The City of Alexandria has been picked for a Safe Streets grant that will help the city take another look at seven high-crash intersections around Alexandria’s West End.
The grant approval comes as Alexandria is going through a sweep of safety audits looking at some of the city’s most crash-prone intersections. The projects involve examining the causes of the crashes at the intersection and providing analysis, as well as a community engagement and design process.
The total cost of the audits is $1 million, with the federal grant covering $800,000, the city’s media relations manager Jacqueline Woodbridge told ALXnow.
The full press release from the City of Alexandria is below:
The U.S. Department of Transportation has selected the City of Alexandria as a grant recipient of the Safe Streets & Roads for All program. This grant will fund safety audits for seven high-crash intersections on Alexandria’s West End. The intersections include:
- South Van Dorn Street and South Pickett Street
- South Van Dorn Street and Edsall Road
- Seminary Road and Mark Center Avenue
- Seminary Road and Kenmore Avenue/Library Lane
- King Street and Dawes Avenue
- King Street and 28th Street
- King Street and Park Center Drive
The project will begin in Fiscal Year 2024 and will include safety audits, analysis, community engagement, and conceptual design for each of the seven intersections.
This project supports the City’s adopted goal of zero traffic deaths and severe injuries in Alexandria by targeting safety improvements at locations with a history of fatal or severe crashes. The Safe Streets & Roads for All Program is a new funding program created by the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law intended to prevent roadway deaths and severe injuries.
Visit alexandriava.gov/VisionZero for more information about the City’s efforts to improve traffic safety.
For inquiries from the news media only, contact the Office of Communications & Public Information at [email protected] or 703.746.3969.
This release is available at alexandriava.gov/go/4309
Image via Google Maps
As the city works through some of the most high-crash intersections, it’s setting its sights on twin troublesome intersections in southern Old Town: the intersections of Duke Street with Route 1 (South Henry and South Patrick streets).
The Duke Street intersections with Route 1 are among the most crash-prone in the city, with over 70 crashes at the intersection since 2014, the city said in a release. Of those, four resulted in severe injuries and more than 20 resulted in non-life-threatening injuries.
The intersections are just north of where the two streets converge, crossing with the aterial Duke Street. Contributing to the chaos is a right turn lane off Duke Street onto South Henry Street.
The City of Alexandria has launched a the “Duke Street & Route 1 High Crash Intersection Audits Project” with the goal of evaluating safety issues and developing designs for improvements.
The City is collecting feedback on mobility, safety and access issues at the intersections. Feedback can be submitted online anytime before Tuesday, Feb. 28.
The project is supported by a grant from the Metropolitan Washington Council of Governments (MWCOG) Regional Roadway Safety Program.
The long and tangled history of the Appomattox statue that once stood at the intersection of S. Washington Street and Prince Street took another turn this week as ALXnow learned the base had been installed in a Carlyle-area cemetery.
The statue had been removed in 2020 after years of debate over its presence. While some neighbors have expressed misgivings at the base’s new home above Confederate graves in the Bethel Cemetery not far from historic Black cemeteries, the new location is on private property and the cemetery’s owner said he’d like to see the statue reinstalled there.
It was also a tumultuous week at Alexandria City High School.
Twice this week, the school had to be evacuated due to bomb threats. On the second day, students had already been dismissed, but parents and faculty were still in the building for parent-teacher conferencing.
Unrelated to the threats, the Alexandria School Board approved new metal detectors at two Alexandria schools, over the concerns expressed by a student representative on the School Board who said students would feel uneasy with the new security measures.
The most-read stories this week were:
- Old Town residents and business owners cry foul over new George Washington Birthday Parade route
- Fire alarms didn’t go off during Saturday’s high-rise apartment fire in the West End
- Two Alexandria restaurants featured on Washingtonian’s ‘Very Best’ list
- Petitions launched for and against ABC Virginia opening new store in Old Town
- JUST IN: Alexandria City High School evacuated for second day in a row due to bomb threats
- Teen shot to death in West End hotel Friday night
- The base of the Appomattox statue has resurfaced atop Confederate graves in Alexandria
- Lorton man charged with DWI after multi-vehicle crash in Old Town
- Alexandria teens make suggestions for city to help on youth safety issues
- New regional plan offers significant steps to boost affordable housing in Alexandria
A few intersections along Patrick and Henry streets could turn into “no turn on red” intersections as part of an effort to clamp down on crashes in Old Town and Parker-Gray.
Both streets were identified as high crash corridors in the city’s Vizion Zero Action Plan. The city said over a dozen people have been struck and injured walking on Patrick and Henry streets in Old Town since 2016.
The city said restricting right turns on red lights can be a cost-effective way of reducing collisions with pedestrians. Nearby D.C. voted last year to ban right turns at most red lights by 2025.
“[No turn on red] restrictions are a low-cost safety treatment that protects pedestrians by reducing collisions between pedestrians and people turning right at a red light,” the city’s website said. “These are typically coupled with signal treatments known as leading pedestrian intervals, which give pedestrians a head start into the intersection and further enhance safety.”
The City is proposing "no turn on red" (NTOR) restrictions for some streets turning onto Patrick and Henry Streets. The proposed changes would take effect in early 2023. For more information >> https://t.co/Uc0ZXHXXVa pic.twitter.com/bpMoa7HUNp
— Alexandria Transportation & Environmental Services (@AlexandriaVATES) January 5, 2023
Patrick and Henry Streets are the parts of Richmond Highway split into separated northbound and southbound streets that run through the Parker-Gray (or Braddock, depending on your preference) and Old Town neighborhoods.
The restrictions would be put into place on these intersections with Henry Street:
- Wythe Street
- Oronoco Street
- Princess Street
- Queen Street
The restrictions could be in place for these intersections with Patrick Street:
- Montgomery Street
- Wythe Street
- Pendleton Street
- Oronoco Street
- Princess Street
- Cameron Street
Potentially getting rid of the right turn on red option for those intersections is part of a broader Vision Zero effort, which includes a push to overhaul some of the city’s more crash-prone intersections.
According to the website, the city is soliciting public feedback on the potential change until Feb. 6.
The City is accepting public comment on the proposed changes. To submit a comment, please email [email protected].
Image via Google Maps
About 58% of Alexandria City Public Schools students feel safe in school, with bullying, gang activity and selling/using drugs topping a new list of concerns.
Consequently, ACPS is considering enhancing the role of its school resource officers to not only serve as law enforcement but as teachers and informal counselors.
Interim Superintendent Melanie Kay-Wyatt will use the report by Hanover Research and recommendations from an advisory group to present a plan next month. The plan will focus on a reimagined partnership with the ACPS and the Alexandria Police Department’s school resource officer program.
The new arrangement has been months in the making — including 18 discussion group meetings — and will go into effect at the end of this school year in June.
Hanover is recommending the “triad” concept; a method of policing backed by the National Association of School Resource Officers where SROs serve as law enforcers, teachers, and informal counselors.
“In effective SRO programs, SROs fulfill educational and counseling functions in addition to providing law enforcement services,” Hanover said. “Discussion group participants suggest that intimidation and opposition to SROs can be overcome through community-building activities such as classroom visits or athletic events.”
SROs have been a contentious issue in Alexandria. The officers were defunded by the City Council in last year’s budget, and ACPS spent the first few months of the 2021-2022 school year without them. They were returned after ACPS pleaded to Council for their return after multiple incidents with weapons in schools.
“I feel safe from outside threats,” a Black student at Alexandria City High School’s Minnie Howard campus said in a report. “But within our hallways, we have a lot of fights that break out randomly throughout the day, and I just don’t want to be caught up in that.”
There were 46 students arrested and 68 injured in the 2021-2022 school year, with 194 incidents that provoked a police response, according to an ACPSÂ safety report.
The school system is using the 2021-2022 school year as a baseline for future improvement.
This school year began with new safety protocols, like a new identification requirement for students and staff at Alexandria City High School, staggered dismissal times, and designated entrances for students and staff at schools.
Hanover’s student safety survey of 5,200 students, staff, parents and community members found that just 35% of community members feel that the school system provides a safe environment, versus 75% of parents and 72% of ACPS staff.
“Students also identify drug use as a major concern and express substantial discomfort with drug sales and use in bathrooms,” the report said. “Staff express concern about a perceived lack of follow-up actions to address student violence.”
Between October and November, Hanover Research conducted 18 focus groups with 142 participants, in addition to garnering feedback from more than 5,200 people in the survey.
“Most non-staff members don’t even know how to contact the SROs at the schools,” Marriam Ewaida of Hanover Research told the Board. “The ones that have interacted with the SROs actually have largely positive perceptions with their interactions, but some of them…Â describe the SROs as being sometimes intimidating or distance in their limited interactions. Most respondents did not see the SRO as an informal mentor or educator.”
The survey also found that:
- ACPS has problems with violence or theft — 47% of students agree, 63% from the community, 38% from ACPS staff, and 37% of parents
- ACPS has a cyberbullying/bullying problem — 39% of students agree, 73% from the community, 46% of staff, and 34% of parents
- ACPS has a gang presence problem — 32% of students agree, 57% from the community, 31% from ACPS staff, and 31% of parents
Alexandria has started identifying pedestrian safety improvements around Alexandria City High School and a number of other school campuses.
Staff with the city’s Department of Transportation & Environmental Services are creating “walk audits” with available for public review in a final report by next June.
The walk audits will be conducted at both campuses of Alexandria City High School, George Washington and Francis C. Hammond Middle Schools, and at the city’s newest school — Ferdinand T. Day Elementary School.
“We will be coordinating with the school communities for each of those schools,” said Bryan Hayes, the City’s Complete Streets coordinator. “That’s the principals, teachers, parents, the students… to help identify things that make it challenging or unsafe for students to walk or bike to school.”
It’s all part of Alexandria’s Complete Streets and Safe Routes To School programs, which are devoted to making infrastructure improvements like adding new sidewalks, enhancing crossings and traffic calming.
Five years ago, the City identified 250 transportation improvement recommendations at 13 elementary schools. The city has completed about half of those recommended projects, according to the Department.
Staff will gather data through this winter and spring. To develop recommendations, the Department will have a small team of city staff, consultants, school representatives, and others to observe students walking to schools.
Making the improvements will be a multi-year process, said Alex Carrol, program manager of the City’s Complete Streets project.
“We’ve we’ve tackled a lot of the low hanging fruit in the recommendations,” said Carrol. “These were always intended to be multi-year efforts. I don’t have a specific timeline for when we expect all of the recommendations to be completed, but it is going to be a multi year process.”
Alexandria City Public Schools officials say that their strategies to make school safer are working, although it will take time to tell if they’re right.
Flanked by city, school and police officials, interim Superintendent Melanie Kay-Wyatt said at a student safety forum on Wednesday night that crime incidents are down this school year.
Kay-Wyatt didn’t present data to back up the claim that schools are safer, but said that it’s because of a new identification requirement for students and staff at Alexandria City High School, staggering dismissal times, designating entrances for students and staff at schools, and providing all ACPS students with a mandatory 30 minutes of daily Social and Emotional Learning (SEAL) time.
“While we see that incidents are down, I remain very hopeful,” Kay-Wyatt said. “I believe that it’s (due to) of some of those SEAL lessons that are in place and other supports that we put in place throughout the school year to make sure that we are supporting families and students.”
There were 46 students arrested and 68 injured in the 2021-2022 school year, with 194 incidents that provoked a police response, according to an ACPSÂ safety report. The school system is, in fact, using the 2021-2022 school year as a baseline for future improvement.
Transportation-wise, the city recently approved the installation of speed cameras in five school zones, as well as reducing speed limits in school zones to 15 miles per hour. The city is also working on walk audits for potential pedestrian improvements on roadways near Ferdinand T. Day Elementary School, George Washington and Francis C. Hammond Middle Schools, and both ACHS campuses.
By December, Kay-Wyatt will also receive recommendations on a reimagined partnership between ACPS and the police department, the latter of which provides school resource officers to the high school and the city’s middle schools. In the meantime, a proposal will be presented to the School Board to continue the SRO program as it stands until the end of the school year.
“Last year was very challenging, extremely challenging,” John Contreras, ACPS Director of Safety and Security Services, said at the forum. “It was a very challenging year and this year is a bit calmer.”
Contreras also did not present any safety data on this school year.
While the school system might feels safer, it will take time to collect the data to really see what’s working, said School Board Member Abdel Elnoubi, who attended the meeting as an audience member.
“You’ve got to give it time,” Elnoubi said.
One high school student at the event said that SEAL lessons aren’t working, and that the information being presented to the community is being “sugar-coated.”
“They have us do community circles to share our emotions, but it’s high schoolers,” another student said. “Nobody want to talk about how they feel. It’s just an awkward experience.”
Alexandria City Public Schools leaders will be on-hand tonight (October 26) to discuss school safety.
The conversation starts at 6:30 p.m. at George Washington Middle School (1005 Mount Vernon Avenue), and speakers on the panel include interim Superintendent Melanie Kay-Wyatt, ACPS Director of Safety and Security Services John Contreras, and Director of School Social Work Faiza Jackson.
The event is hosted by ACPS, the Alexandria Council of PTAs, and Parents for Safe Alexandria Schools, and will be held in the school auditorium. Event organizers caution that the subject matter is “child-sensitive.”
The other panelists are Alexandria Police Officer Richard Sandoval, Alexandria City Gang Prevention Community Task Force Member Mike Mackey, Everytown for Gun Safety’s Be SMART Secure Gun Storage Program Member Andy Corso, and Alex Carrol of the city’s Department of Transportation & Environmental Services.
School safety has been a major issue within ACPS since full in-person schooling resumed at the beginning of the last school year. There were 46 students arrested and 68 injured in the 2021-2022 school year, with 194 incidents that provoked a police response, according to an ACPS safety report.
The school system’s partnership with the Alexandria Police Department also came under intense scrutiny, and a new plan on school resource officers (stationed at Alexandria City High School and the middle schools) will be unveiled to the School Board by mid-December.
Updated at 5:55 p.m. The Alexandria School Board on Friday (October 20) received a recommendation to extend its agreement with the Alexandria Police Department to provide school resource officers at the city’s high school and middle schools until the end of the 2022-2023 school year.
The School Board will vote on the matter at its upcoming meeting on Thursday, November 10.
The memorandum of understanding (MOU) between the school system and police department was set to expire at the end of this month. By mid-December, the School Board will also receive interim Superintendent Melanie Kay-Wyatt recommendations on the reimagined partnership. Those recommendations will have been guided by the School Law Enforcement Partnership (SLEP) Advisory Group.
“The SLEP advisory group may recommend changes to the MOU as part of their overall recommendations to the School Board in December 2022/January 2023,” Alicia Hart, the ACPS chief of facilities and operations, wrote in a memo to the School Board. “To this end, we are recommending extending the current MOU with APD through the end of June 2023. This extension will allow time to account for any potential recommendations that may come from the SLEP advisory group process as well as completion of the public comment process related to the review of the MOU.”
School safety has been a major focus within ACPS since full in-person schooling resumed at the beginning of the last school year.
ACPS began the 2021-2022 school year without school resource officers, after they were defunded by the City Council in last year’s budget. The first few months of the school year were punctuated by incidents with weapons in schools, prompting School Board Chair Meagan Alderton and then-Superintendent Gregory Hutchings to successfully plead to Council for SROs to return in October 2021.
Two months later, two SROs at Alexandria City High School’s King Street campus were put on administrative leave after being accused of having inappropriate sexual conversations with a former student. The school ended up not having SROs stationed at the King Street campus for the remainder of the school year.
There were 46 students arrested and 68 injured last school year, and 194 incidents that provoked a police response, according to an ACPS safety report.
Police Chief Don Hayes says that police are needed to contend with crews of violent kids within the school system, and Kay-Wyatt said that she will work collaboratively with the police to keep schools safe.
As has become a tradition at every major holiday where drinking is involved, Washington Regional Alcohol Program (WRAP) is offering free Lyft rides during the Halloween weekend.
the 2022 Halloween SoberRide program will be in effect from 4 p.m. on Saturday, Oct. 29, until 4 a.m. on Sunday, Oct. 30.
“[SoberRide is] a way to keep local roads safe from impaired drivers during this traditionally high-risk period,” WRAP explained in a release. “During this twelve-hour period, area residents age 21 and older celebrating with alcohol may download the Lyft app to their phones, then enter the SoberRide code in the app’s ‘Payment’ tab (under the ‘Add Lyft Pass’ option) to receive their no-cost (up to $15) safe transportation home.”
The code will be posted at 3 p.m. on Saturday, Oct. 29, at the SoberRide website.
“Nearly half of U.S. traffic fatalities during Halloween involve drunk drivers according to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration,” Kurt Erickson, WRAP’s President, said in a release. “Halloween is of particular concern for younger drivers as 2020 NHTSA data shows that 68% of drunk driving deaths on U.S. roadways during the fall holiday involve drivers ages 21 to 34.”
WRAP reported that last year, 777 people in the region used the SoberRdie program on Halloween rather than drive home impaired.
The program is available in:
- D.C.
- Alexandria
- Arlington
- Fairfax
- Loudoun
- Falls Church
- Manassas
- Prince William
- Montgomery County
- Prince George’s County
- Bowie
- College Park
- District Heights
- Gaithersburg
- Glenarden
- Greenbelt
- Hyattsville
- Laurel
- Mount Ranier
- New Carrollton
- Rockville
- Seat Pleasant
- Takoma Park
WRAP also offers the program on St. Patrick’s Day, Cinco de Mayo, Independence Day and the winter holidays.