Motorist deaths in Melbourne have fallen by half over the past decade, but there’s been no reduction in deaths among pedestrians, motorcyclists and bicycle riders over the same period.
It is in this context that City of Yarra councillors voted last week to expand a trial of 30km/h speed limits across all of Fitzroy and Collingwood, other than major thoroughfares and pending state government approval.
A growing number of major cities including London, Paris, Toronto and Barcelona are adopting 30km/h limits on their streets and say it has made their cities safer. The World Health Organisation has called for it to be the maximum where vehicles mix with pedestrians and cyclists. But Victoria Police’s chief commissioner, Shane Patton, scoffed at the plan last week, saying he was not aware of any evidence that it would reduce road trauma. “I think no one is going to obey it ... it’s ridiculous,” he said.
Patton’s view – although perhaps widely shared – may have been a shock to Victoria Police’s fellow members of the Victorian Government Road Safety Partnership, made up of the Transport Accident Commission and the Transport, Justice and Health departments.
The partnership told a state parliament inquiry into road trauma earlier this year that successive studies had shown that 30km/h was the “maximum impact speed for a healthy adult before death or very serious injury becomes increasingly likely”.
Someone hit by a car at 50km/h has a 90 per cent chance of being killed, compared with a 10 per cent chance at 30km/h, those studies show.
Melbourne
Come with me on a magical journey between Sydney and Melbourne. No, not via the airport… but starting at Sydney’s Central Station, aboard a newly refurbished all-sleeper night train.
[…]
So my perfect journey is a dream – but why can’t Australians enjoy such a pleasant way to travel, given sleeper trains are going through a major resurgence in Europe, partly in response to climate change? It’s a good question, and there’s a simple answer: because the New South Wales government doesn’t want you to.
To Fitzroy locals, carrot man – who calls the inner-city Melbourne neighbourhood home – is simply known as Nathan.
VKM first photographed him during Melbourne’s Covid lockdowns and over walks in Carlton Gardens a friendship was formed.
“I know him now just as Nathan,” VKM says. “When we were walking, I’m not thinking about the man with a carrot. But then you see people’s faces and people’s reaction and it’s like, ‘oh that’s right, I’m with the guy who’s got the carrot’.”
For such a public persona, VKM points out Nathan is “humble and shy”.
Guardian Australia approached Nathan for an interview via a friend, but was informed he was happy for the carrot to speak for him.
The owners of the Corkman hotel site in Carlton will build a replica of the heritage pub they illegally demolished seven years ago.
In 2016, Raman Shaqiri and Stefce Kutlesovski knocked down the pub that had stood on the site since 1854. They had no planning permission or building permit.
The pair bought the Corkman Irish Pub for almost $5 million in 2015 and plans obtained by The Age soon after the demolition showed them considering a 12-storey student housing project on the site.
After public outrage at the brazen demolition, then planning minister Richard Wynne ordered that the pub be immediately rebuilt. But after a drawn-out legal battle, the pair were given an alternative: get a new plan for the site approved by the planning minister or rebuild the heritage facade.
Most of the revenue lost in Victoria due to fare evasion comes from the career evaders, who were the smallest group of the four. These people were found to be typically wealthy and chose to evade for the challenge rather than being unable to afford the ride. Of this group, Currie said, “We’ve got this archetypal, old view that it’s a young person or a drop-out that’s doing bad stuff. No, that’s not what’s going on.”
What is going on, though, is that despite research showing the majority of fare evaders not having criminal intent, they are still being treated as though they do by the Victorian government’s authorised officers.