Good morning, RVA! It's 41 °F, and today brings with it a mixture of rain and...snow!? As temperatures drop this evening expect the rain to transition to snow and continue through most of Saturday. At this point, we're looking at 1-3 inches of either snow or slush or cold, wet rain.
Water cooler
Michael Paul Williams in the RTD writes about the lack of public involvement in the School Board's recent decision to approve a facilities plan. However, I enjoy newly-sworn-in 3rd District Representative Kenya Gibson's quote: "When I knocked on doors, I said again and again, public education is starved. Most everyone I spoke to agreed. So I voted for an aggressive, feasible plan that keeps schools open and will touch the lives of thousands of our students and teachers. We can always refine the plan, but right now, we need funding to make it happen." On this tip, Justin Mattingly says on Twitter that Monday's Education Compact meeting will be held at the Police Training Academy at 9:00 AM. Hey, question: Do any of y'all know if the Education Compact has, like, a website where they post meetings and minutes and that sort of thing? Inquiring PDF-focused minds want to know...
I'm into this post by Richard Meagher about the Mayor's response to the city-wide audit conducted earlier this year. Richmonders should be stoked about this report, and we should make sure that the City implements it's recommendations. Maybe someone can put together a checklist of the things in the report so we can all follow the progress? Wait, maybe that someone should be the Mayor's office.
The RTD continues to tread lightly around the sexual harassment accusations against former Martin Agency Chief Creative Officer Joe Alexander. Adweek, though, couldn't care less about how it treads.
It's easy for me to forget just how much beer Stone Brewing makes down in Fulton. 3 million gallons just this year is a lot of dang beer! Mike Platania from BizSense has the details.
In "Holiday events that you can take part in while it's maybe snowing" news, the 31st Annual Court End Christmas is this Saturday. Carriage rides (in the snow!), probably some living history folks wandering about, and free admission to a bunch of historic sites—sounds great.
Because I'm super boring, I wanted to mention the new dynamic tolls that debuted this week on I-66 in Northern Virginia. The idea is that as traffic increase, tolls for single-occupancy vehicles increase until they're expensive enough to encourage folks to find another place to drive (or carpool or take public transportation). The tolls continue to increase automatically every couple of minutes to keep traffic moving at a 55 mph. It's a clever solution to reduce congestion and helps get people to work on time. On Tuesday, the tolls topped out at $40, as of yesterday they peaked at $25.50, and I imagine today they'll dip lower as folks find other ways to get to work. I'm a big fan of this experiment and would be really bummed to see politicians limit or cap these dynamic tolls. If the tolls can't increase into the Super Dang Expensive Zone™, they'll fail to deter drivers, and speeds on the road will slow down. Pure economics, my dudes! For a way better explanation on how this all works, go read Taber Bain's piece, "On I-66, Virginia can have high peak tolls or gridlock. Pick one."
Sports!
- Rams take on Seton Hall on Saturday at 3:00 PM.
- Spiders try to turn things around against JMU at 6:00 PM on Saturday.
- Hokies host Maryland Eastern Shore on Sunday at 3:00 PM.
- The Dukes of JMU face Weber State in the Quarterfinals of the Football Championship Series playoffs tonight at 7:00 PM. You can watch on ESPN 2.
- Washington takes on the Chargers on Sunday at 4:05 PM.
This morning's longread
Hi, It’s Us, All the Fourteen-Year-Old Girls in America
McSweeney's!!
But it’s not just about us. It’s about you, being ancient. You still think you’re so young, don’t you? Yeah… no. Each and every one of you is just wrinkled, withering proof that mortality comes for us all. If you remember where you were on 9/11, you’re too old for us. Did just thinking about that make you feel old? That’s because you’re old. You’re all a thousand to us. Your faces make us sad.
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