My job is relocating me to Portsmouth, VA. I’m unfamiliar with the area, and wondering if any Dopers had tips on safe but cheap neighborhoods to look for an apartment.
Basic research indicates downtown Norfolk and Portsmouth aren’t the greatest places, getting safer but more expensive the further outside the cities one looks. I would like to find a studio or one bedroom for about $700 in a place I don’t have to worry too much about break-ins. Additionally, I would like to be no more than a 45 minute drive from downtown Portsmouth.
So, are there any Dopers with experience in that area who wouldn’t mind pointing me in the right direction?
Thank you in advance (and I promise to come back and let you all know how it turns out).
And the Hampton Roads tunnel. That’s the one I actually meant. A stopped car there can delay traffic for hours (same with the longer Bay Bridge tunnel, but there is a lot more ‘stuff’ on the north side of the Hampton Roads tunnel (like Hampton Roads and Newport News).
Yep the tunnels can be terrible. Even on a good day people slow down for no reason when entering the tunnels, which causes a domino braking effect behind them leading to what I call “phantom traffic jams.”
:shrug: Norfolk was always more expensive but I preferred it over the Portsmouth area. YMMV. There are downtown areas of Portsmouth and there’s there’s areas that are just plum out in the middle of nowhere, both places were not appealing for me.
Portsmouth is largely Teh Suck. Parts of Norfolk aren’t bad. Your best bets if you can swing either of them are Chesapeake or Suffolk. Stay off the Peeninsula if at all possible. The southern end of Newport News is nasty, and everything south of Colonial Parkway has the crowding of southern California without the advantages.
If you must do Portsmouth, the Western Branch neighborhood (near the Coastie base) is pretty good.
VBob, former resident
ETA: Virginia Beach is as crowded as the Peeninsula, and pricey near the water.
I lived all over Norfolk, Va Beach and Portsmouth [Chesapeake House, on 13th Bay street, Witchduck Rd, and 8405 Atlantic Ave and ended up being part owner of a house in Craddock - an ex military housing area in Portsmouth. Google it, fascinating place.]
The trouble with Tidewater is thus - the area is several river deltas emptying out into Chesapeake Bay. There are rivers with bridges and tunnels. [there is a back sneaky bridge over the James near Craddock, it passes by the old Ghost Fleet area. Never as busy as the main roads.]
In addition to the rivers and tunnels, the ‘interstate highways’ or 4/6 lane divided highways make sort of a cross instead of a loop, so that also chokes down the traffic. You can parallel parts on Little Creek or Virginia Beach Blvd.
Other than the vacationers, huge masses of military based traffic clogs the highways. Even though we have reduced the sheer amount of military personnel and dependents, there is still a major amount of military in the area.
Chesapeake, Suffolk and Portsmouth are on one delta. They were the red headed step child of Tidewater. Originally more rural, traffic chokepointed by a couple bridges and tunnels. Virginia Beach and Norfolk on the adjoining delta. The main tourist and military area. Across the bay in one direction is Newport News and that was solidly military with civilian support [bars, businesses, housing] blending up into Yorktown Annex near Williamsburg. Across the bay the other way is the DelMarVa peninsula, the Bay Bridge Tunnel is 28 miles of traffic jam.
I would honestly say to take a few days vacation and go explore. We went back on vacation last spring and it had gone from an almost sleepy Norfolk/Va Beach to what I would have expected packed with people and traffic summer level in Feb. I wouldn’t trust a recommendation on a specific neighborhood from me right now.