Plans are being finalized for the Downtown Mall overhaul, Sean Tubbs writes for Charlottesville Tomorrow, and a couple of hundred people showed up at a Monday-night forum to see and comment on the plans. Having learned from when the Mall was built in the first place, the city will be working with “block captains,” representing the businesses on each block of the Mall, to figure out how to time construction to keep from shutting down the whole shebang for all five months that the reconstruction should require. In a minor but important issue, they’re looking at going with 4″x12″ pavers, as specified by the original designer of the Mall, with sand-swept joints, rather than the mortared ones that have worked out so badly. Construction is scheduled to begin in January.
Coolest of all, they’re looking at giving away the torn-up bricks to the public, so that we can all have a bit of the Downtown Mall on our patios and in our barbecues. Sign me up for that.
VDOT presented their safety assessment of the Forest Lakes intersection with 29N last night, and 160 people showed up to see how the intersection could be improved. Sixteen year old Sydney Aichs was killed there in May when the driver of a semi ran the red and hit her car at full speed. VDOT says that the intersection isn’t up to spec, since there’s not enough “stopping sight distance.” Folks want to see the speed limit there lowered to 45 MPH from 55 MPH, and they were frustrated by VDOT saying that it would take at least a few months to accomplish, despite their agreement that it should happen. (How hard is this? Just replace a few signs. You’re done.) Sean Tubbs mentioned in a comment that VDOT told the BoS this afternoon that they may have it done by the end of the week, which is more like it.
That’s a whole section of 29N that, for years, was 55 MPH clear up to Gainesville, without a stoplight to be seen (other than the one at Pete’s Park-n-Eat. Towns, counties, and VDOT have all been slow to realize that the whole road is changing to a continuous suburban corridor. In thirty years, driving to D.C. is going to be a five hour process.
Incidentally, this story is written by the newest Daily Progress reporter, Brandon Shulleeta. He comes to the paper from the The Caroline Progress, interned at the Richmond Times-Dispatch last year, and attended VCU, where he studied broadcast journalism.
The Daily Progress will immediately shut down their printing operations in Charlottesville, having everything done at the Media General plant in Hanover County. Twenty five of the paper’s 120 employees—the entire printing crew—have been laid off. The newspaper’s aging press has required increasingly-expensive repairs, and the paper has been wondering what they’d do when the thing finally gave out for good. Another important factor in this decision must have been Media General’s demand that papers increase their profit margins; getting rid of a fifth of the staff and consolidating printing operations will go a long way towards doing that.
I have to wonder how much longer they’ll remain in their facility on Rio Road. The paper was long produced in the old Daily Progress building on Market Street (one block west of NBC 29), but they had to move to their current location in order to accommodate their then-new printing press. With the thinning of the once-crowded newsroom, they’ve now got 29,000 square feet, a whole lot more building than they have any use for. Valued at $4M, how long until Media General sells off their property for a one-time cash infusion and puts their remaining employees in rented space in an office park a ways out of town?
The city plans to hire an outside firm to conduct an efficiency study, Rachana Dixit writes in today’s Daily Progress. Though a firm hasn’t been selected, the university’s Weldon Cooper Center seems like a clear top candidate. The five-month study is intended to measure where Charlottesville can reduce the size and cost of government. Council has budgeted $50,000 for the study, which they hope will begin September 1.
VDOT has a bridge planned for Advance Mills, and this time they mean it. Brandon Shulleetta writes in the Progress that VDOT is proposing a $3M steel truss bridge to replace the existing bridge, which has been shut down for over a year because of its aged condition. VDOT had planned to build a bridge, cancelled their plans, planned to build a temporary one followed by a permanent one and then cancelled that. At this point, folks in Advance Mills just want a bridge, and don’t seem to particularly care about the details. This final (?) planned bridge is due to be finished by late next year or early 2010.
In The Hook, Lisa Provence provides the first description of what happened the night of the 64 shootings. The 16-year-old—the accomplice in the case—was spending the night at 19-year-old Slade Woodson’s house. It was the first time his parents let him stay over at a friend’s house. It was also the first time he ever had alcohol. Woodson split a case of beer with him, and the boy had 8-10 beers in under four hours. The two headed out for a ride, Woodson turned out to have a gun in his vehicle, and that was when they started shooting. The next morning, back at home, the boy realized what he’d done, and immediately set about figuring out how to turn himself in. Prosecutor Darby Lowe praised the boy for his immediate and complete cooperation in the case. He’ll spend six months in the local juvenile detention center, and then be monitored electronically and pay $12k in restitution to his victims.
19-year-old Slade Woodson has pleaded guilty to the overnight shooting spree on Route 64 in March, Jimmy LaRoue writes for the News Virginian. He’s waived a right to an appeal, and is facing up to 55 years in prison. Sentencing isn’t likely for a few months.
Things are not looking good for the local housing market, Brian McNeill writes in the Progress, but few real estate agents will say that in so many words. Dave Phillips, CEO of the Charlottesville Albemarle Association of Realtors, actually claims that the market is “hot,” with the caveat that that’s in relation to Alaska’s temperatures. Pat Sury of Montague Miller says “we have stabilized,” and that “it’s a great time to buy.” And the president of CAAR, agent Judy Savage, says “we’ve hit bottom.” Real Estate III’s Pam Dent suggests that now is the time to buy a home in Glenmore because, really, who can commute all the way to a barn to see their horse? (It’s dreadfully inconvenient.) All of that tells me that we may have a lot farther down to go. Real estate blogger Jim Duncan is inclined to agree that, at least, there’s no way to tell whether or not we’ve hit bottom: you’ve got to start back up before you can know. Real estate agents are dropping like flies, expensive houses are being rented for a song, and houses are languishing on the market for months and months. True to its mission, the Bubble Blog says the bottom is nowhere in sight, and its proprietor has taken to drinking. So it’s a buyers market…as long as you don’t need a mortgage.
The greening of Charlottesville is saving the city money, Henry Graff recently reported for NBC 29. (Weirdly, they don’t seem to date their stories on their website.) Conservation is fundamentally about reducing the consumption of resources, and consuming resources costs money. The water is reused when washing buses, they’ve replaced drafty windows, installed motion sensors to activate lights in some buildings, and, of course, installed a green roof on city hall. The city has spent $1.3M on energy-saving measures in the past five years, and it’s already recouped $561,000 in energy bills in the last two years alone.
Media General, in an uncredited story, reports today that the county office building’s green roof is actually a tourist destination. Lee Catlin says that hundreds of folks are visiting it each year, including representatives from other municipalities coming to check it out.
VDOT has given $328k in funding to C’ville to get more kids to walk and bike to school, the Daily Progress reports. This is the third year running that the city has gotten a big chunk of change for this ongoing project. For decades we’ve built our transportation infrastructure in support of vehicles, but largely ignored pedestrians. Simultaneously, childhood obesity has become a major problem. That’s no coincidence. It just hasn’t been safe for kids to walk or bike to school, but that’s changed, and it’s continuing to change. The city has been using the money to build bike paths and trails, and this year’s allocation will go for new sidewalks and crosswalks.
I used to bike to school regularly in middle school. I’d show up awake and ready to learn, rather than groggy from a the soporific morning bus ride. This Safe Routes to School is a great way to get kids doing likewise today.
Police have arrested four in the Saturday murder on 6th Street, and they’re exploring whether there’s a gang aspect to the killing, Stephanie Kassab and Brian McNeill write for the Progress. City and county police, along with the ATF, arrested three males and one female, all in their 20s, in a hotel on 29N. Four guns have been seized. Nineteen-year-old Joshua Anthony Magruder was found dead at 3 AM Saturday morning. Police say that Magruder was trying to escape a conflict between two groups at the spot; he was shot twice while running away. “Quite a few” people witnessed the murder. This is the third homicide of the year, which is a pretty high rate given that it’s only July.
Yesterday I drove by the scene, and it’s as Zoe Krylova photographed it: a retaining wall turned into a shrine, covered with chalked remembrances, stuffed animals, candles, and liquor bottles.
07/24 Update: Brian McNeill has many more details in today’s paper.
City Council signed off on a $7.5M overhaul of the Downtown Mall last night, Rachana Dixit writes in the Progress today. The whole affair will be torn up, block by block, and replaced with 4″x12″ bricks. It’s ambitiously scheduled to take place over just four months, beginning in January.
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