Good morning, RVA! It's 56 °F, and you should expect another round of hot temperatures—with highs maybe even back up around 90 °F. If you're spending time outside, remember to wear sunscreen and stay hydrated. Enjoy it while you can, because a cold front rolls through tomorrow and will drop temperatures about 25 degrees.
Water cooler
I've got a whole bunch of City government stuff to get through this morning, so hold on to your butts!
First, City Council will host their second budget amendment session today. I'll make sure to get that up on the Boring Show in the next couple of days.
Second, Council will have a regularly scheduled meeting tonight and will consider a bunch of papers that I have my eye on. To mention a few: Councilmember Addison's resolution to ask the Mayor to establish an actual Department of Transportation (not going to happen this budget cycle and that paper will be amended); the ordinance to hand over $7.3 million to RPS for the design of an 1,800-seat George Wythe replacement (ORD. 2022-12); the laundry list of confusing, conflicting, and unnecessary amendments to Richmond 300 (RES. 2021-R026, submitted an entire year ago tomorrow); and two different "If We Manage To Pass A Casino Referendum This Time Around" resolutions, one to shortsightedly lower the real estate tax rate (RES. 2022-R007) and one to stash away a third of any theoretical casino profits to cover reductions in state funding for public schools (RES. 2022-R014). If I were to guess the fate of each of these papers, I'd say all of them but the George Wythe ordinance will be continued until a later date—but what do I know!
Third, I did end up finding the proposed zoning map for the City Center Innovation District. The big shift seems to be replacing the patchwork of existing zoning districts (RO-3, CM, B-4) with a smooth, uniform "Amended RP." I had to pull out my copy of the zoning ordinance to figure out that "RP" stands for "Research Park District," which, new to me! The aforelinked website has a table laying out some of the changes between existing RP and the potentially amended RP, but, unless you're a bigger zoning person than myself, you're probably going to have a hard time parsing out how "floor area ratio" or "fenestration" impacts the neighborhood. I think the biggest change I see (that I can understand) is the removal of any height restriction at all across the entire area bounded by the highway, Broad Street, and 5th Street(ish), which seems like a positive. If you're feeling up to it, you can leave feedback on the rezoning plan using this survey, the entirety of which is one question: "Please give us your feedback on the rezoning plan."
Turns out that COVID-19 is not the only infectious disease: Kate Masters at the Virginia Mercury has a fascinating report on the rising cases of syphilis in the Commonwealth. Read through to the end to see how contact tracing—something we're all super familiar with now from coronatimes—is an important part of fighting other diseases, too.
Ugh, I'm such a sucker for these "From the Archives" pieces at the Richmond Times-Dispatch. This one features now-closed Richmond area restaurants. Make sure you check out the intersection of Broad and Lombardy in 1952—hostile to pedestrians for over 70 years! Also, RIP Zuppa.
Via /r/rva, a picture of a new mural down at the Canal. Remember, the RVA Street Art Fest is coming to paint a whole new round of murals down there! If that bums you out, make sure to stop by and, like Marie Kondo says, tell the existing murals that they did a good job at being murals and it's OK for them to go.
This morning's longread
The Best Way to Beat a Bike-Lane Backlash
This is now the second article I've read that references Cambridge, Massachusetts's law requiring their DPW to build any bike lane in their bike master plan during a routine repaving or resurfacing. I think we might need to start planning out the advocacy around getting something like this passed in Richmond!
Mayor Eric Garcetti also made a commitment to Vision Zero, the international traffic safety movement that emphasizes redesigning roads to dramatically reduce transportation-related fatalities. But in the last seven years, only 3% of the plan has been completed. At this rate, it will take 200 years to realize, not the 20 that the plan calls for, the Los Angeles Times recently noted. And instead of going down, traffic deaths have gone up, increasing 21% in 2021. A pedestrian is killed within the city’s boundaries about every three days. This is a pattern repeated in city after city, where plans to build safer streets sit on shelves, get mired in endless red tape, or are reversed after backlashes — often led by business owners and drivers who fear traffic impacts or object to parking disruptions.
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