The Speed Hump Sound-Off
It's Petty. It's Personal. And Chevy Chase Is Honkin' Aggravated.

By Paul Schwartzman
Washington Post Staff Writer
Tuesday, September 29, 2009

There are moments in life when it's time to step up and show solidarity, and Sean Duffy believed that moment had arrived one recent night as he drove along a peaceful, leafy street in one of Washington's most prestigious neighborhoods.

Duffy beeped his horn once -- honk! -- a second time -- honk! -- then a third -- honk! It was his way of choosing sides in a not-so-civil war that has erupted among the lawyers, journalists, policymakers and wonks of Chevy Chase. What could be profound enough to trigger teeth-gnashing arguments and reams of nasty e-mails in such civilized environs? What could inspire otherwise law-abiding citizens to engage in spasms of vengeful honking?

A grand total of three speed humps -- three of the latest to pop up in D.C. Mayor Adrian M. Fenty's citywide blitz to sedate traffic.

"It's petty and it's personal," said Kip Joseph Crecca, 43, a Chevy Chase resident. "It's war."

Since Fenty (D) took office, the number of speed humps in Washington has soared, from about 100 to 868. The humps have sprouted from Friendship Heights to Congress Heights. There are 10 new ones along Anacostia Avenue in Northeast, six along Lebaum Street in Southeast and four on one block of Monroe Street in Northwest.

The need for humps evolved with the District's recent prosperity, city officials say. "Like a lot of major cities, we have seen a real renaissance, we have people moving back, you have people having children in the city," said Gabe Klein, director of the D.C. transportation department. "Pedestrian safety has become a very big issue."

Klein contends that "we get nothing but positive feedback about speed humps."

Not quite.

In Cleveland Park, a candidate for the citizens association's board, Mike Rosella, has urged residents to toot their horns to protest new speed humps on Newark Street NW. Len Oliver, 75, a consultant who has joined in the honking there, imagines his neighborhood becoming an obstacle course if humps continue to proliferate. "No one would want to move to Humpville," he said. "It's ugly."

In Chevy Chase, the public spat over something as mundane as speed humps has become an embarrassment to a community that views itself as the essence of worldly sophistication. The honking began after the humps were installed in early August on Morrison Street NW, prompting the block's residents to snap photos of their tormenters and confront them. Jim Doyle, owner of a small policy research firm and husband of Hillary Rodham Clinton's former campaign manager, Patti Solis Doyle, felt compelled to sit on his porch one afternoon and videotape a passing driver who honked 30 times.

"We needed to show the neighbors that this was going on," said Doyle. But instead of hosting a viewing, he only mentioned the video at a community meeting, referring to other honkers who gave residents the finger as they drove by. Doyle pleaded for peace.

The honking abated, but the bitterness endures. It was at that same meeting that Sheldon Shreiberg, a lawyer on Morrison, shouted "Get a life!" at Jennifer Blackburn, who proceeded to tell the audience how she almost died a few years ago when a car struck her a block from Morrison.

Shreiberg apologized. But his support for the humps has not wavered: "I can't believe people are yelling because cars are going slower on our street."

Actually, the humps are only part of the spat, which has a history as tortured as some marriages.

Crecca, a surgical device salesman, has lived a block over from Morrison for 10 years, on McKinley Street NW. Five years ago, residents of his block asked the city to find ways to slow traffic on McKinley, which is ineligible for humps because it's a well-traveled route connecting neighborhoods. But Morrison residents and others in the neighborhood complained. They contended that no action should be taken to ease McKinley's pain unless the city first studied what any fixes there might do to divert traffic to adjoining streets. McKinley's application stalled.

Now Morrison has gotten its speed humps without the city performing any neighborhood-wide study. The Morrison humps, Crecca contends, have pushed traffic to other streets, including his own.

"You say no to us, and we just wanted a sign," Crecca said. "Then you go out and get these mondo humps. Isn't there a double standard?"

Crecca and others reserve much of their ire for Mary Rowse, a Morrison Street resident who opposed McKinley's quest to slow traffic. Rowse has long been active in the community, moderating a Chevy Chase listserv, and helping to lead an unsuccessful campaign to designate the neighborhood as a historic district.

"She's trying to turn the 3700 block of Morrison into a cul-de-sac on the Potomac," Crecca said.

For their part, Morrison's residents -- all 20 households supported the humps -- say that traffic-calming measures were necessary in part because new families, some with small children, have moved to the block in recent years. They say the humps are needed to slow speeders who try to beat a traffic signal that the city installed at the end of the street.

Rowse described the criticism of her as a "witch hunt" and said, "All we want to do is slow people down. This is a done deal. The humps are here to stay."

A British invention that migrated to the United States in the 1960s, speed humps -- which cost about $3,500 a pop -- have won over legions of bureaucrats looking for cheap ways to control traffic. But the humps also routinely cause uprisings. A revolt in Montgomery County in the late 1990s led officials to make it more difficult to install humps.

Before Fenty's election, residents seeking speed humps had to wait for the District to perform a traffic study, which can take months. Fenty's team expedited the process, allowing for installation if city engineers approve and 75 percent of the host block registers support.

"We want everyone to get a traffic study, but it's no longer contingent," Klein said. "We don't want to deny people safe streets and safe routes to school."

The District plans to conduct a traffic study in Chevy Chase in the next year. In the meantime, neighborhood warriors have found something to agree on: Morrison's humps are too high. "Like they were designed to stop an armored invasion," wrote one resident.

From their porches and living rooms, residents can hear the scrape of metal on asphalt as cars hop the humps.

"It sounds terrible," said Beth Cartland, whose husband picked up a chunk of bumper after one car passed. Another headache. "We thought we were getting speed humps. Not opening a hornet's nest."