WASHINGTON — Some D.C. residents say they are fed up with routine crashes at an intersection in their Northwest neighborhood.
On Sunday night, two cars collided at the intersection of Iowa Avenue and Arkansas Avenue in D.C.’s Sixteenth Street Heights neighborhood.
According to witnesses on the scene, children could be heard crying in pain in one of the cars. Fortunately, no one was killed. However, locals say incidents like the one that happened at that intersection Sunday are not new.
DC Councilmember Janeese Lewis George said there have been seven big accidents at the intersection in roughly a year’s time.
Lewis George said she and residents in the neighborhood also met with District Department of Transportation Director Everett Lott at the intersection last year.
But the councilmember said she has been frustrated by the lack of action by DDOT to improve conditions at the intersection so far.
She said the agency committed to adding more paint and flex posts to the intersection as a traffic calming measure.
However, Lewis George’s office shared an email from a DDOT official, written in July, that said the department would not place a requested streetlight at the intersection.
Since then, neighbors say there have been three crashes at the intersection of Iowa and Arkansas.
“We recently heard that we have to wait for a study between January and March of 2023, next year, that’s unacceptable,” she said.
DDOT’s response to the situation at the intersection has also frustrated nearby residents, like Sharon Warner, who says flex posts achieve nothing.
“I don’t understand what they’re studying,” she said. “We need to slow traffic down. We already know exactly what slows traffic down.”
WUSA9 reached out to DDOT for comment on locals’ concerns regarding issues at the intersection. A spokesperson said the department planned to look into the situation.
For now, Sixteenth Street Heights Advisory Neighborhood Commissioner said residents in the neighborhood will not stop voicing their concerns in the neighborhood until the District government takes a more active approach to address problems at the intersection of Iowa and Arkansas avenues.
“There are solutions out there,” said ANC Commissioner Maria Barry. “We want them utilized, and we want a sense of urgency.”