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Chamberlayne Avenue is the epicenter of crime in our part of Richmond.
First some geography: Bellevue straddles the line between Census Tracts 102 and 104 (The census border runs along Bellevue Ave.; CT102 is north of there and CT 104 is south). The two tracts run from the County on the north to Brookland Park on the South, Old Brook and Hawthorne on the east to I-95 on the west. Chamberlayne Av. runs parallel to the long side of the neighborhood, two blocks east.
or, in more detail:
The Police Department database shows that Chamberlayne is the hotspot for crime in these two census tracts. Here for instance are the UCR data from the database for 1/93 through 12/99, sorted by the highest crime blocks:
Block Total 3900 Blk CHAMBERLAYNE AV 255 4900 Blk CHAMBERLAYNE AV 231 3800 Blk CHAMBERLAYNE AV 195 3600 Blk CHAMBERLAYNE AV 145 3200 Blk CHAMBERLAYNE AV 141 3500 Blk CHAMBERLAYNE AV 99 3000 Blk CHAMBERLAYNE AV 95 1100 Blk AZALEA AV 91 4300 Blk CHAMBERLAYNE AV 91 5000 Blk BROOK RD 84 1700 Blk BELLEVUE AV 76 4200 Blk CHAMBERLAYNE AV 73 1300 Blk WESTWOOD AV 71 4800 Blk CHAMBERLAYNE AV 60 1200 Blk BELLEVUE AV 59 3200 Blk N BOULEVARD 49 4900 Blk OLD BROOK RD 48 4000 Blk MACARTHUR AV 46 3200 Blk N BOULEVARD B 42 4300 Blk OLD BROOK RD 39 4800 Blk BROOK RD 35 3600 Blk HAWTHORNE AV 34 3400 Blk CHAMBERLAYNE AV 33 1000 Blk AZALEA AV 30 4200 Blk NORTH AV 29 4500 Blk W SEMINARY AV 28 4800 Blk W SEMINARY AV 28 1200 Blk AZALEA AV 27 4300 Blk NORTH AV 27 3400 Blk NOBLE AV 27 4800 Blk OLD BROOK RD 26 4200 Blk SEMINARY AV 26 Eight of the top ten blocks are on Chamberlayne. Note that our top two, as usual, are 1200 Bellevue and 4000 MacArthur.
For the same period, 1448 of 4188 UCR offenses (35%) were on Chamberlayne Avenue. The Chamberlayne crime is remarkably violent, ca. 21%, compared to ca. 16% in Richmond in general and ca. 4% in Bellevue.
The crime on Chamberlayne is not evenly distributed. The highest rate is in the long block between North Av. and Bellevue Av. (3900); third highest is the block from Laburnum to North Av.(3800), i.e., adjacent to our neighborhood. The two blocks north of Bellevue Av. (4200 and 4300), also adjacent to our neighborhood, are not exactly safe havens but are much better than 3800-3900:
For a more direct comparison, here are the 1993-99 UCR crimes in Bellevue and the adjacent blocks of Chamberlayne.
OFFENSE
Bellevue 38-4200 Chamberlayne AGGR ASSAULT 13 69 ARSON 3 9 HOMICIDE 1 8 LARCENY 191 130 LARCENY FROM AUTO 205 63 MOTOR VEHICLE THEFT 120 95 NON-RESIDENTIAL BURGLARY 78 12 RESIDENTIAL BURGLARY 114 141 RAPE 9 ROBBERY AGAINST BUSINESS 2 ROBBERY AGAINST PERSON 17 50 Grand Total 744 586 Notice that these four blocks of Chamberlayne have 79% as much UCR crime as all of Bellevue. It is particularly ugly stuff: 23% of it is violent (compared to 4.4% in Bellevue).
The crime rate in Richmond, following the national trend, has been decreasing since 1991. In contrast, the crime in Bellevue and on Chamberlayne rose in the mid-90's, and only more recently has it begun to drop:
There are more questions than answers in these data:
- Why is our crime rate not behaving like Richmond in general but closely following the rate over in the Combat Zone?
- How much of our crime is spilling out from the Chamberlayne corridor?
- If, as seems likely, much of our crime is coming from Chamberlayne, what can we do about it?
We have a discussion of the hotspots in calls for police services on Chamberlayne and what can be done about them. We also have data on the offense reports and arrest data on Chamberlayne.
Last updated 02/24/02
Please send questions or comments to John Butcher