Streetlights installed after decades, spate of crimes

The short walk from Knight’s Pub to Jamal Clayton’s fraternity house always seemed a lot longer.

He’d get several yards from the Alafaya Trail bar and everything went dark in the neighborhood across the street from the University of Central Florida. Knowing the history of robberies, shootings and at least one attempted rape didn’t make him feel any better as he trekked about a half mile back to FIJI on Mendel Drive.

“It really doesn’t feel safe,” he said. “It’s scary just walking down the street when it’s pitch black outside.”

Now, Clayton, 22, and his brothers feel more secure, thanks to nearly two dozen new street lights. Officials hope the lights will help deter crime in the neighborhood, which stretches from Mendel Drive to Pastau Drive and is filled with families, students and 11 fraternity houses.

The requests for better lighting date back to 1987, but each time the subject was brought up there were never enough property owners wanting to pay more in exchange for the boost in safety, according to the Orange County Comptroller’s Office.

“The issue is that most of the property owners in this area don’t actually live here. They rent, so they don’t have to deal with the problems,” said UCF Police Deputy Chief Brett Meade.

The costs for 23 new lights will be split between owners on more than 100 lots. They will end up paying about $167 the first year for installation and $47 every year after, the Comptroller’s Office said.

“There’s no question this neighborhood is now a lot safer, because this was a scary place,” Meade said. “Does it make everything perfect? No, but it’s definitely a good step in making things better here.”

He said the darkness provided the perfect environment for robberies and other crimes because suspects could easily get away.

In 2015, when the request for lighting was approved, the violence in the neighborhood made headlines.

Within weeks, two men were shot in a drive-by shooting and gunshots erupted outside the Phi Delta Theta fraternity house on Khayyam Avenue. The gunman yelled “Brim Blood,” an offshoot of the national Bloods gang.

In September of that year, a woman who had left a local bar was walking near the Marquee Apartments near Solon Drive when a man