Category: Planning
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WTJU Podcast: COVID-19 and the Economy
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in Agriculture & forestry, Bacon and Pigs, Blogs and Blog Administration, Business and Economy, Charity, Philanthropy, Nonprofits, Civil Rights, Individual Liberties, Consumer Protection, Corruption and Scandals, Culture wars, Disasters and Disaster Preparedness, Economic development, Education (higher ed), Education (K-12), Efficiency in Government, Elections, Electoral process, Energy, Entrepreneurs and Innovation, Environment, Federal issues, General Assembly, Governance, Government Finance, Government Transparency, Gun rights, Health Care, Housing, Immigration, Infrastructure, Insurance, Labor and Workforce, Media, Money in politics, Planning, Politics, Poverty & income gap, Property rights, Public safety & health, Race and Race Relations, Regulations, Gov’t Oversight, Science & Technology, Social Services and Entitlements, Taxes, Telecommunications, TransportationBy Peter Galuszka Here’s is the twice-monthly podcast produced by WTJU, the official radio station of the University of Virginia. With me on this podcast are Nathan Moore, the station general manager, and Sarah Vogelsong, who covers, labor, energy and environmental issues across the state for the Virginia Mercury, a fairly new and highly regarded…
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Is It the Death Knell For Dominion’s Pipeline?
By Peter Galuszka For more than a decade, hydraulic fracturing drilling for natural gas and oil has transformed the American energy picture, leading to big revivals in such energy fields such as Marcellus in West Virginia and Pennsylvania and the Bakken field in the Dakotas. It has prompted Dominion Energy and its utility partners to…
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A Look at Richmond and COVID-19
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in Agriculture & forestry, Business and Economy, Children and Families, Civil Rights, Individual Liberties, Consumer Protection, Culture wars, Demographics, Disasters and Disaster Preparedness, Economic development, Education (higher ed), Education (K-12), Efficiency in Government, Entrepreneurs and Innovation, Environment, Federal issues, Government Finance, Government workers and pensions, Housing, Infrastructure, Insurance, Labor and Workforce, Money in politics, Planning, Public safety & health, Regulations, Gov’t Oversight, Resilience, Science & Technology, Social Services and Entitlements, Telecommunications, UncategorizedBy Peter Galuszka Here is a roundup story I wrote for Style Weekly that was published today that explains the effects of COVID-19 on the Richmond area. Hopefully, BR readers will find it of interest. It was a tough piece to report. The impacts of the deadly virus are very complicated and multi-faceted. An especially…
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More Bad News on Coronavirus
All I need is the air that I breathe. Recent research indicates that the coronavirus can live in air for 3 hours post aerosolization. The Hill reports that, “A study awaiting peer review from scientists at Princeton University, the University of California-Los Angeles and the National Institutes of Health (NIH) posted online Wednesday indicated that…
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A Critical Coronavirus Graph
By DJ Rippert OK, Boomer. A study conducted last month from the Chinese Center for Disease Control and Prevention provides statistics about the lethality of COVID-19. Those statistics were analyzed by Business Insider. You can see those statistics in the graph on the left. Younger people have a one in 10,000 (0.01%) chance of dying…
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Richmond’s World of Secrecy and Collusion
by Peter Galuszka There’s long been the “Virginia Way” of ruling oligarchs making decisions in backrooms while leaving the public out of the picture. But then there’s also the “Richmond Way,” which is the same thing on steroids. The key focus today is the so-called Navy Hill District Corporation, a group headed by Dominion Energy…
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Richmond and DC Among Cities People Are Most Eager to Ditch
by Don Rippert Anywhere but here. Moneywise Publishing is citing a “study” detailing the most and least desirable American cities based on real estate inquiries. Real estate brokerage firm Redfin tracks Americans using their web site to find new places to live. According to the company, 25% of people browsing home listings online are “looking…
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On the Fine Art of Forecasting Peak Load Demand
Billions of investment dollars ride on the long-range forecast of Dominion’s peak load electricity demand. But whose projections do we believe — Dominion’s or PJM’s? In its 2017 Integrated Resource Plan (IRP), Dominion Energy forecasts the increase in its peak electric load and anticipates what combination of new gas, solar and nuclear facilities it will…
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Two More Signs that City of Richmond Is Kicking Donkey
The City of Richmond is on a tear. Not only is it seeing more real estate investment than it has it decades, the city is laying the groundwork for future growth and re-development. Its competitive advantage over neighboring suburban counties seems to get stronger with every passing day. Word has leaked to local media of…
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Why Would Dominion Want a $19 Billion Nuclear Plant?
The Nuclear Regulatory Commission has indicated it will issue a license within the next few days to build a third nuclear reactor at Dominion Energy’s North Anna power station, the Richmond Times-Dispatch reported earlier this week. Dominion has spent $600 million so far on planning, engineering and developing the 1,450-megawatt facility, which has been widely…
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Building on Virginia’s Data-Center Boom
Data centers are the hottest trend in Virginia economic development these days. But the state is only beginning to think through the implications. Loudoun County, home to 75 facilities, has developed the largest cluster of data centers in the country (and perhaps the world), and next-door-neighbor Prince William County is rising fast. Rural Mecklenburg County…
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Please, Norge, Don’t Go NIMBY on Solar Project
Report from today’s Virginia Gazette: Members of the Norge community of James City County are “concerned” that a proposed solar farm will impact their neighborhood negatively. The James City County planning commission approved in April an application to build a solar farm on a 225-acre property on Farmville Lane. The developer, California-based SunPower, said that the…
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Yeah, It’s Probably a Good Idea to Update Your Zoning Code Every Half Century or So
News flash: Henrico County officials see the need to bring the county zoning code into the 21st century. Although the zoning code has been amended 240 times, it was adopted in 1960 and has never seen a systematic overhaul since. The code, Randy Silber, deputy county manager for community development, tells the Richmond Times-Dispatch, is “over 55…
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Bikes, Bees, Beauty
by James A. Bacon New York City has its High Line park built upon an abandoned, elevated freight rail line. The City of Richmond has its Low Line park, built underneath CSX Corp. railroad trestles. In the seven years since opening to great fanfare, Manhattan’s High Line has attracted millions of visitors and inspired the construction of nearly…
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Pulse Has a Pulse after All
by James A. Bacon When last I blogged about Richmond Pulse, the Bus Rapid Transit plan for the city’s Broad Street corridor, the projected cost had leaped $11.5 million over its original $50 million estimate. While I support mass transit in the right circumstances, I saw little good coming from this project, in which state…