Gatling Pointe
A Family Feeling Daily Press 1999

Paula Galvin, left, enjoys a late afternoon chat with Julie Dempsey. Galvin was walking with her daughter, Adrianna, 18 months. Dempsey was taking a stroll with daughter Elizabeth, 2, and their dog Lucy. Many residents of Gatling Pointe don't have roots in Hampton Roads, but they say their neighbors serve in many ways as an extended family.

A half-hour on Sunrise Bluff Lane, a quiet cul-de-sac in Gatling Pointe teaches you a lot about what it means to be a neighbor in this community.

Resident Nancy Crouch waits at the corner of her lane and Gatling Pointe Parkway for the school bus that drops off her two daughters. Before long, the girls are rollerblading in the cul-de-sac.

Resident Lori Kasecamp stands on her lawn, watching over her neighbor's sleeping child. She exchanges friendly waves with the driver of nearly every car that passes.

Many of the residents here will tell you that they bought a home in the quiet Gatling Pointe subdivision after job transfers to Hampton Roads. They quickly make their neighbors into an extemded family. They baby-sit each other's children, mow each other's lawns and play team sports together.

Neighbor Kit Burns drops by and returns a can of tire fix-it that she borrowed from Kasecamp. She is just returning from rescuing another neighbor with a flat tire.

Burns says that when her family moved to Gatling Pointe, many of her neighbors' homes weren't built yet. Her family was looking around the area for a place to live and fell in love with the Southside.

"When we came across the bridge and came here," Burns says, "it was like a breath of fresh air."