It’s a few weeks into the ‘road diet’ on Seminary Road, and residents are getting used to a new normal — but they aren’t being quiet about it and most seem pretty unhappy.
A Facebook group called Take Back Alexandria already has more than 630 members. In the Facebook group, residents are posting photos of long back-ups and awkwardly aligned intersections.
This fall, after a year-long discussion and study process, City Council voted 4 to 3 to put Seminary Road on a “diet” — reducing the major east-west thoroughfare from two lanes in each direction to one lane in each direction with a center turn lane. Repaving from the intersection of Quaker Lane on the east end to Howard Street on the west end of the “diet” portion was done in late October and early November.
Residents expressed concerns before and after the paving about traffic back-ups and congestion that they said could make getting to Inova Alexandria Hospital a problem. So far, there has been no official response to the road diet from first responders or the hospital.
Other residents expressed serious concerns about the lack of sidewalks on portions of the roadway, the desire for a dedicated bike lane and the need to slow down cars that routinely flouted the already-reduced 25 mph speed limit.
Ultimately, 13 civic associations, in a joint letter to the City Council, recommended not reducing the number of lanes on Seminary Road. The city’s Traffic and Parking Board also recommended leaving the road two lanes in each direction.
Mayor Justin Wilson joined Vice Mayor Elizabeth Bennett-Parker and Council Members Del Pepper and Canek Aguierre in voting in favor of the road diet on Seminary Road.
The goals of the repaving project were to slow down traffic, provide safer pedestrian and bicyclist use, and minimize delays at intersections.
The road diet achieved much of that, including adding bike lanes and slowing down traffic. Building new sidewalks is a separate, longer-term and expensive project, but there are now pedestrian markings on portions of the westbound bicycle lane on the street. City workers are continuing to make adjustments to intersection light timing to help facilitate better traffic flow, but it's a work-in-progress.
One resident who routinely bicycle commutes on Seminary Road en route to the District noted that his biggest safety concern from a cyclist's standpoint was alleviated with the inclusion of a dedicated bike lane going westbound on Seminary Road up the hill from Quaker Lane. In his experience, biking that stretch of road is now safer.
"In the four lane configuration, taking the whole right lane going up this blind hill, normally into the prevailing westerly wind, would result in a significant drop in my speed with cars zipping by. Add the weight of a backpack and panniers for commuting to work, and the difference in legal speed between a car and bike can be measured in double digits for even the most experienced cyclist. Now there is a refuge for cyclists going up this hill. In my experience cycling using the new bike lanes, cars appear to be keeping to the posted speed limit much better than during the four lane configuration. I have not experienced any negative reactions to my cycling use on the new bike lanes from the car drivers that pass me, or I them," he wrote in an email to Alexandria Living Magazine.
Another resident, an avid biker, wrote a thank you note to the City and Transportation & Environmental Services thanking them "for filling the sidewalk gap on Seminary Road. ... I ask that anyone who uses Seminary Road please be patient and vigilant as all of us learn the new traffic patterns."
However, one resident, who says he is also an avid biker, said in the Facebook group that the new bicycle lanes are "overkill."
Despite achieving some of the desired outcomes, residents say the result have also included lengthy delays during certain parts of rush hour and intersections that force cars to jog to the right through an intersection to go straight.
(Join the Facebook group to see video of the intersection of Quaker and Seminary here.)
The repaving has allowed Seminary Road to add bike lanes eastbound and a bike (and sometimes pedestrian) lane westbound where sidewalks are incomplete. Data is not available yet on how many bicyclists are using their dedicated lanes nor how many pedestrians are now walking on Seminary Road. Data is also not yet available on how much slower vehicles are traveling.
The City of Alexandria has bought into the concept behind Vision Zero, "a strategy to eliminate all traffic fatalities and severe injuries, while increasing safe, healthy, equitable mobility for all," according to the Vision Zero Network, a nonprofit advocacy group.
In recent months, Vision Zero and, more broadly, road diets have both come under fire as unrealistic and unsafe. While the goal of having zero traffic fatalities is inarguably laudable, the results of road diets and changes to achieve that goal can cause problems. The New York City Fire Department's union blames an increase in response times on Vision Zero measures.
City Responds to Resident Concerns
“We’ve heard from you about delays on Seminary Rd.,” the City of Alexandria Transportation & Environmental Services says on its website. “As a reminder, this project is still under construction. With any road reconstruction and design reconfiguration, delays are to be expected while the project is implemented. While paving of the roadway has been completed, crews have been working on the implementation of the Council-adopted 4-to-3 lane road reconfiguration shown in the concept plans.”
The City is continuing to work on signage, markings on the roadways, signal timing and hardware and crossings, including the new median islands. In the coming week, City workers will do the following:
- Continued monitoring of traffic conditions
- Continued striping and markings including the painting of bicycle and pedestrian conflict zones
- Further installation of signs for all roadway users
- Connection and activation of the new pedestrian signals at Quaker Lane
- Installation of new pedestrian signals for the new crossing at St. Stephens Road
- Installation of more signal detection at Quaker Lane
- Implement signal timing revisions at Howard Street
- Fill planted median islands and remove construction materials
But residents are fed up and don’t seem to be waiting for the project to be completed to voice their opinions. Drivers are putting evidence of backed-up traffic on Facebook posts, often hashtagged with #JustinsTrafficJam.
Mayor Wilson has joined the Alexandria Residents Against the Seminary Road Diet group on Facebook and is responding to residents. (Note: Some people in the Facebook group are actually in favor of the road diet, like Mayor Wilson, and are there primarily to listen).
On Nov. 9, a resident in the Alexandria Residents against the Seminary Road Diet posted a note Mayor Wilson sent to him that said, in part, “Obviously there will be an adjustment period as the traffic patterns continue to adjust. You are absolutely correct that much of our congestion (about half) is cut-through traffic using our streets to get through the City. Our goal is to make things less hospitable for those folks, thus keeping them on the highway, while making sure Alexandrians can still get around. It is certainly a balance.”
Wilson said he has both driven and run the “diet” part of the roadway multiple times in the past few weeks to observe conditions. He has also agreed to observe traffic with a group of residents between 8 – 9 a.m. on a Tuesday, Wednesday or Thursday in the coming weeks, when westbound traffic seems to back up the most.
Helpful Links
- The City of Alexandria is keeping the Seminary Road project page up to date here.
- See traffic flow data here for major roadways throughout the City.
- See live cameras for real-time traffic conditions in Alexandria here.
What about West of Howard?
While the road diet was designed to make the portion of Seminary Road between Quaker Lane and Howard Street safer, there have been very limited changes to improve the safety of Seminary Road west of Howard Street.
Seminary Road west of Howard Street to the I-395 interchange was repaved, but there were few changes to the roadway’s configuration, as those will be part of a future project. At the time of the Seminary Road diet discussions, the City noted that improvements west of Howard would take more time and may be more complex because of the highway interchange.
Residents have expressed serious concerns about pedestrian and vehicular safety in the area west of Howard Street, with a public library on the north side of the road and Hammond Middle School on the south side, both just feet from the I-395 intersection. In addition, pedestrians from the south side of Seminary Road routinely cross 6 lanes of traffic to get to the Kenmore shopping plaza (and back) instead of using the crossover bridge or crosswalks.
Data backs up the concerns of residents: According to City data, in 2018 there were
- 14 crashes at I-395 and Seminary Road
- 12 at Seminary Road and Beauregard Street
- 11 at Mark Center and Seminary Road
- 9 at Kenmore Avenue and Seminary Road
- 6 at Library Lane and Seminary Road
By comparison, in the road diet area, only Seminary Road at Quaker Lane made the list of top crash sites in “Sector 2” according to City data, with 6 crashes in 2018.
Recommendations west of Howard include multiple high-visibility crosswalks and adjustments to signal timing to help prioritize public transit. Widened and ADA accessibility improvements are part of the recommendations, as well, that were included in the Seminary Road plans. The City is set to explore the possibility of adding a signal at the intersection of Kenmore and Seminary roads to facilitate safer pedestrian crossing.
See more on potential improvements to Seminary Road west of Howard Street here.
