According to the City of Richmond Department of Public Utilities blog, recently completed stormwater projects include “rehabilitat(ing) 3,300 feet of combined sewer pipe, 4 new manholes, and 5 rehabbed manholes in Gambles Hill area.”
Work planned for the 5th Council District includes cavitation repairs on the 700 block of Idlewood.
In the meantime, the local Sierra Club is fully supporting stormwater regulations for the state, and neighbors are watching VCU’s plans.
A.C.O.R.N. sent out a notice about this event for 310 Schafer Street. That building has recent history also.
It’s yet another reminder that Oregon Hill is not alone in having issues with VCU’s Real Estate Foundation.
We are still waiting for that positive step…
There’s a rumor on the street that the soon-to-open downtown Center Stage project is now taking funding away from the Landmark Theater renovation.
Instead of getting it out of City of the Future funds, the way it was supposed to,
the Landmark actually got its money from the excess surplus from the Manchester Project. But CenterStage leadership is rumored to be negotiating with Council to get the money that would have gone to the Landmark. (Remember when the City of the Future was supposed to be mainly about renovating and building new schools?)
Many Oregon Hill residents have questioned the Center Stage project from the beginning. Now as it gets closer to opening day, more and more people are raising questions. And yet, even more amazing, this sad, wasteful story just keeps growing.
The Landmark renovations will most likely get finished no matter what, but if this rumor proves true then what other public priorities is Center Stage distracting money and attention from?
As usual, I am usually the last person in the neighborhood to hear about things. The following I heard second-hand and only parts of….
The story begins in the alley behind the 600 blocks of Laurel and Cherry. It forms a ‘T’ with entrances on Laurel, Cherry, and Holly, but not China. For a long time after the old cobblestones were taken out, it was an increasingly hazardous, gravel-but-mostly-dirt alley.
It was eventually paved, which lead to more people speeding through it.
Citizens begged for some signage or speed bumps, but the City said it was an alley and not a street and therefore would not get additional signage. I found some novelty/party ‘stop’ and ‘yield’ signs at a thrift store and put those up on the utility poles, but then they were taken down when the power grid was worked on. Speeders go up the alley and skid on the brakes when they realize it does not go all the way through to China Street.
Anyway, sometime last week some young men in a mini-van were speeding up the alley and failed to brake. When my neighbor became incensed at yet another invasion of his backyard, the mini-van pilots panicked and drove between houses. Somehow they drove over an embankment that ended in a three and a half foot drop after a brick retaining wall on the front sidewalk on China Street. In the process they damaged the wall as can be seen in this picture:
I am not clear on what happened after that. I would love to hear some more details. I do know the alley now has a real stop sign. I am guessing the City put it in, or my neighbors “requisitioned” it.
Oregon Hill Home Improvement Council received City approval for its Plan of Development for the 600 block of S. Laurel Street. Two affordable and one market rate house are planned for what is currently a large blank lot.
Because these are modular houses developed by ‘Golden Hammer’ winner Allen Townsend, they will hopefully be in place relatively soon and OHHIC is looking for buyers. If interested, please contact Todd Woodson at 804 644 3812 or candylandmusic@earthlink.net
More details forthcoming…
For Immediate Release:
August 5, 2009
For more information, contact:
Sharon North – (804) 646-5607
Jemila Woodson – (804) 646-5665
City Begins Slurry Seal Paving Program
WHO: City of Richmond Department of Public Works
WHAT: Slurry seal paving program
WHEN: August 2009 through October 2009
WHERE:
Bellevue
Oregon Hill
North Highland Park
Dinwiddie Avenue
BACKGROUND: Slurry seal is a pavement restoration technique that consists of mixed asphalt, aggregate, and additives. The technique effectively preserves and extends roadway life by protecting it from the effects of weathering and normal wear and tear. During the project, there should be minimal interruption to traffic flow.
From refuse collection to pothole reports, Customer Care Center representatives are available at 3-1-1 to assist citizens with all of their Public Works needs. For more information on the City of Richmond, visit www.RichmondGov.com
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From the posted signs, it looks like Laurel Street will get repaved tomorrow (Thursday, August 6). Parking restricted from 7am to 6pm. Towing Enforced.
Earlier this week the City repaved Cherry Street. If you look at the photo below you can see where the old trolley tracks still show through.
Cherry Street
Would this be allowed to happen in Windsor Farms? In the Fan? On the VCU campus? In another City Councilperson’s District?
Again, this trash situation is something that myself and others have brought up time and time again.
The end of July means moving for many people. Unfortunately, for far too many renters and landlords that means pile up your trash on the sidewalk and leave town, and let others deal with their trash. Although I posted before about the problem on Idlewood and Cherry, here is what will greet the Byrd Market attendees this afternoon:
Again, in the Idlewood situation, an easy solution would be to create a trash containment area along the alley which goes north behind the residences just a few yards away, and make sure residents use it. City trash trucks are supposed to be picking up from the back alleys in the neighborhood.
Unfortunately, this is not the only place where this happening, as the following pictures will attest. In every single case, it involves VCU student renters of absentee landlords. All of these places are repeat offenders. While not every Oregon Hill residence has a back alley access due to the way the lots are laid out, all of these places in the pictures have back alley access. There are other trash problems in the neighborhood, but I find these particularly egregious because they block front sidewalks. Personally, I suggest the City increase fines against the landlords, who are easier to identify and locate. I would be in favor of landlord licenses, not unlike what other university towns have implemented.
In the meantime, I will go out this morning since I have the day off from work and try to at least tidy the sidewalk trash on my block. Maybe this will stop the City from fining me for not mowing along my back alley while I was away on vacation.
614, 616 S. Laurel St.
500 block of S. Laurel Street
100 block of S. Cherry Street
800 block of Holly Street
RICHMOND, VA— Beginning Monday, August 3 at 9 a.m. and continuing for approximately 18 hours into the early morning hours on Tuesday, August 4, 2009, the City of Richmond Department of Public Utilities will be lining a sewer main from the northeast corner of Franklin Street at Belvidere Street to the northwest corner of Franklin Street at Belvidere Street.
During this construction, the left curb lane of Franklin will be closed from approximately Pine Street to the parking entrance of the Apartment Tower located east of Belvidere St. leaving the center and right lanes available for traffic. The right southbound lane of Belvidere will be closed from Grace St. to beyond the intersection of Franklin with Belvidere streets. The right northbound lane of Belvidere will be closed from approximately Main St. to beyond the intersection of Franklin with Belvidere streets.
Motorists should follow all posted detour signs. Motorists are asked to proceed with caution around the construction area.
The City of Richmond Department of Public Utilities provides natural gas, water, wastewater and stormwater services to more than 500,000 residential and commercial customers in the metropolitan region. DPU also operates electric street lighting utility, which maintains more than 37,000 streetlights throughout the City. For more information, call DPU’s Customer Care Center at 644-3000 or visit DPU’s Web site at www.richmondgov.com/dpu.
Previously, I have posted on new residential solar power as well as problems with Dominion Power’s service in the neighborhood. One of the benefits of putting grid-tied solar into place, (besides redundant power, besides lower power bills, besides tax credits, besides being able to sell state renewable energy credits (SRECs), not to mention cleaner energy in general), is that it does illuminate grid problems. For example, since taking inverter readings, and contacting the State Corporation Commission (SCC), Dominion Power has put new poles in, added transformers, and increased voltage to proper levels. In other words, if neighborhoods want better energy service, then get solar and create your own energy.
But that leaves the old utility poles in place, and brings me to my next topic- Verizon actually owns many of the old poles in the neighborhood. Dominion Power has just rented space on them in the past, while it is the City of Richmond that actually does the planning and managing of the right-of-ways. So, getting Verizon to do its part in upgrading service will encourage the City and Dominion Power to do more.
With that in mind, I call on Verizon to bring FiOS to Oregon Hill. For one thing, I have heard that FiOS is already offered north of Cumberland Street. The neighborhood has the residential density. The City has a contract with Verizon for services to its residents. I already have DSL, and Verizon sends me offers for DirecTV every week- why not save the ad money and use it instead to bring FiOS to the neighborhood? The neighborhood is right next to downtown and close to Verizon’s Virginia headquarters. While many residents already have Comcast, many of them would be willing to make the switch to FiOS. Covad and wireless beckon if Verizon cannot keep up with technological advances in the neighborhood.
The newly Council approved Downtown Master Plan recognizes Oregon Hill as a historic neighborhood that deserves Old & Historic status- to the point of offering incentives to residents for the designation. Certainly, getting rid of old utility poles and lines by bringing in buried fiber optic cable with new services would go a long way. After all, Verizon already buries line and offers these services for VCU campus.
Again, these are the sort of services that citizens expect our elected representatives to push for, especially when the service contracts come back up for vote.