Monty strikes again

By Spencer Fowler Steen

The Montague Street Bridge has been hit yet again, bringing the tally to six this year.

A truck collided with the infamous three-metre clearance bridge in South Melbourne on November 6 at around 3.15pm. As a result, the two right-hand lanes were closed for about one-and-a-half hours before both were re-opened, according to VicTraffic..

“Unfortunately, Monty’s been hit again,” VicTraffic said in a Facebook post.

The driver appeared to have hit the bridge despite driving through an overhead height warning system consisting of dangling gantries, installed by VicRoads two years ago.

The controversial bridge even has its own website: How Many Days Since Montague Street Bridge Has Been Hit, where it’s been dubbed “Monty Balboa.”

The website tracks the number of “days as champion,” information about each “contester,” photos of the “aftermath” and the “bout” date.

It also has its own Twitter page, which has over 4000 followers, dedicated to documenting each crash.

Bus driver Jack Aston recently had his prison sentence overturned after successfully appealing a five-year jail term for hitting the bridge in 2016, injuring six.

Mr Aston called upon Premier Daniel Andrews to take further action before someone was killed.