This article has been updated since it first appeared in print.
Photo by Jay Paul
In just six months, drivers speeding past Frances W. McClenney Elementary School have racked up over 7,000 citations.
During school hours, the speed limit at the 3800 block of Chamberlayne Avenue slows from 35 mph to 25 mph. Drivers trigger the two cameras there when going 11 mph or more over the limit. Following a grace period, fines were first mailed out Oct. 1, 2024, resulting in 4,137 citations in the last three months of that year alone. Only nearby Linwood Holton Elementary School caught more speeders in 2024; the speed cameras there, unlike those at McClenney, were active all year.
In January, Richmond Police Chief Rick Edwards said his department issued a total of 26,739 citations based on footage from 11 active locations in 2024 (now 13, as of April 2025), calling it “an incredible number.” RPD has hired four part-time employees whose only job is to review footage collected by the automated traffic enforcement company Elovate, which operates the 26 cameras in the city. A full-time employee then finalizes the citations; in July, a new law will allow retired officers to perform this role.
“They do the best they can,” Major Ronnie Armstead says. “That’s a lot for that small group of people to handle. They’re doing a tremendous job, given the manpower, but it’s a lot.”
Road safety has been a priority for the city, especially since establishing a Vision Zero plan in 2017 to eliminate traffic fatalities by 2030. The issue was thrust into the spotlight again when Mary Munford Elementary School Principal Gregory Muzik was hit by a car while biking on Patterson Avenue in March; he was released from the hospital in late April and continues to undergo rehabilitation.
“I’m hopeful that the expansion of the Vision Zero speed camera program will improve safety,” Richmond School Board member Ali Faruk, whose 3rd District includes McClenney, writes in an email. “Many of our schools are located in high-injury networks, and cars flying down these streets present a huge safety danger for students and families.” He adds that there’s a “dire need” to redesign the corridor to increase safety.
Armstead says that, because the speed camera program began just last year, progress will be slow, but he’s hopeful that the fines — $50 for first violations and $100 for subsequent citations — will have an impact.
“I just want to see people slow down,” he says, adding that drivers, cyclists and pedestrians all “need to be more vigilant and pay better attention.”
