AuthorAllen

My wife and I lived on Neck-O-Land Rd for two years while I was in grad school at William & Mary. We really liked it, because the house was close to campus, but it was off-the-beaten-path for tourists and shoppers. This meant we could get around Williamsburg easily, but didn't have lots of traffic right outside our place. At night it was pretty quiet, which was great.

Two downsides;

1) Neck-O-Land dead ends, so the only way in or out of this area is off Jamestown road. So when lots of people are heading to or from Jamestown, you'll catch that traffic.

2) Cell phone reception there was non-existant... literally. By the time I got home, I had absolutely no cell phone reception (this was in 2006). Don't be surprised if you need a land line.

If you're going to W&M for grad school and want something quiet and away from campus, this area of W'burg is worth considering. Just know you won't be able to walk to campus.

My wife and I lived here for two years. The apartments were great (so was the swimming pool). However, there are a lot of people moving in and out every month, so the neighborhood is very transient. For a while you might have really nice neighbors who are quiet and friendly, then they might move out and you'll have a college student living above you for a year.

Some of the people were just odd, too. It's a very dog-friendly neighborhood, but most pet owners didn't want their dog anywhere near other dogs. When my 5 year old, calm, German Shepherd went up to most other dogs, people would start pulling their dogs away.

Two other negatives;

1) Lots of people park in the handicapped spaces simply because they're lazy. One time another dog owner and I said something to a woman who got out of her SUV in a handicapped space. Her response? "I pay too much in rent to walk around the building to my apartment." Seriously...

2) Lots of these same people are too lazy to put their trash bags in the dumpsters. Instead, they simply drive their trash up to the dumpsters, and leave their bags on the ground outside them -- even if the dumpsters are empty.

If you can deal with these two negatives, the development is pretty nice, otherwise. Definitely once of the nicest apartment complexes I've seen for people with dogs.

My wife and I lived here for two years while she was in graduate school. We were a block away from Carytown, which was great, but the area was not safe. My car was broken into about 5 times over the two year period, and our landlord was atrocious (bad landlords in Richmond?? Shocking!!). If you like the area around Carytown, it's fine. Just don't expect any people in the area to act neighborly.

Oh, I also forgot to mention that while we lived there, a college girl was shot in the head at the corner of N Colonial and Main Streets at 9 PM on a Sunday night just before Christmas. She died on the sidewalk, and her killer was never found. Not exactly safe -- then again, most of the Fan isn't (and I grew up in Richmond).

My wife and I recently moved here, and like it. Everyone's been nice, no one's too loud, and we're away enough from County Line Rd. that it's quiet.We definitely made a good choice in terms of location, and most of our neighbors have lived here since the houses were built in 2001.

Two downsides, though; We're foodies, and wish the area had better restaurants. Also, if you're a fan of public transportation, it's non-existant in this area. Otherwise, it's great.