Good morning, RVA! It's 59 °F, and I think, today, we emerge from the wet and the clouds and may even see the sun for a minute. You can expect highs in the mid 70s, probably dry skies, and a chance to catch a single sunbeam later this afternoon. Storms return tomorrow though? Bleh.
Water cooler
Jack Jacobs at Richmond BizSense reports that the bus will officially remain fare-free for the next year. GRTC's Board met earlier this week and approved spending $1 million to keep the program afloat for another 12 months. That's great and good for this year, but if the region wants to keep its zero-fare program moving forward, it needs to start having the conversations about how to distribute the (increasing) costs of that program...like, ASAP. If we wait until next year's budget season to figure it out, we'll either end up resuming fare collection or, more likely, using money intended for bigger and better bus service to cover the growing cost of the fare-free program. I see tense conversations about this in our future!
VPM's Ben Paviour reports on the depressingly limited options for gun violence legislation still floating around in the as-yet-approved state budget. Sen. McClellan and the Senate want $24 million to create a new Virginia Center for Firearm Violence Intervention and Prevention that would focus on "collecting and disseminating data, research, and strategies on preventing gun violence." Meanwhile, House Republicans are willing to consider $5 million for a similar thing "more narrowly focused on gang violence." OK, that seems vaguely racist and also ignores the fact that 54% of gun deaths in this country are suicides. With any luck they'll end up somewhere in the middle.
Do you want to head up the City's new Office of Sustainability? Or, maybe even better, do you have someone in your extended network that'd be a perfect fit to lead Richmond through the implementation of its RVAGreen 2050 plan? If so, great news, because the City just posted the Director of the Office of Sustainability job! Please share this opportunity widely—the right candidate could have a pretty big impact on Richmond over the next couple of years. Applications are due by June 24th.
Graham Moomaw at the Virginia Mercury has some predictable follow up to the story about Joe Morrissey blowing up on his radio producer. Don't click through unless you want to read some gross quotes from the Senator.
Scott's Addition food hall, round two! Mike Platania reports that local restaurant group, EAT Restaurant Partners, have purchased a building on the 3000 block of W. Leigh Street and have set their eyes on food hall country. Platania says that this food hall will be "nearly twice the size of Hatch Local," so, in your face, Manchester! While a food hall featuring little, mini versions of EAT's existing restaurants is less interesting to me than, say, a restaurant incubator, it's probably a pretty great business decision.
Reminder! Bike Walk RVA's Henrico-focused Bike Walk Talk takes place tonight at 5:30 PM at Final Gravity Brewing up on Lakeside. Spend your evening with advocates and County planners talking through what's next for bike and pedestrian advocacy in Henrico. Like I said the other day, if you're looking to get involved, this is a great opportunity. Don't miss it!
Via /r/rva, one of my favorite classically Richmond pictures: A blue heron perched on the Pipeline.
This morning's longread
Touch Screens in Cars Solve a Problem We Didn’t Have
I love "old man complains about stuff" columns, especially when its about stuff I, an old man, complain about on the regular. As vehicles get larger, more dangerous, and filled with more distractions, it really seems like whoever regulates these things is asleep at the wheel.
The only difference now is that the evidence of the effects that glowing screens have on automotive safety is overwhelming. In 2017 the AAA Foundation for Traffic Safety found that performing tasks on a car’s screen took a driver’s attention away from the road for more than 40 seconds. With traffic fatalities spiking over the past few years and with no real plan for how to make screens less distracting, we seem to have entered into the type of brutal acquiescence that’s common in the tech era; car manufacturers will keep putting bigger and more complicated screens in cars without much thought to safety or even functionality, and we, the consumers, will continue to buy them.
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