I would still avoid Ocean View, especially if the party scene is important to you b/c, well "Pop Rocks" & "Greenies" is it for down there still... It is definitely in transition though. We sold a house in the Churchland section of Portsmouth in early 06 & we're glad to be out, the area is up & coming, doing amazing things but they're putting in a huge, noisy terminal right in Churchland where Portsmouth, Chesapeake & Suffolk meet. We made a killing on our house but now b/c of the terminal, the houses are selling for $20K less... We're on NAB Little Creek, I was house hunting & going to school & my husband was TDY so I opted to move into housing b/c the market is crazy here right now & honestly, we want to cut & run in a year & w/ it being such a buyer's market, there is no guarantee we could sell anything we bought. I love being on this side by Chick's Beach, Friday nights roll around, we take a cooler of beer & hang out on the beach w/ friends & all the kids play in the water, we have countless little clubs up & down Shore Dr & using Northampton Blvd, I can be most anywhere I want very quickly. My parents live in Kempsville & Witchduck Rd is being widened (houses were just bought by the city to widen the road), the traffic is unbearable & it is a very SWO type mentality (sorry, my Dad was a SWO, I do not want to live in an area where people measure their grass & talk nonstop ab the weather & the traffic... ), I would rather be in a more dynamic area. If we ever do buy here, it will be a condo in Ghent (I really HATE having to worry ab grass...) so that he can quickly be at NOB & I can walk to Norfolk General. Like I said, we're not fans of traffic either. I think the whole Hampton Roads area has pros & cons, only major worry right now is that the state is trying to sell the Hampton Roads Bridge Tunnel to a private company (the one that owns Chesapeake Bay Bridge Tunnel) & this company wants to charge $1 each way to offset the costs of dropping more tubes & widening the bridges so that's quite an additional expense that offsets any potential savings by living on the Peninsula.