Two speed cameras along Memorial Drive at Corrimal will be switched off and removed in the coming months.
Subscribe now for unlimited access.
$0/
(min cost $0)
or signup to continue reading
But that stretch of Memorial Drive won't be free of cameras - Transport for NSW will be replacing them with a pair of red-light speed cameras.
One has already been placed at the Towradgi Road intersection, with the other to be installed at the Railway Street intersection by April.
The Towradgi Road camera is not yet operational and a Transport for NSW spokeswoman said the two speed cameras will be switched off before the new cameras are placed into service.
The switch in cameras is due to a spate of accidents at the two intersections.
In the five-year period between 2014 and 2018, 20 crashes occurred at the Towradgi Road intersection.
READ MORE: Wollongong speed camera in the top 10
Fifteen people were injured, three seriously, at that intersection.
During the same time period, there were 11 crashes at the Railway Street intersection with nine people were injured, two seriously.
"These new cameras will target high-risk behaviours at the intersections and enforce speeding and red-light running for both north and southbound traffic on Memorial Drive," said the Centre for Road Safety executive director Bernard Carlon.
Mr Carlon said, in general, around 60 per cent of offences picked up by red-light speed cameras were from people running a red light.
"We know that running red lights can lead to serious T-bone crashes or vehicles crashing into pedestrians," Mr Carlon said.
The public will be notified before the red-light speed cameras are turned on, and they will operate in warning mode for the first month before infringement notices are sent out.
The speed cameras are not being removed because they are ineffective.
The two cameras were installed on Memorial Drive in July 2002 and each year, a speed camera review has marked them down as effective and recommended they be retained.
According to the latest review, which compares the five years before installation to the five-year period ending in 2017, there was no difference in fatalities along that stretch.
However there was a 17 per cent drop in total injuries, from 29 down to 24 and an eight per cent drop in the casualty cost to $12.68 million.
Glen Humphries
I'm an award-winning senior journalist with the Illawarra Mercury and have well over two decades' worth of experience in newspapers. I cover the three local councils in the Illawarra for the Mercury, state and federal politics, as well as writing for the TV guide. If I'm not writing, I'm reading.
I'm an award-winning senior journalist with the Illawarra Mercury and have well over two decades' worth of experience in newspapers. I cover the three local councils in the Illawarra for the Mercury, state and federal politics, as well as writing for the TV guide. If I'm not writing, I'm reading.
