Coledale residents hoped it wouldn't take a death to draw attention to their safety concerns about a pedestrian crossing near the suburb's public school.
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Now they fear that the death of a 74-year-old man at the Lawrence Hargrave Drive crossing last Thursday evening still won't be enough to get the authorities to take action.
South African Frank Honiball was crossing at the marked pedestrian crossing about 6pm when he was struck by a Ford Falcon, travelling south.
He was taken to Wollongong Hospital but died several hours later.
Coledale Public School P&C president Annie McNamara said residents had been campaigning for safety measures to be introduced at the crossing for at least a dozen years.
She took up the fight about three years ago and had been appalled by the number of "near misses" she had witnessed, or been told about, between vehicles and pedestrians at the site.
"It's a really busy crossing and a lot of young children use it with the public school and the day-care centre on one side," she said.
"A lot of elderly residents use it too, and there's been so many near misses. We're all just shocked and dismayed by the death last week - that's exactly what we've been terrified of."
Ms McNamara said poor visibility - and speeding - caused many of the safety issues.
"It's in a tricky place - it's situated on a slight rise and if you're coming from the south you don't see it until you're almost upon it," she said.
"Then those coming from the north will have just come through the last in a series of bends before Coledale Beach and they hit a nice, straight stretch of road and many just accelerate.
"Certainly no-one sticks to the 40km/h school zone limit."
Ms McNamara, like the campaigners before her, has written to numerous authorities.
Heathcote MP Lee Evans took up the issue on behalf of the residents this year, writing a letter to Roads Minister Duncan Gay, which led to the Roads and Maritime Services (RMS) conducting a road safety evaluation last month.
An RMS spokesman yesterday told the Mercury the results of that investigation would be finalised this month.
"Monitoring of the crossing was carried out in March, which included traffic counters to determine traffic and pedestrian volumes as part of a wider investigation into safety at the crossing," the spokesman said.
"Following the tragic crash on the crossing last week, RMS has accelerated investigations into increasing safety at this location."
Ms McNamara said there needed to be some "traffic calming" measures, whether that was the installation of traffic lights or even moving the crossing further north.
Another Coledale resident, Chris Collimore, campaigned for safety measures for more than five years, but to no avail.
"Kate Curtis first started campaigning in 2001, and I took up the campaign from 2004 for a number of years," he said.
"Over the years we've written to a number of different politicians, council, state government, the Roads and Maritime Services and other authorities ...
"If someone getting killed doesn't make something happen, then I don't know what will."
Wollongong police and the Southern Region Crash Investigation Unit are investigating last week's fatality at the crossing and are calling on any witnesses to contact Crime Stoppers on 1800 333 000.
