Road safety campaigners have unveiled new banners in Springholm urging motorists to slow down.
Chris Wybrew and Dorothy King have put up the signs as part of UN Global Road Safety Week, which runs until Saturday.
They’ll also be carrying out increased radar speed checks to see just how fast vehicles are travelling through the village.
The pair have been pushing for improvements on the A75 Euroroute – such as a lower speed limit and a bypass – for a number of years.
Their efforts saw speed activated traffic lights in 2017 but Mr Wybrew says they plan to step up their speed checks to highlight the “ongoing failures” of the signals.
He said: “The main thrust this week is to promote enhanced 20mph awareness among our region’s councillors and MSPs.
“We hope they will take advantage of the special webinars instead of being wedded to the perpetuation of the unsafeor active travel inhibiting fast traffic status quo on most of the region’s streets.
“The last thing we want is business as usual. Now is the time for transformative change.
“The silver lining of the first lockdown was the massive reduction of the traffic noise which is the sound track to our lives here and on many other fast, busy streets. Cutting speeds to 20mph can have a very similar calming effect as unwanted, intrusive traffic sound pretty much doubles between 20mph and 30mph.
“We know, both from official and other survey data, that above average speeds can easily extend up into the mid 50s and does involve significant numbers of the largest HGVs using the North Channel ferries.
“In these instances sound will have doubled and more and be 10-15 times more than a small car.
“All night there are sharp percussive sounds like thunder as heavily laden vehicles pass over road surface irregularities.
“Killing speed is at the heart of taming A75 Euroroute traffic blight here until a bypass is built.
“It is crazy that politicians have got away without such provision since 1973 when a tentative bypass route was pegged out and test drilled by the Stewartry of Kirkcudbright County Council.
“The era of kicking the can down the road and relying on mere luck to keep us safe is over.”
Mr Wybrew said it is likely he will soon be making a Freedom of Information request to the council regarding their 20mph policy, with the speed limit on the A75 in Springholm currently 30mph.
He added: “As matters stand we have to stay lucky all the time whereas one of these fast HGV drivers only has to be unlucky once.
“The precautionary principle demands that 20mph be adopted now and measures taken to uphold it. All A75 drivers will have seen the rutted verges along the route where lorries have either run off road entirely or nearly so.
“It is not long since a car left the road in Crocketford demolishing the newly installed pedestrian crossing signals and their control box.”
