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A Virginia bill inspired by two Oakton High School students killed while walking home in 2022 could allow Northern Virginia localities to install speed cameras on more high-risk roads.
House Bill 994 has passed the Virginia General Assembly and is awaiting action from Gov. Abigail Spanberger. Del. Holly Seibold, a Democrat whose 12th District includes part of Oakton, introduced the measure to expand camera eligibility beyond school crossing and highway work zones.
The legislation would permit cameras in “safety red zones” identified by the Virginia Department of Transportation’s Pedestrian Action Safety Plan. Eligible roads would have speed limits of no more than 45 mph.
Seibold said the zones account for about 5% of Virginia’s roads. Factors such as missing sidewalks, inadequate lighting, frequent pedestrian crossings and other infrastructure shortcomings can contribute to the designation.
Current state law allows local governments to authorize speed cameras only in active school crossing zones and highway work zones.
Fairfax County has 20 cameras operating outside schools, including one on Blake Lane near Oakton High School, after expanding its program at the beginning of the school year. Cameras are also being used in work zones associated with the Fairfax County Parkway widening projects.
Bill honors students killed on Blake Lane
Seibold said the legislation honors 15-year-old Leeyan Yan and 14-year-old Ada Martinez Nolasco, who died after a driver struck three Oakton High School students on Blake Lane in 2022. The third student was injured.
The driver, reportedly traveling 81 mph at the time of the crash, was sentenced to four years for involuntary manslaughter.
Seibold described the combination of speeding vehicles and large numbers of students walking to and from school as a “perfect storm” on Blake Lane. She said cameras located directly within well-equipped school zones do little to protect students once they reach nearby secondary roads with fewer pedestrian safeguards.
“Oakton, for example, had a camera in its school zone. It’s not going to help the kids who are walking home from school, because the schools themselves have great infrastructure,” Seibold said.
She said the greater danger can be found on roads such as Blake Lane, where drivers may ignore relatively low speed limits while students are walking nearby.
Northern Virginia limit could still change
Lawmakers amended the bill before passage to restrict it to Planning District 8. That district covers Arlington, Fairfax and Loudoun counties, towns within those counties, and the cities of Alexandria, Falls Church, Fairfax, Manassas and Manassas Park.
Seibold hopes Spanberger will amend the measure to make it apply statewide, pointing to pedestrian-fatality concerns in places such as Richmond.
If enacted, the bill would let eligible localities decide whether to move cameras from school zones to designated high-risk areas. Seibold said those decisions should be driven by the potential to prevent pedestrian deaths rather than to raise money.
The legislation limits how revenue from camera fines may be spent. It would also allow highway work-zone cameras to operate only when workers are present and would require signs and other public notices wherever cameras are deployed.
“We want people to know where they are. We want full transparency,” Seibold said. “We don’t want to make money off these cameras. We just want people to slow down so what happened to my constituents walking home from Oakton High School doesn’t happen to other people’s children and other families in our community.”