Charlottesville – Page 22 – Black and White

Teachable Moment

members of the public speak
Via the stepwise Parks and Rec ten part “Park Master Planning Process” members of the public are halfway to the finish line, the 18th hole, the goal posts, whatever lousy sports analogy you want to employ. Halfway to adoption by the City Council of a McIntire East Park Master Plan.
(One suggestion to P&R, can we take out the qualifier (Master)?
Were there UVA anthropologists/sociologists (or maybe systems engineers or religion majors) in the room February 28, in native dress, doing fieldwork? Extracting the academic relatable lessons from this painful and painstaking process?

Pictured above, Public Mtg. 4, the Venting phase. Earlier in the evening Chris Gensic oriented the Public and answered questions. Following Mr. Gensic the Public was invited to speak. The Public can be characterized in many dualistic ways. Male/Female, republican/democrat, grid/cul-de-sac, old/young, elitist/populist, eggheads/athletes, polemicists/harmonists, tree-hugging/bulldozing, orator/listener, round-ball/no-ball. The binary way of thinking is divisive, but we think like we walk.

And so people stood on their hind feet and said stuff. Mostly flights of rhetoric, emotional pleas, cants and rants. Some information emerged. For the hardy and open-minded, there were things to learn, as least two of the City Councilors dropped by.
NEXT MEETING: Monday, March 26th, 6:00pm at the Buford Middle School Auditorium, Parks and Recreation Advisory Board Public Hearing.

flow chart

Many of the speakers represented the local chapter of The First Tee™ .
The First Tee™ was established by the World Golf Foundation in 1997 as a 501(c)3. The initial focus was on creating affordable access for those not previously exposed to the game of golf.
The First Tee™ headquarters is located in the World Golf Village, a 6300 acre real estate development (almost the size of Charlottesville). The World Golf Village is located South of Jacksonville Florida in St Johns County, I-95 south to exit 323, then take the International Golf Parkway.
As of today March 2, 2012 the average home price for homes for sale in World Golf Village is $270,214,
The First Tee™ headquarters gets a walk score of 46, it is located in a suburban landscape.
Honorary Chair of The First Tee™ is President George W. Bush. Former honorary chair was President George H.W. Bush.
The mission of The First Tee™ is “to impact the lives of young people by providing educational programs that build character, instill life-enhancing values and promote healthy choices through the game of golf.”
The life-enhancing “Nine Core Values”:
– Honesty, Integrity, Sportsmanship, Respect, Confidence, Responsibility, Perseverance, Courtesy, Judgement.
The CHO Chapter of The First Tee™ has been chartered since 2004 and is one of 202 Chapters operating in 46 states and five countries.

Amen.

Charlottesville Tomorrow has the story

Urban Design

Our City is currently involved in several urban design discussions simultaneously.
Are cities gender neutral? Our city, being Charlotte’s Ville. Maybe she can multitask. Talk about redesigning her central park and her bridge downtown and not cut off the wrong leg by mistake.
I have missed the bridge-design events & discussion. Watching the video by Dan Bluestone and Brian Wimer has me playing catch-up.

Why do we allow our bad things to happen to our cities? Why do we allow our cities to be designed by autos and fire engines?
Jim Kunstler talked a bit about the Law of Perverse Outcomes in his November 2011 “Eyesore of the Month”.

falling

wet press
Verdict came down in the case of of The Commonwealth of Virginia vs. George Wesley Huguely V. So did the rain.

Dave Chapman
Commonwealth’s Attorney Warner “Dave” Chapman addresses the media on the stairs of the Circuit Court following the jury’s announcement of their sentencing recommendation.

anti-icing

anti-icing brine
Had a few inches of snow Sunday afternoon. In preparation, Saturday night the City applied some manner of brine solution to the streets. I’ve seen this stuff on the interstates before but never in town. Much tidier than the salt slinging trucks…

Henry Graff

Henry Graff WVIR
I have not seen any out of area broadcast coverage of The Commonwealth of Virginia vs. George Wesley Huguely V.
How does the out of town coverage compare to that of the local broadcast folk?

stake out

stonewall and the satellite dishes
The Commonwealth of Virginia vs. George Wesley Huguely, V continues in the Charlottesville Circuit Court, 315 High Street, Charlottesville, VA. Media have the entrances covered. Unobserved approach would be subterranean or under the cover of smoke or darkness.

view south on 4th street

gauntlet
150 years ago the cavalry had a knack for arriving where it was unexpected but technology has erased that advantage. Even Thomas Jonathan Jackson mounted on Little Sorrel can’t outflank the radio waves.

electronic occupy

WCAV Rachel Bryan
National and local media are queuing up for The Commonwealth of Virginia vs. George Wesley Huguely, V in the Charlottesville Circuit Court, 315 High Street, Charlottesville, VA.
The City is Very Organized on this one. TV perimeter is in place. There are assigned locations for stand-up news, a web page, an RSS feed, a 17 page, 4677 word Huguely Trial Media Plan document…

CBS Whit Johnson
NBC network has a magician working on their support staff. Most of the TV people (including CBS National network, reporter Whit Johnson above) have 81 square foot spaces roped off on the tree lawn on the south of High Street opposite the Circuit Court.
NBC has 900 square feet on the courthouse grounds, beneath 2 magnolias and a white oak.
(Note to City budgeteers. remember to designate money to pay for air-spading, watering and fertilizing all the trees that will be damaged by the electronic occupation.)

media liason office
Each morning of the trial, a representative from each media outlet must report to the Media Liaison Office at the Levy Opera House on High Street to pick up the Courtroom Day Pass for his/her media outlet. I love this office! In a stairwell of CHO’s 1852 Town Hall. Necessity is the mother…

brit the dog
Brit the Golden Retriever takes his morning constitutional down 4th Street, the designated area for satellite trucks.
On the South side of High Street opposite Circuit Court in the 81 square foot corrals, from west to east:
WSET Roanoke, WRC Washington, WBAL Baltimore, WVIR Charlottesville, WCAV Charlottesville, WTVR Richmond, CBS Network, HLN/CNN network, WWBT Richmond, WUSA Washington, WTTG Washington, WRIC Richmond, WJZ Baltimore, WMAR Baltimore, WBFF Charm City.

Off the record, the news people wonder if this is news.

tectonic

Weldon Cooper CHO pop by nhood
The people at the Weldon Cooper Center for Public Service at the University of Virginia have posted some fascinating information on demographic trends in the last ten years.
They did an extra fine job with the graphics, the information is readily accessible regarding population shifts, who is moving in, who is moving out. Shocking really.
In CHO, they say the average house price has doubled in the past ten years. Salaries sure haven’t.
And while people are moving into CHO and AlbCo, people in the Slabtown county are moving out.

boarded up house

pave paradise

Which transportation projects should Albemarle County and Charlottesville begin planning for now to make it easier for people to travel around the community in the future?–Sean Tubbs.
Charlottesville Tomorrow has the story on yesterday’s local confab regarding which roads the community builds next. The idea of paving Charlottesville, using it as an intersection between Albemarle County locations seems to have a lot of support. Planners want cars to be comfortable, not to be impeded in their daily course.

meter hookup
I live in a neighborhood built before the introduction of the automobile. The last couple of days have been delightful from a traffic point of view. The water main contractor has been inconveniencing drivers as they cut-through our residential streets, reducing their speed and their number.

flagmen
Single-family residential zoning districts are established to provide and protect quiet, low-density residential areas wherein the predominant pattern of residential development is the single-family dwelling.

corner of Franklin and Market
The utility pole at this location and the stone wall on its right have been chunked down by oversized vehicles cutting the corner (see scrapes on the sign).

signs of transgression

Quercus phellos

Q phellos grove, CHO mall
Does anyone know the value of these trees? I heard that the timber at Ragged Mountain didn’t have much value, or more accurately, that the value of the Ragged Mountain trees would be realized by the low bidder on the earthen dam.
But what is the value of this downtown stand? What is the replacement plan? Maybe we could let the restaurants and vendors who lease this space sell the lumber to help defray their rental expense?
Have there been any reports from arborists that these juveniles are “in decline”? That is often the way the cutting begins.