Good morning, RVA! It's 72 °F, and today's looking hot and humid. Expect highs near 90 °F with maybe a chance for a bit of rain. You can expect a similarly hot, humid, and dry week ahead of you, too.
Water cooler
You've still got some time this morning to vote in the quarterfinals of the very exciting RVA Sweep 16 tournament bracket (aka the wonderfully distracting Twitter poll to name Richmond's adorable bike lane street sweeper). Contenders that look like they'll move on to the semis: Sweepy McSweeperson, The Grim Sweeper, Meryl Sweep, and MF BROOM. If you disagree, get in there and vote (the Grim Sweeper and Bike Dyson race is especially close)!
Wyatt Gordon at the Virginia Mercury reports on the new variable speed limits on a 15-mile stretch of I-95 just south of Fredericksburg. The new technology hopes to slow vehicles and avert traffic jams before they happen: "The problem variable speed limits seek to solve is called speed flow inversion — the phenomenon whereby even minor interruptions in vehicles’ movement cause extensive congestion due to the density of traffic." First, I had no idea there was a name for those highway standstills with no discernible cause. Second, Gordon talked to some traffic experts who say this sort of thing can only be truly effective if you pair it with increased enforcement. The piece ends with this quote from VDOT which really speaks to the mindset we have around what we're willing to do to keep our streets safe: "Drivers don’t like to be slowed down when they don’t need to be or else they won’t comply." Someone could write a whole book about that quote (oh wait, they did).
Aw man, Filip De Mott at Richmond BizSense reports that Bolt Mobility and Helbiz will both pull (have already pulled?) their electric scooters out of Richmond. That leaves Bird, Lime, and the City's bikeshare system as Richmond's only micromobility options. Honestly, two private operators and a municipal system seems fine for a city the size of Richmond—the only problem is that there's now zero scooters and just a single bike share station on Richmond's Southside. I wonder how much leverage the City has with the private scooter companies and if they could get them to extend their range a bit to the south side of the river?
It's August, and that means City Council is on vacation—good for them! As is their long-standing custom, they've cancelled almost every Council and committee meeting currently on the books and will pick things back up in September. Papers that I've got my eye on that should hit next month's agendas include: Ranked-choice voting for Council elections (ORD. 2022-119), the new noise ordinance (ORD. 2022-219), the short-sighted plan to reduce the real estate tax if Casino 2.0 happens to pass (RES. 2022-R007), and the laundry list of confusing changes Council would like to make to the City's master plan (RES. 2021-R026). That last one was introduced 462 days ago and might be Council's new Most Continued Ordinance—a high honor, for sure.
Gallery5 in Jackson Ward will host a nature walk (potentially inspired by a burlesque show?) this coming Friday at 5:00 PM. They've done this a couple times now—at least the nature walk part—and I keep failing to mention it before tickets sell out. You can snag one for $10 over on Eventbrite. Better do it quick!
This morning's longread
The Solace, Despair, and Disinformation of Long Covid Internet Communities
Another Anne Helen Petersen piece! Maybe just subscribe to her newsletter instead of this one! I thought this interview with a long COVID researcher was fascinating, especially the below section about the difference in how men and women interact with our health care systems.
Interestingly, I’ve found on Reddit that men assume that I am male no matter what I write — and they’re often mean, in part, I think, because of this understanding that “men don’t get sick.” Men in general also have less experience with the bureaucracy of health care and being gaslit by medical professionals, so they’re shocked when they’re treated poorly and rarely have an established primary care doctor. In fact, I cannot think of one time that I’ve seen a man write that he had an established relationship with a doctor. Older women (aka women over 30-35ish) in these groups are often still trying to “do it all.” They ask questions like “Any suggestions for pacing (staggered breaks during the day) when I also have to take kids to school, work a full time job, and cook dinner and clean the house?” You never see with men.
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