A man who has holidayed at Shag Point for the past 50 years says the stretch of road where Dunedin photographer Riley Baker died after a crash at the weekend is very dangerous.
Timaru resident Graeme Mundy was one of the first people on the scene after Mr Baker’s motorcycle collided with a car driven by Chinese national Limin Ma on State Highway 1 near the Shag Point turn-off on Saturday.
Mr Baker died on Monday as a result of his injuries and Ma now faces one count of careless driving causing death.
Mr Mundy said he was walking along the beach with his wife on Saturday when he heard the crash.
He ran to the scene and found people surrounding Mr Baker.
He could not see the occupants of the vehicle.
"I had to push the airbags aside," he said.
"I couldn’t get the driver’s door open.
"They were in shock. I felt for them because I could see how easily that could happen."
Police said at the time of the crash it appeared the car crossed the centre line and into the path of Mr Baker’s motorcycle while the driver was attempting to enter a layby about 400m north of the Shag Point turn-off between Palmerston and Hampden.
"It is quite a dangerous place to pull into," he said.
He had seen several near misses in the past.
The layby had been an accident waiting to happen because of the topography of the area and the build-up of vegetation.
The layby was difficult to see and as traffic came over the brow of a hill, spotting oncoming vehicles could be hard, he said.
He believed Ma had slowed ahead of the turn-off, and was not speeding but had not seen Mr Baker coming towards him.
"There’s a lot of prejudice against Chinese people for crossing the centre-line, and a lot of it is reckless, but in this case I believe it could have been a simple accident," he said.
Because of the road’s topography — despite being a straight stretch — Mr Baker would not have had time to avoid the car, Mundy said.
"It is very dangerous. You have four seconds before a vehicle travelling at 100kmh from either direction is upon you. There is no room for indecision.
"Trees and shrubs on both sides at that time in the afternoon make it hard to see vehicles blending into the scenery."
The scenes which confronted him had affected him deeply, Mr Mundy said.
"I haven’t been coping at all," he said.
"I haven’t been sleeping ... from the traumatic impact of seeing [it]."
The accident followed the death of Motueka motorcyclist Craig Chambers last November, on State Highway 1 about 20km north of where Mr Baker died.
On that occasion, Singaporean tourist Wei Kiong Lew crossed double yellow lines into the path of oncoming traffic.
A NZ Transport Agency spokeswoman said State Highway 1 between Dunedin and Oamaru would receive safety improvements under the Safe Roads Alliance.
However, she could not provide details of the work which would occur on the road and said it would be unlikely to prevent incidents involving motorists crossing the centre line.
