For the past 18 years, Daniel Naude has been the name and face behind South Canterbury’s road safety efforts.
But the former South African police officer is saying farewell to the community that he has worked to make safe, to head to a new job as service manager for traffic and road safety at the Palmerston North City Council.
The move will bring Mr Naude and his wife closer to family — a son and daughter-in-law are expecting a baby, and they want to be close — but he will miss the community he found so welcoming when he arrived here nearly 20 years ago, he said.
Mr Naude first applied for the road safety co-ordinator role in 2003 while living in South Africa.
He was not successful, but a couple of years later when the family had decided to move to New Zealand, in a stroke of great timing, the position became vacant, so he applied again, this time, taking up the role.
Working initially for the South Canterbury Road Safety Trust and later employed directly by the three South Canterbury councils — Timaru, Waimate and Mackenzie — Mr Naude said he was surprised how quickly he was able to settle in to Timaru and the job.
‘‘In December 2005 I was sitting in a meeting with public health and others, and made a comment that within two weeks of being here, I knew more people around the table than I used to know when I was back in South Africa. It was pretty quick to form a team to push the messages through.’’
The aims of the role were to reduce road trauma, incidents and to educate the public.
His first perceptions of South Canterbury drivers was that they were quite well behaved, and much more disciplined than he was used to in South Africa.
But there have been challenges; factors in most fatal crashes include not wearing a seatbelt, drink-driving, and speeding.
Over the years, the drinkdriving message has got through to more people. Other challenges have come over the years from changes in government and policies impacting on his work.
‘‘It has been a wee bit disappointing to see a lot of the good work we have done scrapped. Attitudes towards road safety change; some parties’ focus is more on the efficient flow of transport, not so much on the safety part of it.
Highlights have included being involved in the successful push to change the give-way rule in 2011, a visiting drivers’ campaign involving a series of posters in public toilets that gained worldwide attention, and getting rally champion Hayden Paddon to voice road safety advertisements.
He is also proud to have been involved in the acquisition of a driving simulator in Timaru, and providing free driver assessments for older drivers to educate and improve confidence for those who have to re-sit their licence.
Timaru’s ageing population poses its own challenges.
‘‘It can take an older person longer to get things done, like crossing a road, and their reaction time is slower. So we need to cater for that, make sure they have access to places, and encourage them to get out and about.’’
The road toll gets plenty of publicity and Mr Naude has personal experience of losing family members to crashes.
While he will be a day’s travel away from Timaru next year, he will still be keeping an eye on how we are doing, after spending nearly a third of his life trying to keep the community safe, he said.
