Dialogue: More highway patrols save lives by slowing motorists

By CATHY ARONSON

The commute from Auckland to Hamilton is a daily mission for me. White crosses that decorate the state highway make it hard to forget that it includes some of the country's worst blackspots.

Why is the road so dangerous? First, the volume of traffic increases the risk and State Highway One is the throat through which all must pass to reach the middle of the North Island. That's if you make it.

To avoid becoming a road fatality, you have to dodge cars heading towards you on the wrong side of the road, as impatient Aucklanders, not used to one lane, overtake trucks. It's a case of making way for the speedsters and staying awake.

That was until a year ago, when the Dukes of Hazzard swapped sides and disguised themselves as traffic cops. Thirty-one highway patrol officers were dedicated to the Waikato roads last year, just before the holiday season began.

But it wasn't just a holiday fling. Daisy, Beau and Luke won't leave us alone. The new blue-and-yellow striped stickers might not have the style of the General Lee, but they haunt you on every corner.

Or if they are not out to cause trouble, they will just cruise along at 90km. No Once Were Warriors gangs dare to overtake them.

But this does cause trouble. It causes a whole new obstacle called time. Up to half an hour of extra time that it takes you to get to work. That is a lot when the dark, fog and cold are waiting to give you your wakeup call.

And it's precious time if you haven't allowed for it in your busy morning schedule. Arrive in Hamilton, get through the urban traffic, find a car park, walk to work and go to the bathroom to refresh yourself after the long journey.

Not that half an hour is any consolation prize for your whole life. It might cost you hundreds of dollars in overtime but, according to the Land Transport Safety Authority, the social cost of one life, or death, is $2.5 million.

The cost of the car you have crashed, the cars that crashed into you and the people who miss the appointment of their life because they are held up in four-hour queues.

More than likely, two crews of fire trucks, with four firemen in each, will have to cut you out of the car. Someone has to pay the wreckers, the hearse, the funeral, the family.

St John Ambulance and the WestpacTrust Rescue Helicopter will have to transport the injured to hospital, where countless staff will fight for weeks, maybe months, to keep them alive.

What price can you put on the psychological damage to the family, witnesses, firemen, police, ambulance, doctors and journalists? Yes, most of the professionals choose their occupation and your death keeps them busy, but not many enjoy it.

Daily calls to the emergency services give anecdotal evidence that something is working. Question: "How was your day today?" Answer: "Quiet, except a car hit a pig, but it was a minor injury. Of course the pig died." (True story, it happened last week.)

No, it is not the clever billboard of a speeding ticket attached to the foot of a dead corpse that has slowed the traffic and it is not the speed camera that surprises you after the passing lane near Te Kauwhata. It's those Dukes of Hazzard again.

But despite their best efforts, some very real obstacles still remain in the daily mission. Like the sheets of water spraying out from trucks that make it impossible to see for what seems like a lifetime (flashing before your eyes). Or that sucking feel when you drive past two trucks in a row.

But it can't all be the trucks' fault. Did they design the roads that bring you face to face with the headlights of oncoming traffic? Did they pour the cheap, uneven road surface on to swampy Waikato land, or attempt to renovate by pouring more cheap tarseal, layer upon uneven layer?

The Government has come to our rescue with its idea to put more money into roads, because no one uses public transport - only the 30-odd commuters on Tranz Rail's express train to Auckland who put down the morning paper to wave to the strung-out commuters from Auckland.

But even the public transport bodies have ruled out what you would expect to be a viable option. Think outside the square, go underground, give us a subway. We might not have the numbers, the room under the ground or the carefully constructed district plans to make it financially viable.

But what cost do you put on human life? Is it a mission impossible?