Historical Posting, Comments Rates

Published by Waldo Jaquith on August 3, 2006 in Site News. 5 Comments

I was crunching some numbers on historic cvillenews.com comment rates today, so I figured I’d stick ’em on a graph and share them, on the off chance that anybody cares. This first one has two Y axes, plotting both the number of blog entries each month and the number of comments each month, spanning from the site’s 2001 beginning through July. It’s on a log-lin scale, with both Y axes logarithmic. You can click on it for an enlarged version.

Graph

This second graph, likewise log-lin, plots the X:1 ratio of blog entries to comments, again aggregated by month. A 1:1 ratio would mean that blog entries that month had, on average, one comment. A 75:1 ratio would mean that blog entries averaged 75 comments.

Graph

It’s interesting that, as time goes on, the fluctuation of comments more accurately trends the fluctuation in blog entries — that’s me learning what people like to talk about and focusing on posting those sorts of stories. Stepping through some of those comment peaks, generally they reflect some sort of big event going on — the coal tower killings, the 2002 City Council elections, the group of CHS students attacking UVa students, etc.

Albemarle County Fair Underway

Published by Waldo Jaquith on August 3, 2006 in General News. 16 Comments

Pirate ShipThe Albemarle County Fair is on. Though as Christina Tkacik says in today’s Progress, the heat isn’t real conducive to attending the fair, I say that just means you need to get another Sno Cone and hop back onto a fast-moving ride. My wife and I went last night (and I took some rockin’ pictures) and checked out the livestock and produce, did some people watching, played with baby ducks, shared a funnel cake and checked out all of the rides. It’s just 10 minutes south of town. Admission is $6 for adults and $2 for kids. It runs through Saturday.

YASC Approved: Cascadia

Published by Waldo Jaquith on August 3, 2006 in Development. 8 Comments

The Board of Supervisors approved “Cascadia” last night, Charlottesville Tomorrow reports. The vote was 5-1, Dennis Rooker dissenting. The 61-acre suburban development on Rt. 20, just north of Pantops, which will be bolted onto Fontana, a similar recent suburban development. It will include 330 houses and condos.

There was also a 5-1 vote against the 38-home Westhall development in Crozet, with four supervisors saying that the infrastructure in Crozet won’t support it and objecting to the growth on general principle. Ken Boyd said that he’s convinced Crozet is growing too much, citing the “need to draw the line.” Dennis Rooker was not pleased with Frank Stoner’s $3,000/unit proffers, suggesting something closer to $25,000 would be more like it. Bafflingly, David Slutsky was the lone vote in favor of the development. (Did I miss a memo?) The whole thing amounted to a sea change in the BoS’ take on growth — Charlottesville Tomorrow podcasts the audio of the discussion.

How do we know when we’re done growing? When we run out of space?

YASC Approved: North Pointe

Published by Waldo Jaquith on August 3, 2006 in Development. 25 Comments

The Albemarle Board of Supervisors has overruled planning commission and approved the North Pointe developed this evening, NBC 29 reports. North Pointe was unanimously rejected by the planning commission in 2002, and again shot it down in 2003, each time finding the plan untenable. The Board of Supervisors clearly disagreed, with Dennis Rooker and Sally Thomas being the two dissenters. (David Slutsky has some explaining to do, I expect — he was elected on a platform of opposing this sort of thing.) The 270 acre development will go on the corner of Proffit and 29, across the street and just north of Wal-Mart.

The addition of North Pointe will bring us one step closer to realizing our dream: continuous sprawl running from Barracks Road clear up to Ruckersville.

Virginia sales tax holiday this weekend

Published by Duane Gran on August 2, 2006 in Business and Taxes. 5 Comments

This weekend, August 4th through the 6th, the Commonwealth of Virginia has authorized retailers to sell certain school items tax free. There are price limits for items and not all retailers are guaranteed to participate.

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