Click play for Brad Worrall's video report with details on the crash and a drive-through at the scene.
THE “goat track” that claimed the life of a young man on Thursday night will kill again, says a prominent Border businessman.
But yesterday member for Albury Greg Aplin said it was unlikely the Riverina Highway near Lake Hume will be improved any time soon.
Huon electrician Lloyd Walker, 23, died after his car crashed into a tree, despite his brother's heroic attempts to save him.
Mr Aplin, who gave the stretch of road its nickname almost five years ago when in opposition, said statistics didn’t back the claim for a major upgrade.
He also said recent works and the growing demand to fix flood damaged roads in northern NSW would push the work down the “to do list”.
But Albury Lake Hume Resort managing partner Jon Ward says traffic is on the rise and another fatality increasingly likely.
“It is a bloody dangerous road,” he said.
“I was at a meeting with the RTA in 1996, where they promised it would be done in the next 12 months — they had a map showing 13 fatalities on that stretch of road.
“About 12 months ago they finally spent some money on the road but there was no structural change.
“Anyone who travels that road infrequently wouldn’t notice that anything has been done.
“The growth corridors for Albury and Wodonga are towards Lake Hume, you still have the army out here and Bellbridge is also growing.
“This road will carry more and more traffic and there will be more fatalities unless something is done.”
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Mr Aplin said traffic counts didn’t support the need for a major upgrade while recent works had also made the highway safer.
“The argument is that the roads authority has reacted to past criticisms and there has been some substantial work done in recent years,” he said.
“The road works included widening, removing trees and reducing the speed limit to 80km/h.
“They also did traffic counts and that suggested there was insufficient traffic volume to justify a major upgrade of that road.
“It now becomes a matter of it being placed on a priority listing.”
Mr Aplin said he would continue to push the need for more work but believed other roads had more pressing needs.
“Given there has been a massive number of major roads damaged by recent floods I can’t see it being on the top of the list,” he said.
“It is not on a black list and prior to this tragedy there haven’t been any significant accidents for quite a period and that comes after there was quite a spate in the 1990s, before it was upgraded.
“It’s not a massively used road.”
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