By CAMERON LUCADOUWELLS
A BUSINESSMAN has captured hair-raising video footage of a hoon driver’s car losing traction as it circled a roundabout at Fiveways industrial estate in Keysborough.
James Kerr III, who runs Red Roo Commercial Environmental Equipment, is installing a $20,000 surveillance suite of nine high-definition CCTV cameras – some of them pointing to Keysborough Avenue which he said has been plagued by hoons for 13 years.
Footage shot on one of those permanent cameras mid-afternoon on 11 January shows a white Skyline sedan without numberplates tearing smoky circuits around a roundabout metres from another car which then exits the junction sideways in a haze of smoke.
Mr Kerr hopes neighbouring businesses and Greater Dandenong Council will help create a comprehensive network of cameras and lighting to identify hoons’ cars.
“I want hoons to know if they come here that we’ll catch them on camera.
“If the council puts a pole up on the roundabout, I’ll put in the camera and I’ll monitor it. “We need bright lighting – without it, we have no chance.”
The council has painted line markings to narrow the road, and will install parking-restriction signage to allow police to move congregators away at night.
However it has baulked at Mr Kerr’s suggestions for rubber speed cushions and permanent CCTV coverage in the estate.
Mayor Jim Memeti said the council found there was “no majority support” among the estate’s businesses for speed cushions.
Additional street lighting would be introduced to dark spots in the estate.
Chief executive John Bennie said the council focused its CCTV coverage on anti-social behaviour in activity centres such as Menzies Avenue and Foster Street, Dandenong, rather than “isolated streets”.
Last year, Senior Sergeant Scott Roberts of Greater Dandenong Highway Patrol told the Journal that police would find high-resolution CCTV footage of hoons useful.
“We really do need the assistance of high-resolution information, such as rego plates, then we’ll definitely prosecute them.”
Last month, police charged a Langwarrin man using video footage of a car dropping burnouts in a Dandenong South factory yard.
Mr Kerr believes surveillance is needed to guard Fiveways estate, particularly at night when it is a “virtual ghost town”.
Last October, businesses at the estate were offline for three days after a car smashed into a telephone exchange hub.
The resultant black-out of internet and phone services cost thousands of dollars in lost trade, adding to a litany of flattened roadside trees, light poles and signs.
The council has advised Mr Kerr that it will remove a large rock which has since been placed next to the exchange hub because it is a traffic hazard.
WATCH the video below.
