The Washington Post editorial board concludes that Elisha Strom is both a very unpleasant woman and within her right to free expression. Defending free speech means defending even the most unpleasant speech. #
News and meta-news about Charlottesville, VA, since 2001.
Monthly Archive for August, 2009
Page 5 of 6
- Crozet Hardware. By Charlottesville Tomorrow. / CC BY 2.0
Crozetians believe overwhelmingly that their #1 priority is limiting growth, WCAV reports. The county surveyed Crozet’s citizens about the Master Plan—which currently calls for the population to more than double—and it was in that context that they volunteered their concerns about population growth. Specifically, they’re also looking to stop the 250 corridor from sprawling out, and instead build up downtown. A 2006 county report forecast a maximum Crozet population of 24,000 in 15 years, a number that left many Crozet residents horrified, no doubt spurring contributing to the strong support for a sustainable population that this survey has shown.
- The USPS Distribution Facility on Airport Rd.
It was just a few years ago that the USPS built their processing facility on Airport Road, but they’re already looking at shutting it down, Jason Bacaj reports in today’s Daily Progress. A study of their operations will be running for the next few weeks, which will determine whether they’re going to keep it open, move all of the operations to their new facility in Richmond, or do something between those two. The results of the study are due to be announced late next month. If they were to shut down this facility, my understanding is that all mail sent within Charlottesville would have to be routed through Richmond, though I certainly hope that’s not right. Charlottesville’s original mail sorting facility is now the home to the central branch of the Jefferson-Madison Regional Library, which took it over in 1977; if abandoned, I wonder what the future holds for their current facility.
Juandiego Wade proposes putting portraits of Obama in all city schools. And if the next president is a Republican? Wade isn’t sure what to do then. Um. #
The county is looking to stop developers from razing the land and then leaving a field of mud, Sharon Fitzgerald writes in today’s Daily Progress. The proposal is to require that cleared land be covered up within nine months, whether with grass, a structure, or some kind of paving. Developers who can’t get that done in nine months can apply for a three-month extension.
After land is graded, the denuded land can lead to terrible runoff problems, clogging storm drains and filling stream beds with silt. (Recall Hollymead Town Center, which was a sea of red earth for years, the runoff from which reduced Hollymead Lake to a mud puddle.) It’s in a developer’s best interest not to let that happen—dirt isn’t as cheap as the expression would have you believe, and if you let dirt start flowing around on your property, there’s no telling where it’ll move to, and that can make a mess. Wendell Wood, the developer of Hollymead Town Center, blames the multi-year moonscape on the county, for delaying his permits, but that doesn’t explain why he’d grade acre upon acre of land without the permits to do anything with it. Jay Willer of the Blue Ridge Home Builders Association opposes the proposal.
Disclosure: I’m in the awkward position of writing about this during the same week—the very day, I think—on which the county is going to consider whether I have to renew the bond for the swath of land that I had cleared last year, which is contingent in part on whether I have adequately covered the land in question. Though having gone through that process, I do think I’m in a good position to say that nine months ought to be enough time, especially if those nine months don’t include winter. (Mine did, which meant I couldn’t grow a blade of grass until March, despite my best efforts.) Anyhow, knowing that folks from that office read this blog, and wanting very much to be released from that bond, the assumption that I’m sucking up is, while incorrect, totally warranted.
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