ride of silence

cyclists on Water Street
A second ride of silence took place in CHO yesterday. This is a worldwide event held every year, 3rd Wednesday in May, beginning in 2003. Locally the event is organized by cyclist Alan Bewley.

Main street
More information is available at the official ride of silence website. The ride highlights the fact that our roads are shared public spaces that are not shared very well. The ride honors, and provides a prolonged moment of meditation/contemplation for cyclists killed in the streets.

Rugby Rd
The rolling police protection which accompanied the 80+ riders through the streets of CHO Wednesday affords a level of safety missing for cyclists most days.

Norris, Bewley
Mayor Dave Norris, after the ride with event organizer Alan Bewley.


Some of the riders…
Ian Ayers’ video of the event.
Peter Norton and Coy Barefoot talk about the streets.

Critical slopes


Charlottesville Planning Commission and City Council have a joint public hearing tomorrow night regarding updating the Critical Slopes ordinance. A unique opportunity for members of the public (Developers and residents) to weigh in on what our City will look like ten years down the road.
If you are a player of meeting bingo, the sustainability box will be filled in early.

Arbor Day

“A society grows great when old people plant trees whose shade they know they shall never sit in.”


Members of the Charlottesville Area Tree Stewards, the Charlottesville Tree Commission, Charlottesville Parks and Recreation and Mia the Dog planted a quercus bicolor in Tonsler Park this morning celebrating Arbor Day.

Martha Warring, forester with the VDOF addressed the assembly, marking Charlottesville’s 5th year as a “tree-city”, a citation granted by the Arbor Day Foundation.


Trees start small, they get big. This quercus falcata (Southern Red Oak) is located in the City’s Oakwood Cemetery.
If you have a tree you’d like to nominate for the Charlottesville Area Tree Stewards “treasured tree” program contact them.

South of the Tracks

left bank of Moore's Creek

Sec. 10-71. Duty to retain or establish stream buffer.
(a) Except as otherwise provided in this article, any land adjacent to the following listed waters, shall provide buffers for the purposes of retarding runoff, preventing erosion, and filtering nonpoint source pollution from runoff:
(1) Rivanna River;
(2) Moore’s Creek;
(3) Meadow Creek.
(b) A required stream buffer shall be no less than one hundred (100) feet wide on each side of the stream, which buffer
shall be measured horizontally from the top of the stream bank.–CHO Minicode

North of the tracks we are spending millions to restore Meadow Creek. South of the tracks, on Moore’s Creek, the poor man’s creek, is there a mitigation plan, any plan? Put in the new sewer pipe, grind up the trees. That is that?

brick house

512 Rives ST
The house associated with the Rives Street store was torn down last week.

The third little pig met a man with a load of bricks, and said:
‘Please, man, give me those bricks to build a house with.’
So the man gave him the bricks, and he built his house with them. So the wolf came, as he did to the other little pigs, and said:
‘Little pig, little pig, let me come in.’
‘No, no, by the hair of my chiny chin chin.’
‘Then I’ll huff, and I’ll puff, and I’ll blow your house in.’
Well, he huffed, and he puffed, and he huffed and he puffed, and he puffed and huffed; but he could not get the house down. When he found that he could not, with all his huffing and puffing, blow the house down, he said:
‘Little pig, I know where there is a nice field of turnips.’

Sunrise, night

DIVISION 5. MANUFACTURED HOME PARK (MHP) RESIDENTIAL DISTRICTS
Sec. 34-406. Purpose.
The purpose of the R-MHP district is to establish areas of the city deemed suitable for manufactured homes, and to ensure a safe and healthy residential environment consistent with existing land use and density patterns.–Charlottesville Code
(9-15-03(3))

Looking at the zoning map, I am not sure where these MHP districts are located?
hic sunt dracones?