St Albans is the western suburbs’ No.1 hotspot for people illegally crossing railway tracks.
Police have also reported cars ignoring warning signals and driving around boom gates as well as a spate of near-misses in the past two weeks in Deer Park and Sunshine West.
“Victoria Police is aware of one report, but we’ve been told by V/Line there have been many more in the small area of Deer Park and Sunshine West,” a police spokeswoman said. “A V/Line driver reported a near-hit with a five-tonne truck at the Station Road level crossing in Deer Park last week,” she added.
Twenty-two people were fined for illegally crossing St Albans level crossings between 2012 and 2014. The next-highest incidence of fines in the west was four in Laverton and two in Albion, according to state government data.
From July 1, the government doubled penalties for illegally crossing train tracks when boom gates are down or where there isn’t a designated crossing point. The maximum court penalty for drivers and cyclists has risen from $1467 to $3033, and from $738 to $1517 for pedestrians.Crossings at Furlong and Main roads in St Albans will be removed by 2017 with works expected to begin in coming months.
Police transit safety division inspector Karl Curran said that with new V/Line timetables increasing the number of trains going through level crossings at Deer Park and Sunshine West, police were “absolutely sick” of drivers “dicing with death”.
“If driver behaviour continues this way there is going to be a fatality,” Inspector Curran said. “I’ve tasked our transit police to patrol high-risk level crossings and issue penalty notices to any motorists who cross tracks when boom gates are closed, who drive across tracks when warning signals are operating or fail to stop or give way at level crossings.”
State government data has revealed there were 51 near-misses for pedestrians at the Furlong and Main road crossings in the past decade.
There were 27 near-misses for drivers in the same period and two fatalities at Main Road.
Nearly 15,000 cars use the Furlong Road level crossing each day, while 7000 use the Main Road level crossing, government data reveals.
