Surveillance images don’t lie, director who caused havoc in Hoboken drove way too fast: « It’s a race track here » (Hoboken)

Saturday morning, just before 7 am. Various local residents of the AntwerpSesteenweg in Hoboken wake up awake from a hell of noise and rush out. On the street they find a true havoc. A sporty Audi RS6 is crashing with great violence against eight parked cars, a home and a waste container and also pulled out a tree, to end up standing against a lighting pole. As by Wonder, nobody is seriously injured. Two occupants from the Audi are removed.

The driver, a twenties, is being picked up. He is not under the influence of alcohol or drugs, but according to local residents there is no doubt that he was driving a lot too quickly.

« It is actually a miracle that no major accident has happened here. The Antwerpsesteenweg is a real race track, » sighs the woman whose home was damaged in the accident. « Fortunately we only speak of material damage and not injured. » The gigantic ivy that adorns her facade and that of her neighbor has been demolished on the trunk.

On camera images of a butcher, a little further in the street, you can clearly see how the car in question races just after 7 hours on the stone road. Razing is the right word: not only on the screen, but also the sound is clearly noticeable how the driver does not stick to the permitted speed of 50 kilometers per hour. A few seconds later, the driver and his passenger crash against a waste container and drag eight cars in their ravaget trip.

The local residents seize the event to raise the situation in their street. « It has to change here urgently, » says a neighbor. « The Steynstraat, parallel to the Antwerpsesteenweg, has recently been redesigned. They used to flame through it, now they race on AntwerpSesteenweg. Sometimes against each other, with one on the roadway and the other about the trambeding. »

Yet not everyone seems to believe that a large reconstruction is the solution to the problem. « Now they crash against parked cars and a facade, with escape mounds it can just as well be that they end up in my bedroom, » says the affected neighbor with a boutade. « Then you can still construct escape hills, trees and speed inhibitors: the problem is the mentality for some. As long as it does not change, the problem will not be solved, » she says.