County Road 9, an accident waiting to happen

Editor:

County Road 9 between Creemore and County Road 124 has to be one of the most treacherous stretches of road in the province. I’m reminded of it almost every time I go to town. It’s a dangerous blend of people driving way too slow and people driving way too fast; it’s also a series of winding turns that lead into kilometre-long straightaways. This past Saturday, all those factors came to a horrific head at the bottom of my driveway.

A young man lost control of his car heading east out of Dunedin. The car slammed into the hill below my house. The sound of the impact was terrifying. The screaming that ensued was worse.

My wife called 911 immediately and within 60 seconds we were down at the road and expecting the worst. Based on the sounds we’d heard from the accident we both expected a cyclist or motorcyclist to be lying on the ground. We’ve heard stories like thisbefore. A friend was the first person on the scene of a fatal motorcycle crash in Dunedin, on County Road 9, a couple summers ago.

We were relieved when we got to the road and realized no one had been killed. It was a single vehicle crash and the driver was already out of the car and stumbling around in a daze. A woman who was just passing through the area was already on the scene. We encouraged the kid to sit down and wait for help to arrive. He was in shock and certain he had broken his back. He was scared. It was scary for all of us. I couldn’t help but think in that moment that his life might never be the same. I’m not sure how it all turned out for him. The ambulance took him away. I hope he’s ok.

I have no idea how fast he was going. I have no idea why he lost control of the car. The roads were slick from intermittent rain. What I do know is he had blown by the woman (the one on the scene), across a solid yellow line, as they came out of Dunedin proper; at Glen Huron Road. This happens all the time. People are impatient and there’s nowhere to pass.

They closed the road for a couple of hours. A few friends who were heading home in Dunedin came up to the house to wait for it to reopen. They’re people who have lived here a lot longer than us and had countless stories of the things they’d seen over the years on County Road 9.

Hopefully whoever wins the municipal election in October will do something about it. The speed limit needs to be reduced. People are driving too fast, and too slow. There are also cyclists everywhere and hidden driveways around every bend.

County Road 9 is literally an accident waiting to happen.

Andrew Murray,

Dunedin.