As with all areas, we suffer from a group of drivers who take no notice of speed limits and rush around everywhere in their souped up cars, especially after dark.
The Community Association keeps the local constabulary informed of especially troublesome streets and they pay them a visit when they can suitably armed with Speed cameras and the like. Our area is a rapidly growing one with new homes, new residents and builders with their utes and delivery trucks keeping traffic up and running as yet another new home is completed and a young family moves in.
As with many new home areas some of the infra structure from previous days just doesn't happen nowadays mainly to keep prices down. One of the results is fewer footpaths for people and children to use. Backyards too are minimal in size which further encourages kids to use the front street for play purposes.
This in turn leads to children (especially during school holidays) playing on the roads and generally treating some of the roads as mini playgrounds. So for children, roads are the just the playgrounds for them to use.
You would expect parents to be aware of the dangers involved and encourage their children to be aware of Safety First road rules, to be alert when around roads and to wear safety helmets and other equipment when riding bikes, scooters, skate boards etc.
A group of younger children were having a great time on the bikes and scooters the other day when one unsupervised 8 year old rode straight out onto the road and hit a tray truck while riding his motorized scooter. He wasn't wearing a helmet and he ignored all the road safety rules. Now he is in a critical condition in a Brisbane Hospital. Eye witnesses suspect any future he may have will be severely restricted with possible brain damage if he even makes it.
Needless to say the whole community is in shock over this.
Despite this a resident was riding around yesterday in the same area as where the child was hit on a quad bike. This morning on my bike ride I saw two lots of two kids riding their scooters along the road without helmets on. I spotted a grandfather on a bike with his toddler grandchild in a dicky seat on the back of the bike. The child was wearing a helmet, the grandfather a baseball cap.
Another you mum and dad were enjoying a Sunday morning bike ride. Dad had the daughter on a seat on the front of his bike while mum had the pet dog in the bike's carry basket. The daughter was wearing a helmet while Mum Dad and dog weren't.
I ask you why should we as a Community Association bother!
I remember back to a previous lifetime when I was a school principal and where there were times that I believed I cared more about a child's safety than their parent did.
It was a scary feeling!
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