A car rammed into the Grand Hunan Chinese Carry-Out restaurant in the Westover Shopping Center last night.
The accident happened around 7:45 p.m. The car hopped a curb and slammed into a low brick wall, coming to rest across the sidewalk. Amazingly, no one was hurt.
The brick wall was damaged, but there was only minor damage inside the restaurant.
Photo (top) courtesy Anne W.
A car flipped on its roof in residential Ashton Heights last night, but luckily no one was seriously hurt.
The accident happened on the 500 block of N. Nelson Street just before 8:00 p.m. The car flipped over after hitting another vehicle, though the collision itself did not significantly damage either car, according to a witness. The driver of the overturned vehicle was able to get herself out of the car and was not seriously hurt.
Photos courtesy @dadonymous
Nearly the entire length of northbound I-395 is slow this morning, thanks in part to an accident near the 14th Street Bridge.
Crews are still in the process of cleaning up a multi-vehicle accident in the center lanes of 395, just before the Boundary Channel Drive. Police are on the scene.
Traffic clears out after the accident, but expect a nightmare commute on northbound I-395 if you get on anywhere before Pentagon City.
Update at 1:15 p.m. — Another accident has occurred on the same stretch of highway. One minor injury has been reported.
As seems to happen quite often during heavy rains, an accident has occurred on southbound I-395 just past Washington Boulevard.
Three vehicles were involved in the accident. One vehicle ran into the guardrail on the right side of the roadway, while the other two smashed into the barrier on the left side, blocking the lefthand lane.
Currently, only two lanes are getting by the accident scene, producing a small backup.
This curvy stretch of I-395 is particularly accident-prone during rain. We’ve reported at least three accidents there this year, one of which was a roll-over accident.
A cyclist who collided with a vehicle last month at the dangerous intersection of Lee Highway and N. Lynn Street was issued a police warning, while still in his hospital bed, for failing to “obey a highway sign.”
The accident happened on the afternoon of Wednesday, Aug. 10. The cyclist said he was heading eastbound on the Custis Trail, crossing Lynn Street in Rosslyn with the green light, when a car quickly turned in front of him as he was traveling across the intersection. He slammed on the brakes but still hit the vehicle’s rear driver’s side quarter panel.
The cyclist, who did not want to be named, said that police followed his ambulance to the hospital, asked him to write a written statement, and then handed him a warning as soon as he had finished the statement. The warning was for failing to “obey a highway sign.”
As explained to the cyclist, he was culpable in the accident because he did not stop at a painted “stop” sign on the sidewalk just before the intersection. Further, he was considered a “cyclist” while on the trail, but became a “vehicle” when he entered the intersection, and thus did not have the right-of-way to oncoming traffic.
“You just can’t tell me that it’s all my fault for being hit,” the cyclist told ARLnow.com. “Naturally, if you’re a cyclist heading into an intersection, you’re not concerned with what’s below you but with what’s in front of you.”
The cyclist says he later found out that the driver who turned in front of him was not issued any sort of citation. As a result, not only will he be financially responsible for his own bills — the hospital bill for his hand, arm and shoulder injuries, plus the replacement cost of the $2,000 carbon fiber bike — but he may be held responsible for damage to the driver’s vehicle.
“That leaves me holding the bag. I have no recourse whatsoever,” he said. “Drivers have carte blanche.”
His situation is not unique in the area. The Falls Church News-Press reported over the weekend that a cyclist who was struck by a car and injured at the intersection of Great Falls Street and the W&OD Trail was charged for “disregarding a stop sign,” despite the fact that there were once signs at the intersections stating that bike trail users had the right-of-way.
As for the cyclist struck in Rosslyn, he says he’s now writing to county officials to try to lobby for some short- and long-term solutions for making the Lee/Lynn intersection safer for trail users.
“I go through it all the time and it is a very dangerous intersection,” he said. “Bicyclists take their lives into their own hands when crossing crosswalks.”
Arlington may be the safest city in the U.S. when it comes to traffic fatalities, but we’re also some of the most accident-prone drivers in the country, according to new data from Allstate Insurance. The good news: we’re less accident-prone than drivers in Alexandria, Baltimore and the District.
Arlington ranks 180 out of 193 cities in Allstate’s “Best Driver” rankings. That’s a downgrade compared to last year, when Arlington drivers ranked 174th. According to the latest data, drivers in Arlington go an average of 6.8 years between accidents.
By comparison, drivers in the safest city on the list — Fort Collins, Colo. — go an average of 14 years between accidents.
The District ranked dead last on the list, at 193rd, thanks to an average of only 4.8 years between accidents. Baltimore was the second worst, at 192nd. Alexandria ranked 184th.
File photo
Police are investigating a possible hit and run involving an Arlington Transit bus.
A driver told police that an ART bus hit his driver’s side door near the intersection of S. Courthouse Road and 2nd Street, then continued on its way. No injuries were reported.
Police arrived to interview the driver and take photos of the car. A representative from Forsythe Transportation, which contracts with the county to run the ART bus fleet, also arrived and talked to police. Later, a passerby told ARLnow.com that a No. 42 ART bus was offloaded at S. Courthouse and 2nd Street as police inspected it.
Earlier this summer Forsythe fired a number of striking ART bus drivers and went on a hiring spree to quickly replace them. We’re awaiting comment from the county’s Department of Environmental Services, which is responsible for the county’s transit services.
Update at 10:45 a.m. — The ART web site reports that all buses going through S. Courthouse Road are “late due to… police activity.”
A fully-loaded dump truck came to a grinding halt at the intersection of N. Glebe Road and Randolph Street this morning after its left front wheel detached from the axle.
Nobody was hurt, but the accident did block Randolph Street for at least a half hour, as a heavy wrecker truck was brought in to move the disabled dump truck. A large gash was visible in the pavement, showing where the truck started grinding into the street after the wheel fell off.
The incident happened as the truck was turning from northbound Glebe onto Randolph, across from the Harris Teeter and the Ballston mall parking garage.
Another cyclist has been struck at the intersection of Lee Highway and N. Lynn Street, in Rosslyn.
The cyclist was struck by a vehicle on Lynn Street, just past Lee Highway approaching the Key Bridge, around 3:30 p.m. Only minor injuries were reported, but initial reports suggest the cyclist is going to be brought to a hospital.
This is the second reported bicyclist accident at the intersection in three days. Arlington County is the early stages of designing and implementing safety improvements at the intersection. The project is not expected to be complete until 2014.
(Update at 10:30 a.m.) A bicyclist was struck by a van near the Key Bridge in Rosslyn this morning.
The accident happened on Lynn Street, near the intersection with Lee Highway. Two lanes of Lynn Street were blocked as medics treated the bicyclist and as police took photos of the accident scene.
The bicyclist was taken to George Washington University Hospital with unspecified injuries. So far there’s no indication that those injuries are life-threatening.
Rush Hour Accident on the Pike — A two-car accident on Columbia Pike, between S. Scott Street and S. Rolfe Street, caused some minor delays during last night’s rush hour. One woman, whose car was rear-ended, was brought to the hospital for reported back pain.
Old Guard Horses Used For Soldier Therapy — Fort Myer’s Caisson Platoon, the horses that bring the caskets of fallen heroes to their final resting place at Arlington National Cemetery, are also being used to rehabilitate soldiers suffering from Post Traumatic Stress Disorder. [Examiner.com]
Arlington Defends Streetcar Project — In response to a Washington Post editorial that suggested the Columbia Pike/Crystal City streetcar project should be delayed, Arlington County has sent reporters a link to an explanation of why it’s planning to build the more than $140 million streetcar line. The county has also pushed back on the Post’s suggestion that streetcar funds could be redirected to add capacity to public schools — insisting that the funds come from a tax that can only be used for transportation projects. [Arlington County]
Centenarian Recalls Old Arlington — Martha Ann Miller, who turns 100 on Aug. 6, recounts the changes that have taken place in Arlington over the 74 years she has lived her. [Sun Gazette]
