No Passing in the Neighborhood

To the lady who thought she was clever by passing me while on Vestals Gap Road this morning at 11:30AM - your license plate and car description have been passed on to Loudoun County police. Even if you thought I was driving too slowly - it is inexcusable to pass in a residential area. Did you not see the kindergarteners waiting for the bus at the corner???

I'm not trying to get nasty and I'm not uptight. I was driving through the neighborhood with my child in the back. I wasn't on the phone and/or driving too slowly. I was approaching a stop sign and was slowing down.

I love this neighborhood and want to live here forever. I hate bothering the police with this but I don't know how else to make it stop.

Sorry for the rant - I'm very frustrated about the speeding/bad driving issues in Broadlands. I don't want to see someone get injured.

 

good for you for calling LOCO police. inexcusable. This happens on DeMott regulary. Watch out for the caravan of speeding minivans on their way to St. Theresa's every school morning!

 

If everyone would just slow down and chill around here, it would make life a lot more sane. What kills me is when people DO pass you and then you catch right up to them at the stop sign or signal. SO what progress did you make, except you're now in front of me. That story about the woman passing on the shoulder at Point of Rocks in MD was horrible. We drive on RT 15 all the time when we go back to the WNY area. I've seen people do this all the time....this time was deadly. Short of an emergency.....what's the hurry??? SLOW DOWN and enjoy life and smell the roses......it's not worth it.

 

I get the same thing on Village Drive! Nobody has passed me yet, but people speed down that road like its a race. And trust me, I'm a car nut and have been to racing school so I'm not one to talk.

I make it a point to do the 25 mph speed limit on that road, specifically because of all the foot traffic along it. I've walked my dog too many times with speeders coming down it and nearly running us over.

Just last night I had a guy tail gating me the entire way, I was doing 25mph, he was swerving left and right as though he was agitated. Turns out it was my damn Neighbor!!

 

During nicer weather we walk down Village alot. If you here someone yelling at cars to slow down, odds are it is me. It pisses me off how somepeople drive on our residential streets!

 

I always keep it at 20ish mph on village. No higher than 25. It always astounds me how many people get right up on my butt on village.

Im a jerk about though. Tailgate me and chances are I will slow it down a little.

 

My tactic also Skull. And I also move to the middle of the road a bit to dissuade the possibility of a pass.

 

I've been passed several times on Chickacoan. Wish I could get the tag numbers when it happened.

 

Ridgeway and Highview Trail also have a lot of speeders. What's so maddening is it's our neighbors that speed and with one or two exceptions it's the adults not the teens that are the worst offenders. What's so frustrating is that there doesn't seem to be any recourse. We've called the Sheriffs Office a couple times but don't feel comfortable swearing out warrants on our neighbors. There are a 1/2 dozen or so daily offenders - they get shouted at and glared at but it doesn't slow them down. I seem to remember a forum admin type scolding folks for posting licence plate numbers and vehicle types here, but I for one vote for public scorn.

 

If you want to post the license plate numbers, you can always do so in platewire.com. This can also serve as an outlet to vent all your frustrations!

 

Esub,

Thanks for the URL. I like the concept of platwire but I got dizzy and confused trying to navigate and find relavant posts. Like politics all road issues are local. It would be nice to have a Broadlands version of this site to apply some public pressure to the bad drivers in our hood. I've said it thousands of times since we moved here two years ago, a child is going to get killed here riding her bike, scootering or crossing the street to go to school. It's nuts and we need to band together to stop it.

 

That is exactly my worry - that some day it will be too late and a child will be killed.

I received a response from Loudoun County. They will put a BOLO to all units for this driver. They will put patrol on the road. And finally, I could prosecute this person for reckless driving. However, to do that - I would have to positively ID her. I have a vague description of her but couldn't ID her. As a person said earlier in the thread - it feels a bit weird putting out warrants on your neighbors BUT - they are the ones that are not being neighborly in the first place.

I wrote back to the officer asking for suggestions for the many people that are frustrated with the bad driving/speeders in our area. I will let you know what response I get.

Perhaps it WILL take people banding together to take charge and make this situation change. If it were crime invading our area - we would have a group of people leading the charge to clean up the neighborhood. Don't know why the same can't be done for obnoxious drivers.

 

I thought traffic violations had to be witnessed by the police?

 

They said it was a "criminal matter". Surprised the heck out of me.

 

Love that idea. My team was thinking about the paintball approach for 360 degree feedback at work.

 

AJHT - Not exactly sure where you were or the circumstances, but I'll just throw out this one idea.

I drive down Village Dr. every morning right before the middle school bus picks up. As I approach Claiborne, there are often 3-8 cars parked on the side of the road. Just this morning, I was behind a minivan that was slowing down and obviously pulling over to the curb. So I passed it. (It was already pulling over.)

Possibly, just possibly, the woman thought you were actually stopping to drop a kid off at the bus stop?? Not trying to discount the danger of driving fast or passing on a residential street, just a thought...

 

dcdavis - I know exactly what you mean. Cars do that all the time here. It was the opposite for me, though - there were a lot of cars parked on the right side of the street and I had to move more into the center of the street to get around the parked cars (not cars parked for school bus - just people that had parked outside their house). So I wasn't moving towards the curb - I was moving away from the curb to get around.

 

We just finished 360 feedback for 2007 at our work. So, this post made me smile. Can you imagine if we used paintball for all feedback? It would be awesome. Cars covered in paintball residue would be the sign of bad drivers, and police would know who to watch closely.