Hampton Park resident Eric Bleile is fed up with VicRoads’ failure to take action after a second car ploughed into his Pound Road house.By Alison Noonan
HAMPTON Park resident Eric Bleile says he is living in fear after another car ploughed into his house last week.
Mr Bleile returned to his Pound Road home on Friday afternoon to find a section of his front brick wall had been smashed in, tyre marks snaked on his lawn and a note from police informing him that someone had crashed into his house.
“It smashed right through my carport and pushed part of the front brick wall under my living room in about two inches.
“This is the second time my house has been damaged. I’m scared to sit in my own lounge room now,” he said.
This latest incident comes just three months after a car veered off the road and hit a tree on his front lawn and follows a series of other near misses this year.
“I’m fed up with this happening again and again. I get a shock each time,” he said.
“This is something I shouldn’t have to put up with at my age. I’ve had enough. But I don’t have the money to move.”
Mr Bleile said he has spent the last year pleading with VicRoads to have a guardrail installed at the front of his property, only to be told by VicRoads that it was not possible at that particular location.
“VicRoads put a guardrail outside my property after a car lost control and crashed through my house several years ago, but then took it away after they installed traffic lights at the intersection.
“Now they are telling me a minimum guard fence of 30 metres is required for it to function safely and because gaps have to be left for driveways that distance can’t be achieved at my house.
“This incident is another example that a guard rail is needed.
“What would have happened if someone was walking past my house at the time they would surely have been killed,” he said.
Mr Bleile said that after unsuccessfully turning to his local ward councillor for help he would now approach his local state member in a last ditch effort to protect his home.
VicRoads Regional Manager Steve Brown said he was aware of safety concerns relating to vehicles completing right turns at the intersection of Pound Road and Hallam Road.
He said VicRoads would be installing right turn arrows to improve the control of right turn movements in October.
“The aim of these works is to reduce the number of vehicles turning right at excessive speed and should minimise the possibility of cars losing control and leaving the road.
“VicRoads will assess the impact that the right turn arrows make on driver behaviour once they are installed and will again investigate possible further treatments at the location,” he said.
Endeavour Hills Constable Michael Hasting said no charges had been laid but police were continuing to investigate Friday’s incident.
