Editor, The Smithfield Times:

I read in disbelief The Smithfield Times article on May 10 “More condos proposed for Carrollton.” I oppose this development! 

We have hundreds of residents living off of a road that has one lane in each direction called Cedar Grove Road, and it’s our only access to Route 17 (Carrollton Boulevard). There have even been occasions when Cedar Grove Road was blocked due to power lines down. This becomes a risky situation when your neighborhoods only have one access in and out. 

Our neighborhoods currently off of Cedar Grove Road are beautiful, full of trees, land, open spaces, marsh, water and a lot of wildlife — unlike so many of the new developments with small yards, maybe a few trees and many homes built close together. 

How can Cedar Grove Road and even Carrollton handle all of these proposed new condos and cars on Cedar Grove, on Route 17 on the James River Bridge and on our bridges with one lane in each direction? Congestion has increased so much already with all of the large-residential developments coming from Smithfield, Carrollton and Suffolk. 

The article also stated that Carrollton Boulevard now has 15,000 vehicles per day, and several more large developments have already been approved to be built in Carrollton. Our roads can’t handle all of this, and neither can most of the residents who moved here for a good, peaceful quality of life. This is stress to the max, and not why we originally moved here. 

Do the people approving all of this massive, uncontrolled growth not get stuck in traffic now too? Carrollton is in a county, not a city! A county called Isle of Wight, which is unique and admired for the beauty of the land, marshes, water, trees and animals/wildlife. Wildlife and land that we should all care about. There must be common sense somewhere!

 

Aurora Lambright

Carrollton