East Coast Greenway To Cross Lee Bridge

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Planners at last Tuesday’s riverfront planning meeting were asked where the East Coast Greenway would be crossing the James River. According to their answer, the ECG’s route will come through downtown but then jog westward along the Canal Walk and come to the Lee Bridge.

Here’s an excerpt from a recent Treehugger.com post about this exciting bike trail development:

If you think highways and flight paths are the only ways to travel long distances in the United States, check out the East Coast Greenway. The network of bike trails and bikeable roads stretches nearly 3,000 miles down the eastern seaboard, from Maine’s border with Canada to Key West, Florida.

In the works since 1991, the route is officially complete, but still very much a work in progress. The goal of the East Coast Greenway Alliance (ECGA) is to have it run entirely on dedicated traffic-free trails, but at this point, nearly three quarters is on regular, if calm, roads.

The ECGA does not create the trails itself, but rather works with local organizations and agencies in the fifteen states it traverses to bring route sections together and to ensure that they all meet the proper criteria. If you live on the East Coast or pass through for a visit, the ECGA provides maps and information for each state’s route.

While circuitous routes off-road trails are preferred to direct on-road ones, the Greenway remains an urban trail system. It is more concerned with transportation than recreation, and connects 25 major cities, including New York, Washington, D.C., Richmond, Raleigh, Charleston and Miami.

Victory Rug Sells For $600,000

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From Times Dispatch article:

A parcel in Oregon Hill, which also is part of the Ferguson bankruptcy, sold separately at a live auction for $600,000 to a developer.

Both transactions took place at the law offices of Hirschler Fleischer in Richmond and are subject to court approval.

Guy Blundon from Somerset near Charlottesville said he plans to build apartments in the building at 407 S. Cherry St. The property is the location for Victory Rug Cleaning Co., an affiliate of Mercer Rug Cleansing.

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WBCH to Host: Chickens and YOU Training Series

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From email announcement:

William Byrd Community House to Host: Chickens and YOU Training Series – Workshop 1

Chickens and YOU Training Series – Workshop 1
Saturday, January 28, 2012 from 9:00 AM – 5:30 PM

Chickens and YOU Training Series Leading to the

Master Chicken Keeper Certification

Chickens are mascots of the local foods movement. Chickens have skill sets that can be gainfully employed in backyard gardens. This series of courses explores in detail with hand-on, real-life information and discussions that give you practical and effective cutting-edge ways to integrate chickens in with your yard and garden that benefit you, your neighborhood and your community. They can empower urban agriculture, and serve as clucking civic workers to help save BIG TIME local tax-payer dollars. Benefits of using a “Chicken Have-More Plan” are explored. It’s time to “think outside the coop and inside your garden” and these courses show you how.
• Laying Hens 101
• Gardening with Chickens
• Brooding Baby Chicks from Scratch
• Way of the Hen: Using Broody Hens to Incubate and Hatch Eggs Naturally
• Composting with Chicken Helpers
• How to be a Chicken Whisperer
• Eggs-trordinary Eggs! The Chemistry and Science behind Cooking with Eggs
• Coop Construction
• Chicken Tractor Construction
• Processing Birds for Meat
• Roosters 101
• Showing Poultry
• How to Get Chickens Legalized In Your City: Strategies from Across North America
Sponsored by The Gossamer Foundation and Good Earth Publications, Inc.,
and hosted by ChiknEGG Productions, LLC.

Interest and Concern for Victory Rug Building’s Future

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With auction time approaching, at least three different developers have contacted Oregon Hill Neighborhood Association leadership about the Victory Rug building on Cherry Street. Some of them are known for previous projects in the neighborhood.

At the same time, neighbors are becoming increasingly concerned about what type of redevelopment will take place. There is hope that a low impact business, non-profit, or art gallery may find residence in the building. Many are concerned that if the building is retrofitted for a dozen or so VCU student apartments, it will be detrimental for the neighborhood. Some plan to attend the auction itself to make sure that developers understand their concerns.

Exacerbating these fears is the news that developers are already contacting property owners on Albemarle Street with an interest in purchasing property adjacent to Victory Rug. The assumption is that the developers are interested in demolishing these properties for parking for apartments in the Victory Rug building. A parking lot is not a permitted use of property in the R-7 zoning. This could really devastate the 800 block of Albemarle Street and the historic fabric of the neighborhood.