It was supposed to be a congestion buster and improve safety but, so far, the $5 million upgrade of a busy intersection is only scoring one out of two at best with many users.
Drivers have complained about delays at the lights which were recently switched on at the intersection of Yandina-Coolum Road, South Coolum Road and School Road, replacing a roundabout.
When work began mid-year, Member for Ninderry Dan Purdie described the intersection upgrade as part of campaign to bust congestion and improve safety.
Then Transport Minster Bart Mellish said it would improve traffic flow and then Member for Nicklin Rob Skelton claimed it would reduce a bottleneck at the entry to Coolum from Sunshine Motorway.
However, dissatisfaction appears to outrate satisfaction with the new lights if social media is anything to go by.
Complaints range from difficulties getting out of Coolum, to a 2km traffic jam back past the Yandina-Coolum Road industrial estate on the other side of the Sunshine Motorway, and a South Coolum road queue of traffic 500m back past the police station.
Some motorists are driving to Peregian and others south along David Low Way to avoid the intersection, increasing the pressure on those roads, while others are rat-running.
The intersection was anything but congestion-busting when Dan Hopkinson took South Coolum Road on his way from Marcoola to Noosa North Shore for a wedding on a weekend.
“Wasn’t too far back from the lights but sat there for at least five minutes and it seemed as if nothing was really moving in any direction,” he said.
“I looked in the mirror and noticed the traffic backed up behind me at least to Woolies which was as far as I could see.”
Mr Hopkinson has stuck to David Low Way since.
“I figured if it’s that bad at 10am on a normal Saturday it’s not smart going anywhere near it on a week day,” he said.
Mr Hopkinson said a two-lane roundabout would have worked better and maintained traffic flow.
“They’ve taken a small queue where people can’t give enough courtesy to zipper merge properly and created a car park in its place,” he said.
The Department of Transport and Main Roads maintains the lights will improve the safety of nearby Coolum State School students, other pedestrians and cyclists trying to cross the road.
The upgraded intersection includes a new through-lane on Yandina-Coolum Road for eastbound traffic, turn-lanes from Yandina-Coolum Road into School Road and South Coolum Road, and turn lanes on each other leg of the intersection.
A TMR spokesperson said “these lanes increase eastbound vehicle capacity and provide additional space for traffic during peak traffic demand.
Westbound traffic was suffering when Sunshine Coast News visited one recent morning, banked up from the new lights well back to the Central Avenue-Yngar Street lights and beyond.
A TMR spokesperson indicated the department was still fine-tuning the lights but drivers also had to adjust to stopping rather than flowing through the roundabout.
“TMR is aware of congestion at the upgraded intersection and is closely monitoring the signal phasing and is making adjustments as required to balance safety and efficiency,” the spokesperson said.
“This active monitoring will continue in the coming weeks with our traffic engineers checking traffic flow in real-time and adjusting the signal phasing to align with traffic and pedestrian demand.
“With the installation of the new traffic signals, road user experiences have changed. This is not unusual, and it will take time for people to become accustomed to the new arrangements.”
Coolum P&C deputy president Shane Urban thanked Sunshine Coast Council and TMR for bringing the project to fruition.
“Our priority is and always will be the safety of our children and I am grateful that finally thiscontrolled set of pedestrian crossings will safeguard them and other pedestrians every hour of every day, not just during school pick up and drop off times,” he said.
But not all school parents are on board with it.
Alyssa Platt, who drives through the intersection twice a day ferrying her children to and from school, was curious about whether Coolum locals had really indicated they wanted lights during community consultation.
“I would like to know the results, what were residents wanting for the area. It’s the residents that are going to be using it the most,” she said.
Ms Platt said she would like to see other options considered to relieve school vehicle and pedestrian pressure off the intersection, the only way in and out of School Road.
She said a bridge from School Road across Stumers Creek, previously declined by the council because of rare frog habitat, would take vehicles and pedestrians out to Park Crescent, while a ring road around the school, through the edge of the adjacent national park, could also bring school traffic out at a different point.
“If they can build an airport on national park, why can’t they do that?” she said.
TMR’s Road Safety Team ran an education program for children at Coolum State School last month to educate students on using signalised pedestrian crossings safely and school crossing supervisors will stay on until the end of the term
Ms Platt was disappointed the lollipop crossing supervisors who had worked a now-removed crossing east of the intersection would not be kept on, saying it would not take much for one of a group of students crossing the road at the lights to be bumped into traffic.
“I think they need to keep the lollipop team in there and not just rely on the kid to press the button,” she said.
A nearby worker said the intersection was working well but the addition of extra lanes near the lights had created problems for motorists trying to exit the service station on South Coolum Road and rejoin outbound traffic on Yandina-Coolum Road.
“They used to have to turn right across a lane, now they’ve got to cross two lanes to turn left to go out to the motorway,” he said.
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