Boy racers move to quieter areas

Boy racers have already changed their tactics before a new bylaw bans them from a popular industrial meeting spot.

The bylaw was meant to come into effect yesterday but it has been delayed until at least January 18 while signs are put up in the Bell Block industrial area where the bylaw applies.

But the street racers have already moved away from the area and are now more likely to be found in smaller groups in remote rural areas around Taranaki.

Yesterday the Taranaki Daily News spoke to two young New Plymouth drivers who used to frequent the Friday and Saturday night burn-out sessions at Bell Block.

Both said the bylaw would not stop people spinning their wheels, they would simply do it in other, potentially more dangerous places.

"I've kind of got out of it," Crystal Plowright, 17, said.

"You don't really know where everyone goes these days, you kind of have to know the right people now.

"They go to back roads in the country which is probably even more dangerous because people are always driving down them but not that many people used De Havilland Drive at night time."

Cameron Hart, 18, said the law makers were making things more difficult for themselves.

"When everyone was there (Bell Block) they knew where everyone was," he said.

"Ever since they said they were going to do the bylaw people have stopped going there but it hasn't stopped the problem at all.

"People scatter all over the place and do their own things.

"There's not the big gatherings any more, it's just all over the place.

"Maybe if you're driving around Taranaki somewhere and you see a good intersection somewhere ... "

Anecdotal evidence from people living in rural areas had already suggested the shift, but not everyone's complaining.

Business managers in Bell Block spoken to yesterday agreed the problem had become significantly less for their businesses in recent times.

PBT group branch manager Mike Van Den Bemd said when he arrived in Taranaki in February last year the conditions at the company's Bell Block depot were ugly.

"It's tapered off to pretty much nothing now," he said.

"We're right on that corner and it all happened outside our building.

"We used to have to spend an hour cleaning up on Monday mornings."

It was complaints from businesses in the area, battling litter, graffiti, diesel on the roads, property damage, and access and safety issues for their employees caused by the late-night street racing and burnout sessions that first prompted New Plymouth District councillor Shaun Biesiek to start work on the bylaw last year.

It is similar to ones in place in Tauranga, Christchurch and Manukau where authorities have reported a successful result, although not without some displacement issues.

The bylaw bans any vehicle weighing less than 3500kg from entering designated streets in the area between 7pm and 7am daily without a legitimate reason for being there.

- © Fairfax NZ News