Good morning, RVA! It’s 48 °F, and whoa did the sun come out last night for a spectacular sunset. Great work, everyone involved! Today you can expect fog in the morning, clouds following, and possibly some rain later this evening. Temperatures should hover around 60 °F, though.

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The Richmond Times-Dispatch’s Mel Leonor says the General Assembly is having a hard time making up its mind about how to reform redistricting and stop with all of the partisan gerrymandering 💸. It sounds like the Senate wants to move forward with the constitutional amendment we’ve all been talking about for a couple of years now, yet the House of Delegates thinks that amendment wouldn’t ensure people of color having enough membership in the process. For now, they’re at an impasse. Surely, though, we’ll end the first season of New Democratic Majority with some kind of redistricting reform, right? Like, the redistricting advocacy group is called One Virginia 2021 for a reason, and post-Census redistricting is right around the corner. Status quo on this is unacceptable!

C. Suarez Rojas, also in the RTD, has the details on Henrico’s new short-term rental (aka Airbnb) legislation 💸. The City has toiled away on their on short-term rental ordinance (ORD. 2019–343) for a while now, and it currently sits on Council’s March 9th agenda. Operators in both localities hate the clause that requires them to live in the Airbnb-able property for a significant portion of the year. This prevents folks from buying up houses to use solely as Airbnbs, which depletes the available housing stock, which exacerbates our housing crisis. I’m OK with this restriction. I should say, however, that I have read conflicting studies on the impact of short-term rentals. This study out of Seattle says that allowing short-term rentals has no effect on the number of commercial landlords in an area and may even support home ownership. While, in Santa Fe (PDF), they found that “the conversion of houses and apartments into short-term rentals reduces the supply of housing, putting upward pressure on rents and home prices citywide.” Better safe than sorry, I think, and Council should pass the ordinance with the owner-occupancy restriction.

Good morning, RVA! It’s 45 °F and rainy. You can expect the rain to continue for most of the morning and dry out later this afternoon. By then, temperatures should have made there way into the 60s—looking like a pretty OK afternoon.

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Last night, City Council adopted ORD. 2020–030, the Special Use Permit which will allow developers to build a 12-story apartment building with 168 places for people to live on the northwest corner of Broad & Lombardy. The vote was 7–2 (YES: Addison, Hilbert, Larson, Lynch, Robertson, Newbille, Jones; NO: Gray, Trammell), which I think speaks to the growing trend of Council passing (at least small scale) urbanist legislation. In recent memory we’ve seen the vote to kill the Brook Road bike lane ban, the rezoning of Scott’s Addition and Monroe Ward, approving a new shelter and services center for folks experiencing homelessness on Chamberlayne Ave, and now this dense urban housing on Broad. While it’s frustrating that we—the people who live in the city and want it and its residents to thrive—have to spend our time advocating for these small-scale projects, it’s exciting that we’re just winning a lot of them. What I’m looking for now is an opportunity for Council to act boldly and pass some Big Time urbanist legislation. I don’t know what qualifies at the moment, but I’ll know it when I see it!

Jonathan Spiers at Richmond BizSense says a D.C.-based developer has offered to “buy nearly 15 acres of the Navy Hill project site from the City of Richmond for $15 million.” My personal, uneducated opinion on this is that its an unserious offer—mostly because it expires May 18th. If we learned anything through the entire downtown arena process, it’s that we’ve got a lot of work ahead of us to figure out what we want from that city-owned land. Plus, honestly, a bunch of trust-building to do, too. An arbitrarily imposed couple-month deadline, while Council figures out the process of creating a small area plan, just isn’t going to cut it. If that dude is interested in helping to rebuild the neighborhood, he can hold his developer horses until the City gets its ducks in a row. Roberto Roldan at VPM has posted the letter to the City on which the developer has handwritten “I AM THE RIGHT GUY FOR THE JOB!!”

Good morning, RVA! It’s 36 °F, and today we’ve got highs in the upper 50s with a bunch of clouds in the sky. Tomorrow you can expect warmer temperatures and some early-morning rain.

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Correction! Last week, in an attempt to find bipartisan agreement in the, of all things, immunization discussion, I attributed a pro-science quote to “Republican Del. Adams.” This was incorrect! There are two Del. Adamses, and the Democrat, Del. Dawn Adams (a nurse practitioner), is the one with the good, pro-herd-immunity quote. For what it’s worth, the Senate version of the immunization bill in question did see actual Republican Sen. Dunnavant vote for it in committee, so, at least in that chamber it’s not strictly party lines.

Today, City Council meets for its regularly scheduled meeting at 6:00 PM, and you can find the agenda in its current state here (PDF). Two things to note! First, Council will consider ORD. 2020–030, the Special Use Permit allowing a 12-story apartment building on the northwest corner of Broad & Lombardy. This is high-density, transit-adjacent, urban living that helps us meet our housing and climate goals. If you’re a City resident—especially of the 2nd or 3rd Districts—take a minute and email your City Council rep telling them to support ORD. 2020–030. If you’ve got more than a minute, consider heading down to City Hall tonight and giving public comment in support—which is always both fun and nerve-wracking. Maybe once we get a bunch of new folks living at that intersection we can start pushing for an in-fill Pulse Station? Second, at their informal meeting, Council will get an update on what they’ll need to do should the casino bills floating around the General Assembly move forward. Since both the House version (HB 4) and the Senate version (SB 36) require holding a referendum, City Council has a bunch of work to do should they want to hold that referendum this coming November. This handy two-pager explains all of the state-mandated deadlines the City must comply with (PDF). Basically, if we want folks voting on casinos this coming election, Council needs to get moving. Graham Moomaw at the Virginia Mercury has a piece about how the State needs to take problem gambling more seriously if its going to legalize casinos.

Good morning, RVA! It’s 26 °F, and you shouldn’t expect temperatures to get above 40 °F today. Bundle up, stay warm, and look forward to a sunny weekend with highs back up in the upper 50s.

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I appreciate this thread by Twitter user @SheriShannon27 about the casino proposed for Richmond’s Southside. Before anyone can build any sort of casino in Richmond, they’ve got to jump through a couple of legal hoops. And before those hoops even get set up, the General Assembly needs to pass HB 4 / SB 36. And before I decide whether or not I think this is a good plan for Richmond’s Southside, I’d like to read some more about giant casinos dropped into off-the-beaten path parts of towns because I’ve got a ton of questions. Do these casinos typically succeed? Do they create local jobs and tax revenue? What impact do they have on folks with lower-incomes? What impact do they have on nearby housing affordability? What does it mean that the proposed location of this specific casino is adjacent to Hillside Court? Like I said, lots of questions, and I’m sure I’ll have more in the coming months. Luckily, both the House and Senate versions of the enabling legislation require Richmond to hold a referendum, so, should they pass, I’d imagine we’ll start seeing some opportunities for the public to learn the answers to some of these questions.

There are now 17 RVA Bike Share stations, thanks to the new one that just opened at Main Street Train Station. This is a particularly useful spot for shareable e-bikes since it sits at the very bottom of a valley and gives folks a quick and easy way to get up either hill into Downtown or Church Hill. I still haven’t renewed my membership to RVA Bike Share yet, but it is nice to see some sort of progress made toward the 40 stations we were promised years ago. With 40 stations, I think you’d have a usable system. Then, maybe we’d get the buy-in from folks needed to expand to 60 or 80, which is when things start to get interesting. Station density is super important to a successful bike share system, and we should shoot for something like four stations per square mile. To put that in context, Downtown should have about 16 stations on its own.

Good morning, RVA! It’s 47 °F, cloudy, and that’s about today for you. However, tomorrow there is a small chance of…snow! Andrew Freiden at NBC12 says, as per always, Richmond is right on the line but could see actual snow—that accumulates—tomorrow evening! S(n)o(w) exciting.

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Richmond police are reporting two murders. First, at 5:40 PM on Monday, officers on patrol near the 200 block of W. Charity Street heard gunshots, responded, and found Katrez T. Bryant, 18, shot to death. Second, later that same evening, police received a call of a person shot, arrived at the corner of Redd and Coalter Streets, and found Kieshell L. Walker, 25, shot to death.

Good morning, RVA! It’s 34 °F, and today’s highs are in the 60s. Enjoy it while you can, because it looks like we’ve got some rain and colder temperatures later this week.

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WTVR reports that a driver hit and killed Shelly Johnson, 41, as Johnson walked along Bethlehem Road towards the Wawa on Staples Mill Road. Bethlehem Road is one of the few ways to connect to Libbie Mill while avoiding both Broad Street and Staples Mill, but, unfortunately, the street lacks side walks and the intersection is massive, unsafe, and designed to maximize vehicle speeds. It’s unsurprising that “the preliminary investigation indicates that [neither] speed nor alcohol were factors in this crash” because the area is not designed as a place for people to safely exist. What will Henrico do to make this part of the County—where they plan on adding thousands of people and jobs—safer for folks moving around? Will they respond to Johnson’s death and change how this intersection works?

Good morning, RVA! It’s 37 °F, and that’s about the temperature for today. Expect a bit of clouds until tomorrow when we’ll, with any luck, fully see the sun again. Temperatures will stay in the 40s and 50s until Monday when thing start to warm up a bit (again).

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This week’s email from Richmond Public Schools’ Superintendent is short, sweet, and right up my alley. He gives folks two ways to concretely get involved in the civic process as it relates to schools funding: 1) Call the legislators who will put the final touches on Virginia’s budget proposal(s) to ask them for more money for RPS, and 2) Show up at the General Assembly building on Sunday at 12:00 PM to immediately respond to the proposed House and Senate budgets (Facebook). For the latter, fingers crossed, the response will be “Hey, thanks for fully funding your share of public education, Commonwealth.” But, should that not be the case, you can be on hand to cast scornful looks upon the legislators.

Mark Robinson at the Richmond Times-Dispatch has a summary of a recent report released by the City Auditor that focuses on overtime pay at the Sheriff’s Office. You can read the full, 14-page audit here (PDF). The short of it: Overtime pay went, way, way up—from $643,985 in FY2018 to $2,786,220 in FY2019—and it does sound like some of the operational procedures at the jail could benefit from some tweaking. That said, pay at Richmond’s Sheriff’s Office still lags behind neighboring facilities, and, something I’m always interested in knowing, the Office has about a 15% vacancy rate. Until the Mayor and City Council find a way to fully fund vacant position at City departments (by, oh, I dunno, raising the real estate tax to pre-Recession era levels), we’ll always need folks to work overtime and we’ll always see huge overtime line items. At some point, surely, you save some money by filling a couple of those vacancies, right?

Good morning, RVA! It’s 37 °F, and that’s about the temperature for today. Expect a bit of clouds until tomorrow when we’ll, with any luck, fully see the sun again. Temperatures will stay in the 40s and 50s until Monday when thing start to warm up a bit (again).

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This week’s email from Richmond Public Schools’ Superintendent is short, sweet, and right up my alley. He gives folks two ways to concretely get involved in the civic process as it relates to schools funding: 1) Call the legislators who will put the final touches on Virginia’s budget proposal(s) to ask them for more money for RPS, and 2) Show up at the General Assembly building on Sunday at 12:00 PM to immediately respond to the proposed House and Senate budgets (Facebook). For the latter, fingers crossed, the response will be “Hey, thanks for fully funding your share of public education, Commonwealth.” But, should that not be the case, you can be on hand to cast scornful looks upon the legislators.

Mark Robinson at the Richmond Times-Dispatch has a summary of a recent report released by the City Auditor that focuses on overtime pay at the Sheriff’s Office. You can read the full, 14-page audit here (PDF). The short of it: Overtime pay went, way, way up—from $643,985 in FY2018 to $2,786,220 in FY2019—and it does sound like some of the operational procedures at the jail could benefit from some tweaking. That said, pay at Richmond’s Sheriff’s Office still lags behind neighboring facilities, and, something I’m always interested in knowing, the Office has about a 15% vacancy rate. Until the Mayor and City Council find a way to fully fund vacant position at City departments (by, oh, I dunno, raising the real estate tax to pre-Recession era levels), we’ll always need folks to work overtime and we’ll always see huge overtime line items. At some point, surely, you save some money by filling a couple of those vacancies, right?

Good morning, RVA! It’s 49 °F, and highs today are back up around 60 °F. Don’t get your slip-ons out just yet, though, because there’s a solid chance of rain until late this afternoon.

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The RTD’s Samuel Northrop has the details on Richmond Public Schools’ increased absentee rate and how the Superintendent’s proposed budget plans to address it 💸. Turns out chronic absenteeism isn’t just kids who don’t want to go to school but involves complicated issues like a student’s housing stability. Related, while poking around the School Board site, I found this pretty interesting (and very readable) FY21 Budget: Board Questions and Answers PDF. It’s worth reading because the School Board is just regular people with regular-people questions—probably some of the same questions you’d have if you looked through the budget presentation (PDF).

Whoa! Mallory Noe-Payne, from RadioIQ, has the single best Twitter thread about the General Assembly that I’ve seen all year—and maybe ever. It’s one-sentence reviews, plus bill numbers, for the 75 bills she thinks are worth knowing about—sorted by topical category! For example, you’ve got “You don’t need a photo ID to vote (HB 19)”, “Localities can ban guns (HB 421)”, “To get charged with larceny you have to steal $1,000 of goods (currently it’s $500) (HB 995)”, and “Must be 18 or older to use a tanning bed (HB 38).” This is a simple and wonderful resource. It must have taken forever to put together—and yet she’s considering doing the same thing for Senate bills, too?? Now she’s got me thinking about how to do something similar for RIchmond City Council ordinances and resolutions 🤔.

Good morning, RVA! It’s 49 °F, and highs today are back up around 60 °F. Don’t get your slip-ons out just yet, though, because there’s a solid chance of rain until late this afternoon.

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The RTD’s Samuel Northrop has the details on Richmond Public Schools’ increased absentee rate and how the Superintendent’s proposed budget plans to address it 💸. Turns out chronic absenteeism isn’t just kids who don’t want to go to school but involves complicated issues like a student’s housing stability. Related, while poking around the School Board site, I found this pretty interesting (and very readable) FY21 Budget: Board Questions and Answers PDF. It’s worth reading because the School Board is just regular people with regular-people questions—probably some of the same questions you’d have if you looked through the budget presentation (PDF).

Whoa! Mallory Noe-Payne, from RadioIQ, has the single best Twitter thread about the General Assembly that I’ve seen all year—and maybe ever. It’s one-sentence reviews, plus bill numbers, for the 75 bills she thinks are worth knowing about—sorted by topical category! For example, you’ve got “You don’t need a photo ID to vote (HB 19)”, “Localities can ban guns (HB 421)”, “To get charged with larceny you have to steal $1,000 of goods (currently it’s $500) (HB 995)”, and “Must be 18 or older to use a tanning bed (HB 38).” This is a simple and wonderful resource. It must have taken forever to put together—and yet she’s considering doing the same thing for Senate bills, too?? Now she’s got me thinking about how to do something similar for RIchmond City Council ordinances and resolutions 🤔.

Good morning, RVA! It’s 45 °F, and we might see temperatures warm up a bit later this afternoon. There’s a small chance of rain throughout the day—but it’s pretty small.

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Dang, y’all! The various chambers of the General Assembly continue to pass major progressive bills each and every day like it’s no big deal. Yesterday, the final day before crossover, when the House and Senate swap bills, was no exception. First, Justin Mattingly at the Richmond Times-Dispatch says both the bills giving localities control over their Confederate monuments 💸, HB 1537 and SB 183, passed their respective houses. The Senate version is unnecessarily intense and requires localities to pass a resolution with a two-thirds majority to take down a monument. I hope that gets changed before something ends up on the Governor’s desk. Next, Ned Oliver at the Virginia Mercury has the details on the GA’s plan to increase the minimum wage in the Commonwealth. Here again the House of Delegates version (HB 395) is more progressive, increasing the state-wide, across-the-board minimum wage to $15 by 2025. The Senate version (SB 7), on the other hand, does a weird regional thing based on proportions of median incomes. It’ll be interesting to see how that all gets sorted before something heads to the Governor. Moving on, Dean Mirashani at WRIC notes that both the House and Senate have passed bills to decriminalize marijuana possession—that’s HB 972 and SB 2. Legalization was a bit too far for even the New Democratic Majority, but I bet we’ll get there in a couple of years. And that’s only three of the things our elected legislators are working on! Please, please keep in mind that plenty can happen between now and the end of this year’s General Assembly session—a bill that looks like a done deal can suddenly up and die. Honestly though, even if some of the marquee bills fail to become laws, this has already been a sea change of a session. Look at what elections do! They really matter! Graham Moomaw at the Virginia Mercury has a much better, broader summary of the session up to this point.

Ben Dennis at WRIC says that the City’s 311 app has updated to include the ability to report a “Public Right of Way Violation”, which you, a regular person, might know as a closed or blocked sidewalk or bike lane. This is great news, and the City staffers responsible for checking tickets submitted through RVA 311 are about to get real familiar with my user account. You can submit your own service requests via RVA311.com or through the mobile app, and the Public Right of Way Violation is listed under “Zoning and Code Enforcement.” Now, keep in mind, that because the City refuses to implement a policy to require that sidewalks and bike lanes remain open during construction, some of the Right of Way Violations you encounter may actually be totally legal and fine. To fix that, you’ve got to move beyond RVA 311 and email Bobby Vincent (the Director of Public Works, Bobby.vincent@richmondgov.com) and Mayor Stoney (RVAmayor@richmondgov.com). Honestly, you should just do that right now and ask both of them to implement this super common-sense policy that prioritizes people over construction.

Good morning, RVA! It’s 56 °F, and there’s a pretty good chance of rain throughout the entire day. Temperatures will stay right around 60 °F, though! You take the good, you take the bad…

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Last night, five members of City Council voted against the Mayor’s downtown redevelopment plan aka NoBro aka Navy Hill—NO: Gray, Hilbert, Larson, Lynch, and Trammell; YES: Addison, Robertson, Newbille, and Jones. Technically, the Council voted against unstriking the handful of necessary ordinances that they struck at last week’s Organizational Development committee meeting, but, you get the gist. It was a long Council meeting, a historic night (I think), and I have a lot of thoughts. But, before diving in, Roberto Roldan at VPM has a recap that includes a nice timeline of the last couple dozen months. OK!

First, whoa! I don’t think I ever, not even a single time, really expected this project to fail. It just seemed too big, have too much power and money behind it, and address too many of the City’s actual needs. I figured it’d tumble forward, like a big katamari clumping up supporters and amendments, until it ultimately splattered across the finish line. In Richmond, “I guess it’s either this or do nothing, and we already have nothing” has typically been a powerful argument. Turns out, not so anymore!

Good morning, RVA! It’s 56 °F, and there’s a pretty good chance of rain throughout the entire day. Temperatures will stay right around 60 °F, though! You take the good, you take the bad…

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Last night, five members of City Council voted against the Mayor’s downtown redevelopment plan aka NoBro aka Navy Hill—NO: Gray, Hilbert, Larson, Lynch, and Trammell; YES: Addison, Robertson, Newbille, and Jones. Technically, the Council voted against unstriking the handful of necessary ordinances that they struck at last week’s Organizational Development committee meeting, but, you get the gist. It was a long Council meeting, a historic night (I think), and I have a lot of thoughts. But, before diving in, Roberto Roldan at VPM has a recap that includes a nice timeline of the last couple dozen months. OK!

First, whoa! I don’t think I ever, not even a single time, really expected this project to fail. It just seemed too big, have too much power and money behind it, and address too many of the City’s actual needs. I figured it’d tumble forward, like a big katamari clumping up supporters and amendments, until it ultimately splattered across the finish line. In Richmond, “I guess it’s either this or do nothing, and we already have nothing” has typically been a powerful argument. Turns out, not so anymore!

Good morning, RVA! It’s 37 °F, and today’s highs will hit the upper 50s. This morning looks pretty chill, but there’s an ever-increasing chance of rain this afternoon stretching into tomorrow.

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City Council meets tonight for their regularly scheduled meeting when they will decide the fate of the Mayor’s proposed downtown arena project…or maybe they won’t! I honestly have no idea what will happen tonight. Here’s what I do know, though: All of the NoBro-related ordinance are on the agenda as “to be stricken,” which, I think, requires an act of Council to un-to-be-stricken them. I also know, from working with Council on 2018’s bus network redesign, that you can learn a lot about how Councilfolk are leaning at the informal meeting (which starts at 4:00 PM). Finally, I know that Council Chambers are gonna be packed, so if you want a seat you should probably get there early—or you can watch online via this website. We’ll all know a lot more this time tomorrow. I feel bad for ORD. 2019–243, the City’s Airbnb ordinance, which is also on the Regular Agenda for tonight’s meeting. It feels like the City’s been working on this particular piece of legislation forever, and now Council will—most likely—either continue it or debate it after spending all of their brain capacity on NoBro.

Speaking of the Airbnb ordinance, Karri Peifer at the Richmond Times-Dispatch has an excellent history of the thing 💸 and why some folks—folks who operate illegal short-term rentals today—dislike the proposed legislation. It continues to blow my mind that these property-owning people willingly go on the record about doing a crime and have absolutely zero concerns that they could face a consequence for that.

Good morning, RVA! It’s 59 °F, and we may see the sun later today! But, beware the wind! We’re under a wind advisory until 4:00 PM, and you should expect 15–25 mph winds with gusts up to 40 mph. After all that rain, some stuff may fall down, and your power could even go out! Saturday and Sunday look pretty rad though.

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Police are reporting that Leon T. Robinson, 27, was shot to death on the 1600 block of Mechanicsville Turnpike, near the 804 Market, on Wednesday night. This is the fifth murder of 2020.

Good morning, RVA! It’s 43 °F, and it’s raining now and it’ll be raining later—probably until tomorrow afternoon. So much rain, in fact, that we’re under a Flood Watch and should expect 2.5–3.25 inches of rain from now through Friday morning. Stay safe, and stay dry!

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Mark Robinson at the Richmond Times-Dispatch has a really complicated story about a tent encampment—with 91 tents—behind the Annie Giles Community Resource Center, which functions as the City’s cold weather shelter. First, the details: VCU owns this property down on Oliver Hill Way, the City uses it as the (“temporary,” scare quotes intentional) emergency cold weather shelter, and a community group has encouraged folks to start living in tents behind the onsite building because they saw a legit need. That’s three different groups with three very different priorities and ways of going about things. My uninformed opinion is that it’s shameful we haven’t done enough to provide housing and support services for the Richmonders experiencing homelessness. I also, simultaneously, believe that 91 tents supported by just two port-o-potties, crammed together adjacent to the railroad is not a humane living situation. It’s complicated, but we’ve got to have more empathy as a City, and we’ve got to do more as a City. Unfortunately, for some of us (PDF), doing more is hard: City Council just a couple weeks ago had a tense debate over whether to even allow a much-needed, proposed shelter on Chamberlayne Avenue. And even that new shelter won’t be enough! The City’s recently released Strategic Plan to End Homelessness (PDF) says we need 150 new emergency shelter beds and 300 new supportive housing units. Those new beds and units aren’t going to appear overnight. So, I guess my question—to VCU, the City, the community group—is if folks are forced to take down their tents and move on, where are they moving on to? Do our current resources have the capacity to support and care for the people living in these 91 tents? Or are we just trying to get rid of the visual of 91 tents crammed together adjacent to the railroad? In a statement, Mayor Stoney said “While we have significant concerns for the health and safety of those living in the encampment, until a longer term solution is identified, we will work closely with these service providers to have a presence, on-site, at the Cold Weather Overflow Shelter so we can help connect those currently living there with available resources and more stable housing as quickly as possible.” Nowhere in that statement does he suggest immediately removing the tents and the people from that space.

I found two interesting items on today’s Urban Design Committee agenda (PDF). First, the City is looking to install sidewalks on Hey Road from Hull Street Road to Walmsley Boulevard on the Southside. I think it’s rad to see infrastructure investment on the southern side of the river, plus, new sidewalks, where none previously existed, are so rare and expensive! Henrico and Chesterfield, take note! The associated PDF with the plans and maps and things is enormous and crashed my browser several times, so know that going in, I guess. Second, VCU wants to build a pedestrian bridge connecting the existing Children’s Pavilion to the impending Children’s Hospital (PDF). Seems cool and necessary, I guess. I know almost nothing about green infrastructure and green rooftops, but this certainly seems like an opportunity to introduce some plants to the area. Not only would a bunch of living, green things planted on top of the bridge make it more pleasant to look at, but would also help with runoff and air quality. Does the City have any policies that relate to this sort of thing? Should it?

Good morning, RVA! It’s 59 °F, and that’s today’s high. You can expect temperatures to drop and rain to fall as the day moves on. Once the rain starts it may not stop until…Friday afternoon? NBC12’s Andrew Freiden says we could see as much as three inches of rain tomorrow!

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VDOT has released their Final Study Report for the Ashland to Petersburg Trail—and it’s not one but many PDFs! If you like the Capital Trail, you’re gonna love the Ashland Petersburg Trail, which will connect the titular Ashland and Petersburg, through Richmond, via a multiuse trail. You can view the alignment of the trail in this PDF, and the Richmond portion starts on page 5. First, having a safe, high-quality north-south path through the city to points beyond will really change things for many, many folks. We all know people, and you may be one!, who say totally legitimate things like “I’d love to bike, but I just don’t feel safe doing so.” This project will give those folks a safe (and useful) place to ride, and that makes me incredibly excited. Second, I’ve got two immediate thoughts on the ATP’s proposed alignment: 1) Sending the kind of bike/pedestrian traffic this amenity will generate across the T-Pot bridge is a bad idea. Just check out the Capital Trail on a nice Saturday—that thing is PACKED with folks. 2) Brown’s Island Way is not a bikeable street and will force northbound folks to walk their bikes up the hill. I ride bikes a TON and Brown’s Island Way is a hill I can barely manage and that I avoid at all costs. There’s a massive bridge with a billion extra lanes just sitting due east that could solve both of these problems. Anyway, rad project, hope the alignment changes, and looking forward to encouraging jurisdictions to fund their portions of it.

Speaking of bike stuff, Bike Walk RVA has a nifty form for you to fill out that’ll let your specific state representatives know that you support the handful of bike and pedestrian safety (and funding!) bills floating around the General Assembly. Take the two minutes and do this!

Good morning, RVA! It’s 56 °F, and you can expect another warm day with temperatures in the mid 60s. There’s a low-grade chance of rain today which really amps up over the next couple of days. Might be a while before we see another dry, sunny afternoon.

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Police are reporting that Sharmar Hill, Jr., 3, was shot to death on the 1700 block of Southlawn Avenue this past Saturday afternoon. Police have put together a string of possibly connected events and are looking for people involved in a nearby carjacking of a white, newer-model Kia. You can read the full statement from the Richmond Police Department here, and you can, if you have any information, contact Crime Stoppers (804.780.1000 or 7801000.com).

Good morning, RVA! It’s 47 °F, and temperatures today will head right up into the mid-to-upper 60s. I dunno, we might could even see 70 °F! Expect a pretty temperate first week of February.

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Richmond Police are reporting that a driver hit and killed a person walking along the 5200 block of Hull Street over the weekend. Police are still looking for the driver and the vehicle—which may be silver or gray in color with heavy damage to the front end. If you have any information you can call the RPD’s Crash Team Investigator (804.646.1665) or contact Crime Stoppers at 80.780.1000 or at 7801000.com.

Good morning, RVA! It’s 28 °F, and highs will hit the mid 40s before dropping a bit this evening. Keep an eye out for rain tonight and tomorrow morning with a pretty neutral weekend following. Temperatures next week, though! Break out your slip-ons.

Water cooler

Del. Jeff Bourne told Ned Oliver at the Virginia Mercury he’s dropping his bill that would allow some state sales tax revenue to pay for a portion of the proposed downtown arena project, aka NoBro. As far as I understood it, that bill would have given the project developers enough cash to allow them to shrink the 80-block BigTIF back down to a more reasonable size, basically the project footprint. The NH District folks (the developers) told VPM’s Robert Roldan that they are still “committed to reducing the size of the increment financing area and are exploring other avenues to help us achieve that goal.” I would love to know what those avenues are! Honestly, I felt like Bourne’s Bill was pretty OK, all things considered. I’ve no qualms with taking state money to pay for local things given how the state regularly stiffs the City on all sorts of stuff—most directly by taking up a huge portion of our downtown land with their tax-exempt buildings. But, with five councilmembers asking the Mayor to withdraw his NoBro ordinances this past Monday, the writing is on the wall, the blood is in the water, or some other noun is preposition the other noun phrase. Moving forward from this specific downtown project, I love this quote from the Mayor’s press secretary, “Regardless of whether it’s used for Navy Hill, there’s no reason this tool for economic development shouldn’t be available to Richmond, as it is for other cities.”

Also at the Virginia Mercury, Ned Oliver and Graham Moomaw look at all the progress The New Democratic Majority have made on guns this General Assembly session: “Both chambers of the Virginia General Assembly have passed major gun-control bills creating universal background checks, a red-flag law and reinstating the former one-handgun-a-month rule.” Heck yes! Now our elected leaders just need to decide if they’re willing to tackle an assault weapons ban. What a bizarre sentence that you can only write in America.