Having a Jack Russell dog die in his arms after being hit by a distracted driver sparked Ōhope surfing instructor Ollie Dobbin to start a petition to have the speed limit lowered on West End Road.

“I picked Maggie up off the road after she got run over,” Mr Dobbin said. “She died in my arms. It was a wake-up call. The driver wasn’t looking at the road, so it wouldn’t have made a difference if she was a dog or a toddler."

As the owner and operator of Salt Spray Surf School, Mr Dobbin spends a large part of his time on the grassy dune beside the 1.3 kilometre no-exit coastal road, popular with surfers and holidaymakers.

“The near misses that we see all the time are countless,” he said. “There’s an obvious reason why. It’s because drivers are allowed to go 50kmh around the carpark.”

Maggie, who lived in one of the houses near the toilets and turn-around area at the end of the road, had become part of the school.

“She was the coolest dog ever. She would come and get all the rats out of the dunes and would come across the road all the time because she was so friendly. She became a part of the surf school over the summer.”

Mr Dobbin addressed Whakatāne District Council’s infrastructure and planning committee yesterday to ask for the speed limit on a section of the road to be reduced to 30kmh and the turn-around area around the toilets to be reduced to 10kmh.

He spoke on behalf of West End resident Briar Goldie, who had carried out work to put together a report but was unavailable to attend the meeting.

They are also seeking traffic calming measures.

“It’s not just lowering the speed limit,” he told the Beacon. He would like to see similar safety measures as have been implemented on the 30kmh section of Muriwai Drive near The Heads, such as judder bars and planter boxes to narrow the road.

He cited another fatality on West End Road in 2019, when a cyclist crashed into a car reversing out of a car park, breaking his neck. He witnessed the accident and alerted the nearby lifeguards to the scene to try to save the man’s life.

He said the 50kmh speed limit combined with roadside parking and the area’s popularity with beachgoers created clear safety risks.

“The surf school alone attracts between 5000 and 6000 people a season, many of them children. They have to cross the road when they come to us, because there are toilets across the road.”

“This weekend we’ve got the West End Wiggle (surfing competition); there will be nearly 1000 people a day frequenting the area. There will not be a car park free on West End Road. The report included a petition signed by more than 100 residents and regular visitors to the popular surf beach over 10 days and comments gathered from residents.

Feedback from West End residents showed 90 percent had experienced cars speeding on the road, while 95 percent had witnessed distracted drivers, and 70 percent had witnessed near misses.

“Because it is a coastal road, every driver looks at the ocean,” Mr Dobbin said. “In our safety briefing we say to every kid that comes to our classes, ‘surfers are terrible drivers because they’re always looking at the beach’. If the surf’s good and you’re driving down this road that follows the beach the whole way, you’re distracted all the time.

“Obviously there’s some self-responsibility there, but there’s some easy measures to implement that will make it safer and that’s what should matter.”

He said he had not heard feedback from anyone against having the speed limit lowered. As it is a no-exit road there would be no issue with through traffic being inconvenienced by the lowered speed.

“There were a few people that said they would only like speed restrictions in certain areas or in certain ways. There was a 5 percent response from people who haven’t seen any issues.

“We’ve seen investment [by the council] into making people stay here. The decks, the shower, the toilets, the freedom camping site, but there’s been no consideration of the speed limit. There’s a disconnect there.

“If nothing is done, something is going to happen. It’s not a matter of if, it’s a matter of when, and as someone who’s here all the time, I’ll most likely be the one here as the first responder.”

West End Road is one of 17 roads in the Whakatāne district that the council is in general agreement should have a speed reduction.

It plans to begin consulting with the public on making speed reductions on these roads at the end of April.

The council will also consult on five other roads where speed limit reductions are proposed but it has not achieved a consensus.

The council approved the consultation document at Thursday’s meeting and voted to delegate final approval of speed limit setting to a five-member subcommittee.

Councillors Julie Jukes, Gavin Dennis, Ngapera Rangiaho, Wilson James and Andrew Iles offered to sit on the committee with Mayor Victor Luca as ex-officio member.