Exclusive: A Victorian motorcyclist who has been riding for over 40 years says he is ready to hang up his helmet after a near-death experience on a pothole-riddled highway.
Ballarat man Stewart Macdonald, 62, travels up and down Victoria’s Western Highway during weekly visits to Melbourne and is “constantly” scanning the road for deadly craters.
Stewart Macdonald has been riding for over 40 years. But the pothole crisis is making him consider changing his mode of transport. Stewart Macdonald
The road is notorious for potholes and has become a hot-button issue for riders and motorists alike following the tragic death of Peter “Tiki” Mason, 71, who was killed on the highway after striking a pothole in September.
Macdonald was riding along the Western Highway near Ballan toward Ballarat on a rainy August evening when he met a pothole he couldn’t avoid.
“In the rain, you actually can’t see the depth of a pothole because it’s just a big puddle,” he told nine.com.au.
“I hit this thing, and it kicked the bike sideways, I did a massive fishtail, left, right, left…
“There was a car travelling behind me and he just slammed on the brakes, I thought he was going to run me up.”
Macdonald briefly considered leaping off the bike as it swerved out of control.
As a seasoned rider, he was able to collect himself and eventually right his vintage Harley.
But it was a “bone crunching” hit to his bike – and his confidence.
Macdonald is semi-retired and is looking forward to enjoying his full retirement in Ballarat.
He doesn’t want a pothole to derail these plans or cut his life tragically short.
This pothole on the Western Highway near Wallace was reported by a local on August 21. Snap Send Solve
“It was a big enough scare… I’m 62. If I get hurt at this age, I won’t recover well,” Macdonald said.
“Maybe I sell the bike. Because I’m up and down that highway most weeks.”
He was unable to report the pothole due to uncertainty over its exact location.
Nine.com.au has asked the Victorian Department of Transport if a pothole has been patched up in this area.
“Seriously, if you stopped and reported every pothole on the way, you’d never get there,” Macdonald added.
The 258-kilometre-long Western Highway is a hotbed for dangerously large potholes.
Reports of potholes on the same highway have increased since Mason’s death on September 13.
Exclusive data shared to nine.com.au from Snap Send Solve founder Danny Gorog found reports of 11 separate potholes along the Western Highway between September 14 and now.
“That’s nearly four times as many as the same weeks last year. It brings the total for 2026 to 114, compared with 27 at the same point in 2025,” Gorog said.
One resident reported potholes “at least every one kilometre” on the road between Wallace and Ballan.
Another pothole near Bacchus Marsh, Ballarat-bound, was described as “sufficient to cause accident for motorcyclists”.
Potholes on the Western Highway near Wallace captured on a driver’s dashcam. Snap Send Solve
A Wallace local reported a pothole near Macdonald’s incident on August 21, describing it was “massive” and only “one of the scores of potholes between Ballan to Ballarat”.
This pothole was reported as “solved” in the app.
In September, Gorog found that there had been 310 reports of potholes along the same highway over the past 12 months.
In period between September 2025 and September 2026, pothole reports on the state-managed Western Highway between Trawalla and Melbourne exploded by 128 per cent.
Mason’s death on the state-managed road sparked a strong response from the Victorian government.
Premier Ben Carroll reiterated his earlier promise of $352 million in funding to double the number of potholes fixed by January 2027.
Carroll also pledged to double the pothole repair target from 250,000 to 500,000.
A spokesperson for Victoria’s Department of Transport and Planning told nine.com.au that crews regularly inspect the Western Highway and that the pothole that Macdonald encountered had been fixed.
“Our road repair blitz is doubling the number of potholes filled,” the spokesperson added.
Founder of the newly minted The West Party in Victoria and candidate for Werribee Paul Hopper said road maintenance and potholes are a key election issue for thousands of voters in his electorate.
He told nine.com.au the potholes “need to be corrected as an absolute priority”.
“It’s just horrible, I worry for our motorcycle-riding cohort out there,” he said.
“It’s years of neglect, clearly.
“However much money of bitumen went into the West Gate tunnel should have gone into the bitumen in the potholes.”
Macdonald said it was disappointing that the state government has only taken action in the months before the Victorian election.
He claimed potholes on the highway have been troubling drivers and riders for years.
“It’s not an issue this week or last week. It’s been ongoing for four or five years, and it’s getting really bad,” he said.