidelines for rentals after spate of tourist crashes

The scene of a fatal head-on crash involving a foreign driver that happened on SH79, the Geraldine-Fairlie Highway. Photo / NZ Police

New guidelines for rental vehicles have been developed after a spate of deaths and a coroner's recommendation for foreign drivers to get better education on arrival in New Zealand.

At least seven serious and fatal crashes involving tourists driving rental cars and campervans have been recorded this year.

Tourism Industry Association (TIA) advocacy manager Steve Hanrahan said the new voluntary guidelines would focus on communicating with visiting drivers at "three key stages" of their trip.

The stages were the booking process, the point when tourists arrived to view their rental vehicle and finally, during their journey around New Zealand.

The new initiatives would include providing links to road safety videos and travel distance calculators.

Another part of the programme encouraged drivers arriving after long-haul flights to rest overnight before picking up their vehicle.

Mr Hanrahan said the guidelines also recommended tourists use Global Positioning System (GPS) tour guides during the journey that broadcast regular safety messages.

Earlier this month, Coroner Richard McElrea released his findings on a fatal crash caused by a German tourist three days after Christmas 2011.

The coroner said New Zealand should consider making all campervan and other rental vehicle firms answerable to a code of practice.

Coroner McElrea said signage around the dashboard such as "keep left" should be compulsory for all rental vehicles.

The coroner also recommended information packs be given to overseas visitors before they hired a car.

Discussing those coronial recommendations, road safety campaigner Clive Matthew-Wilson, the Dog and Lemon Guide editor, told APNZ stricter driving tests were needed for tourists.

Today, the TIA said it would distribute the guidelines to rental vehicle and campervan operators nationwide. The guidelines could also be downloaded from the association's website.

The association said other businesses and groups such as travel wholesalers, information centres, international education providers and second-hand car dealers were welcome to adapt the guidelines.

Tourism Holdings chief executive Grant Webster said it was essential the tourism industry worked with other groups to ensure "continued improvement in road safety" for visitors and locals alike.

TOURIST DRIVER INCIDENTS:

• October 3: A Singapore Airlines pilot admitted causing a high-speed crash that left a colleague fighting for his life in hospital.

• September 30: Hong Kong resident King Wai Yip, 66, dies when her family's Toyota Corolla rental car collides with a Mercedes-Benz sedan near Geraldine, Canterbury.

• June 23: Dutch tourist Johannes Jacobus Appelman, 52, pleaded guilty to a triple fatality collision after running a stop sign in Rakaia in a rental vehicle on Queen's Birthday weekend.

• May 30: US tourist Cody Dickey crossed the centre line in his campervan on the Coromandel Peninsula, killing Aucklander Robyn Eilleen Derrick, a passenger in an oncoming four-wheel-drive.

• February 11: French tourist Gilles Georges Jego, 59, killed a female pillion motorcycle passenger in the Far North when he was driving on the wrong side of the road.

• February 9: An 18-year-old pregnant woman was seriously injured and lost her unborn child in Whangarei after 27-year-old French tourist Marion Laure Heurteboust drove on the wrong side of the road.

• February 4: Canadian tourist Uri Tak Kau Law, 59, drowned after crashing over the side of a Southland bridge.