New heavy vehicle rest bay opens in Cranbrook to save lives on the road

The new Cranbrook heavy vehicle rest bay is now open and the Shire hopes it will help fight fatigue and save lives on the road.

The pullover bay encourages people to stop and rest when driving long distances, with showers, toilets and other facilities.

Shire of Cranbrook Manager of Works Jeff Alderton said its completion was well timed on the eve of harvest.

“This has come about due to fatigue and speed issues within the Cranbrook town especially at harvest time and with heavy vehicle operators,” he said.

“Another problem was a lot of the heavy vehicles were parking illegally overnight on any town street that they could find.”

He said that restricted heavy vehicle movements on the Cranbrook-Frankland East Road was a key reason for the construction of the bay.

“There is a road (Cranbrook-Frankland East Road) which runs between Albany Hwy and Great Southern Hwy with the main intersection right in the middle of Cranbrook Town.

“Back in 2015/16 there were 15,180 heavy vehicle movements on this road alone during the harvest period of November to January and of these 14,000 where exceeding the speed limit.

“With consultation with Main Roads a restriction was imposed on Restricted Access Vehicles (RAV) that they were not allowed to use this road as a through fare.

“An alternate route was via the Albany Highway-Great Southern Highway intersection.

“The harvest of 2016/17 saw heavy vehicle traffic drop from 15,180 to 1,518 and the number speeding dropped from 14,000 to just over 400.”

The bay will also act as a driver reviver station.

Road Safety Commissioner Adrian Warner will officially open the facility at 10.30am on Friday, October 30.