Author Archive for Waldo Jaquith

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Albemarle Place Belly-Up?

Published by Waldo Jaquith on October 27, 2007 in Business and Development. 23 Comments

Jim Duncan noted the other day that Albemarle Place‘s website is gone. And a commenter on his site noted that the development’s signs have disappeared. Tasha Kates looked into this for the Progress today, and found Albemarle Place’s developers won’t comment and Whole Foods says they’ve bailed on the thing and are building their own place on the site of the Terrace Triple. Whole Foods first announced the move two years ago.

Rumors of trouble at Albemarle Place began back in April, when a commenter said she’d heard that funding had fallen through. That was about when its developers had finally got around to noticing that the sewage system couldn’t handle the ginormous new development, which presented a significant problem to them. (Or, more accurately, to the rest of us, since the $19M upgrade would come out of our pockets, not theirs.)

It remains to be seen whether Albemarle Place has actually been reduced to a shriveled pair of striped stockings under Dorothy’s house. But I’ll bet that we can sing soon enough.

Silverman Planning a Downtown Grocery Store

Published by Waldo Jaquith on October 25, 2007 in Business and Development. 25 Comments

It looks like a grocery store is coming downtown, Seth Rosen writes in the Daily Progress. Developer Gabe Silverman has long wanted to bring a grocery store downtown, and now the BAR has approved some changes to his 2,400 sq. ft. space on the corner of 5th and Main that would allow him to do just that. There’s no word as to what chain, if any, would be setting up shop there.

The A&N at that location closed in January of last year, despite Silverman’s best efforts to retain them. A&N is, interestingly, a Virginia business, founded in Richmond right after the Civil War.

What a BoS Upset Would Mean

Published by Waldo Jaquith on October 25, 2007 in Development and Politics. 43 Comments

Will Goldsmith has a breakdown of what a victory for each BoS candidate would mean in the current C-Ville. He forecasts that a win on the part of challengers Ann Mallek and Marcia Joseph would mean developers paying their fair share, rural protection ordinances would pass, and property taxes would go up. If incumbents win, presumably things will stay the same. Goldsmith is pretty frank, and it’ll annoy some people, but it makes sense.

Planning Commission Denies Wood Rezoning

Published by Waldo Jaquith on October 24, 2007 in Development and Politics. 17 Comments

The Albemarle Planning Commission has denied Wendell Wood’s request to add land into the growth area, Jeremy Borden writes in the Daily Progress. Wood sold the land to NGIC for what he says is $9M less than it’s worth, a result of Supervisor Ken Boyd’s claim that he received a phone call from an NGIC employee — he won’t say who it was — saying that they’d pack up and leave town if they couldn’t expand. (Boyd’s campaign now says that this was a fabrication on the part of C-Ville.) Wood says the county owes him for taking a hit, and figures that having 30 acres reclassified from rural to growth area would be fair. NGIC has the land, and they’re expanding, so that’s not a concern anymore. Of course, the BoS is forever overruling the planning commission — they wouldn’t let a little thing like a unanimous vote stand in their way.

Borden also had a pair of articles today about Boyd’s reelection bid — one about Boyd and one about his challenger, Marcia Joseph.

Police Concert on Election Day

Published by Waldo Jaquith on October 22, 2007 in Music and Politics. 9 Comments
Police Concert

The Police concert at the Bell Center, Montreal. By Franz Dejon.

The county sent out an interesting notice today, alerting voters in the University Hall precinct to a scheduling conflict on Election Day. November 6 is the date of the the Police concert at the John Paul Jones Arena. The doors open for the show at 6:30pm, while the polls are open until 7:00. Voters are alerted that they “may experience significant traffic and parking issues” when attempting to vote after work. Seems to me that U-Hall may simply not working as a polling place anymore. After all, UVa can hardly be expected to keep their venue dark on Election Day.

The good news is that tickets to the Police concert apparently aren’t selling. Nosebleed seats are $52, and prices soar up to $227. I’m a lifelong fan of The Police, but ain’t no way I’m paying $200 for a decent pair of seats.

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