VIRGINIA BEACH, Va. (WAVY) — Edwin is a major cut through from Princess Anne Road to Independence Blvd. in Virginia Beach.
Neighbors out here are fed up, and longing for the past.
“I’m thinking what happened to our quiet little neighborhood,” says Linda Hardwick, who remembers the good old days, “It’s not like it used to be.”
She moved in 10 years ago, but it’s different now on Edwin Drive. “In the mornings during rush hour, getting out of the driveway will take 5-10 minutes,” Hardwick said.
Hardwick is serious about cutting down and slowing down traffic. She put up her own signs that read ‘Slow Down Speed Limit 25 mph.’ “We put these signs up because we are having speeders come down the highway, and we have our house up for sale, and we are having a hard time selling it because most people that have come to look at it are having a problem with the traffic.”
It’s real clear the potential buyers come in and say “I don’t want your house, too much traffic.”
Here’s the bad news for Hardwick, it’s only getting worse. “When we are mowing the edges of our yard, we have to wait for the flow of traffic to come through, and hopefully they aren’t texting or on their phones,” she said before looking off as if the situation is hopeless.
She is frustrated, so she called 10 On Your Side. We brought out our radar gun.
“37, 36 right there. 35 mph. Is that what you’re talking about?” we asked. She answered, “yes.”
10 On Your Side came out at noon, and it wasn’t rush hour, and we did not see a lot of speeding cars, but there was a lot of traffic cutting through from Princess Anne Road to Independence Blvd.
We discovered that Edwin Drive is already in Phase Three of Virginia Beach’s Traffic Calming Program.
That means increased fines for speeding with a minimum fine of $200 along with increased police enforcement. Virginia Beach Police were unavailable for recent current statistics on tickets given on Edwin Drive.
However, Traffic Engineering sent these: from July 2016 until February 2017, Beach police spent 36 hours out on Edwin, giving 18 tickets with an average speed of 40 mph in a 25 mph zone.
Now they want something more out here on Edwin, says Larkspur Civic League President Mike Anderson, “We have to work close with the city like we have in the past years to figure out a way to fix it.”
One possibility is for Edwin Drive to move from Phase Three to Phase Four in the Traffic Calming Program, which includes physical devices like speed tables that we reported on in other neighborhoods back in February.
Hardwick has another idea, “How about four way stop signs. We will take anything to slow the traffic down in this area because it has become a major cut through.” Anderson adds, “My message to the city we need to sit down, and talk with the city in person versus emails and phone calls — and we have made contacts.”
