Three in a row for Adelaide’s most dangerous intersection
One Adelaide intersection has been named the city’s worst for casualty crashes for a third year running, while an infamous roundabout has dropped out of the top 10.
The Marion and Sturt Road intersection has been ranked Adelaide’s most dangerous for the third year in a row by the RAA, with 36 casualty crashes between 2019 and 2023. The junction is used by an average of 80,900 vehicles a day.
Right-turn crashes were the most common at the intersection, making up 56 per cent of casualty crashes, followed by rear-end crashes at 33 per cent.
RAA senior traffic engineer Matt Vertudaches said there were “a few things from a design perspective” that stood out about the intersection, saying the introduction of turning traffic lights to turn could help reduce crashes.
“If we look at the number of crashes, more than half of them involved a vehicle heading south on Marion Road, and the majority of those were turning right onto Sturt Road,” he said today.
“It’s quite unusual that we have a filter turn across three lanes of traffic – it just takes one minor error in judgment and a crash can occur. And when they do at that speed and at that angle, it’s likely to result in injury.”
Image: RAAVertudaches said “from a safety perspective” the intersection “absolutely” warranted the installation of a turning traffic light, but that more changes would also be needed.
“By putting a green arrow in for example, it means there’d be more delay at the intersection on all approaches because you would need to be providing say, 10, 15, 20 seconds of extra time just for that right turn.
“To put in an arrow, you would probably need to widen the intersection, perhaps double up the right turn lane to allow more traffic to get through and minimise the time that that light is green.”
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RAA senior manager for road safety Charles Mountain said the RAA “would support the State Government in looking at it [the intersection] in detail to consider whether any improvements could be made”.
The intersection ranked second worst by the RAA was at Curtis Road and Peachey Road, with 32 casualty crashes from 2019 to 2023.
Main North Road intersections ranked both third and fourth most dangerous, with the Regency Road intersection seeing 30 casualty crashes, and the Montague Road intersection 28.
Main North Road appeared on the list of 16 the most, with 5 intersections listed at third, fourth, seventh, 13th, and 16th.
But the notorious Britannia Roundabout at Kensington dropped out of the top ten this year, coming in at 11th place with 21 casualty crashes.
