THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1994, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Saturday, October 29, 1994 TAG: 9410290165
SECTION: LOCAL PAGE: B1 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: BY MAC DANIEL, STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: NORFOLK LENGTH: Medium: 88 lines
Starting at 6 in the morning, every Monday through Friday, the home of Neil and Johnetta Foreman quakes.
Their furniture quivers uncontrollably.
They often have to pause in mid-conversation and wait for the rumbling to die down.
They pray for rain and the respite it brings. They cherish holidays and weekends when their tormentors aren't around.
The Foremans' home in the 4500 block of E. Virginia Beach Blvd. is in the middle of a road-widening and bridge construction project.
A giant industrial crane sits less than 15 yards from their front door. Pile drivers slam huge concrete beams into the bed of nearby Broad Creek, jostling the Foremans' two-story waterfront home as though it were a toy. Its brick and mortar walls are a maze of cracks.
The retired couple were told by officials from the state Department of Transportation and the city of Norfolk that the construction project would cause no inconvenience. But after 1 1/2 years of din, the Foremans are fed up.
``You don't sleep around here no more,'' said Nadine Chapman, the Foremans' 39-year-old daughter, who lives with them. ``It's just total chaos. It's a mess right now.''
Neil Foreman, 71, a retired supervisor for the Norfolk & Portsmouth Belt Line Railroad, has had two heart attacks since the construction began.
``It's disturbing,'' he said. ``I know progress has to be made. But I know what damage has resulted.''
The Broad Creek Shores home, which the Foremans bought in 1978, was solid before the construction began, they said.
``Now we hear cracking in the roof and the kitchen during the construction,'' Chapman said. ``We had none of these things before. You can be even sitting on the commode, and it's shaking.''
Some of the 37 subcontractors working on the project dispute these claims. In letters to the Foremans' attorney, one contractor has said the Foreman home was structurally unsound before the work began.
Johnetta Foreman sees it differently. ``No one,'' she said, ``is willing to take responsibility.''
William J. Cannell, spokesman for the Department of Transportation, said contractors began driving pilings six months ago about 1,000 feet from the Foreman home.
In the near future, when a second phase of bridge construction begins just 20 yards from the house, Cannell said, the state will send a geologist to measure the tremors.
George Anderson, the Foremans' attorney, said the couple were enjoying their retirement before their lives were rattled.
``Speaking as a layman and not as an attorney, I think they were unjustly deprived of the use of their house,'' he said.
The Foremans had planned to sell the house and move to smaller quarters after their seven children left. But with the nearby construction, Neil and Johnetta worry their home won't be marketable.
The construction project is scheduled to be completed by July.
Meanwhile, the Foremans endure as Virginia Beach Boulevard inches to within 20 yards of their front door.
They realize that even when the construction is over and the cranes go away, the noise of trucks and cars along the widened road will likely increase.
Already, the Foremans' front and back porches are empty of furniture. The family spends most of their time in their den and kitchen, on the far side of the house, where the noise is less severe.
The Rev. G. Wesley Hardy of the Cathedral of Faith Church of God in Christ, in Chesapeake, lives two doors down from the Foremans and has also felt the rumbling.
``It feels like it's gone on forever, but it's not as bad as it used to be for us,'' said the 55-year-old former Norfolk School Board member. ``But once they start to drive those pilings on this side, it'll get worse.''
Hardy looked toward the Foremans' home at the heavy machinery parked out front.
``I'm sure it's created a nightmare for them,'' he said. ILLUSTRATION: Color photo by Christopher Reddick
The quiet lives of Neil and Johnetta Foreman have been torn apart by
the din and earth-shaking rumble of construction near their home on
E. Virginia Beach Blvd. The road workhas been going on for 1 1/2
years.
Staff map
Site of the Foreman home
by CNB