About that View...

Two photos from the same spot, taken three years apart. Left: "The Park, 2012." Right "Belmont Steps subdivision, 2015."

As part of my coursework in Urban and Environmental Planning at the University of Virginia, I am performing a series of GIS (Geographic Information System) analyses of the Monticello Road project. GIS provides empirical data to check (or underscore) what intuition tells us. This is the first of a three-part meta analysis. Next: Picture Distribution | To Come: Backer Distribution

Although it is not the main purpose, the Monticello Road project provides undeniable (and sometimes wrenching) evidence of the ways the neighborhood changes over time. The above pairing is especially jarring. We know that frequent low-dose exposure to Nature is beneficial to health and well-being. I suspect that the same can be said of Heritage as well so its loss is something we notice.

When one of my colleagues saw the above photo, he was surprised to hear that the Neighborhood Association did not oppose the subdivision. In fact, there was nothing for them to say about it because it was done by-right, meaning the land-owner did not need anyone's permission as long as they stayed within the zoning regulations, which they did. Additionally, we say all the time that we like in-fill development (instead of sprawl) and this is what it looks like.

So although this kind of change is inevitable and possibly beneficial, we should not pretend that there is no cost. We know there is, but it is not quantifiable, which is a real liability when we consider the pocket full of financial statistics a developer will present.

GIS allows quantitative viewshed analysis and I thought it would be interesting to look at the cumulative effect of building upon the the landscape and heritage vistas in the neighborhood.

For reference, I chose the peak of Mont Alto, so beautifully framed in the photo above left.

Broaden Public Access to Ragged Mountain

It's essential that we get more people--especially kids--into the woods. It's definitely possible to do so without harm--but it will require some work.
(Story|Line Photo: Preston Jackson)

Here's a brief I emailed to Charlottesville City Council about a proposal to open up the Ragged Mountain Natural Area to runners, cyclists and leashed dogs, which are currently prohibited. Council response follows in the comment section.

I had hoped to write you a proper brief about Ragged Mountain and even testify at the meeting tonight, but I have another commitment and won't be able to make it. I believe that if it will not interfere with drinking water quality, then allowable uses should be expanded. It needs to be a zone of active teaching and it is an opportunity and responsibility that must be shared with Albemarle County.

Key Issues (besides water quality, which I cannot address):

Yard Dreams

Yard Dreams takes art out of the white box and into the streets—and yards—of Belmont. I will be one of fifteen 15 artists installing art in neighbors’ yards this for the weekend. The art will be on view 5 p.m. Friday to 5 p.m. Sunday, with a self-guided tour all weekend and a fun neighborhood potluck block party to celebrate the end of Summer on Saturday evening (3-9).

My piece, mending, tweaks two of my neighbors via perhaps the best-known poem in the American canon, Robert Frost’s Mending Wall. The two—both my friends—have a long list of grievances and have found that the best solution is not engage with one another at all. Sometimes that is the best idea, and it probably is in this case and a palisade fence now separates them.

Although the best-known phrase in the poem is “Good fences make good neighbors,” Frost clearly thinks otherwise and backs his claim by pointing out that Nature never allows a fence to stand for very long.

My piece, presented with the good-spirited cooperation of one of the neighbors in question, allows visitors to rearrange the words of that line to propose alternative approaches.

Interested in community engagement through the arts? This is what it looks like. Map, info at http://yarddreamspvcc.com/
Daily Progress Preview

Unsorting America: an Encounter w Dr. Mindy Fullilove

Few issues are as vexing or worrisome as the accelerating process of social sorting that is un-knitting the American people. It’s everywhere—in our politics, school segregation (which has returned with a vengeance and in surprising ways) and in our settlement patterns, including otherwise progressive neighborhoods.

Its what I'm learning is a “wicked” problem—one that must be unraveled from many directions simultaneously while each effort affects the others. I was fortunate to hear Dr Mindy Thompson Fullilove speak on the issue, in which she laid the issue out in stark terms but also proposed a plausible path forward.

Taking New Ideas to the Old School

I hope to bring the planning community some news ways of seeing communities and the people who live there.

I’m really excited to announce what many people already know: I will be joining the Master of Urban and Environmental Studies program at the University of Virginia this fall. It’s a two-year program. Meantime I will work the next marathon in a limited capacity, while concentrating primarily on my studies.

While I am there, I plan to focus improving the front end of the planning process through community discovery (which so often falls woefully short) through the arts and bringing a focus on improvements in well-being, which includes a host of under-appreciated aspects such as access to heritage, spiritual exploration, fresh air and exercise, healthy foods, opportunities for expression and engagement with neighbors.

These are topics familiar to readers of this blog. So it’s really the perfect extension of the work I’m doing. I’m going deeper by learning more, by contributing to a wider discussion with unique perspectives I’ve gathered and—not insignificantly—obtaining an accreditation that will help realize some of the ideas we’ve discussed together here.

A Visit to the Blue Ridge Sanitarium

There are many cool places on Monticello Road but this place might be the best. It's mothballed for now, until some truly compelling future use comes about.
In the days before Big Pharma, prescriptions for serious illness routinely called for maximum fresh air dosed out in rural settings. Instead of being connected to beeping machines that make it difficult to sleep with oxygen piped through hoses, patients in country sanitaria rested on screen porches surrounded by birdsong and pastoral views. The current state of the medical arts is moving in that direction but an authentic historical example of the old kind of facility still exists, in a mothballed state, right on the edge of Charlottesville.

The Blue Ridge Hospital occupies a large green triangle between Monticello, Piedmont Virginia Community College and the city’s southern border. The facility’s still-operable back gate opens to a beautiful valley portion of Monticello Road’s historic right of way and as we think about reopening that ghost road for recreation and heritage, the old sanitarium will be an inevitable ponder.

Garrett Street Mural is a Step Forward

The site chosen by the Tom Tom Founders Festival (the corner of Garrett and 6th Street in Charlottesville) for its City as Canvas mural project was already slated for a capstone expression in the Bridge PAI’s Play the City program. My initial reaction was to ask myself, “Doesn’t anyone talk to each other around here?” As I dug deeper and spent time with artist Mickael Broth and his project, I came to the conclusion that it really doesn’t matter. We should just celebrate the mural, which is pretty cool and it's real.

The site was not just a blank wall—it’s at the heart of a major urban renewal project that effectively erased a neighborhood and replaced it with a new housing project, which is in its turn now the subject of intense speculation. Bitterness about the erasure of history cohabits the zone with nervous speculation about the future, along the historic 6th Street right-of-way and steps from multiple public housing complexes with many children. The location offered a tremendous opportunity for the community to work through some of its issues through the arts and make a strong statement with its own ideas about its specific dreams and desires. That’s an ambitious goal.

Meanwhile, the Tom Tom organizers saw an opportunity to make a mark of their own. They reached a private deal with the landowner (no public bodies needed to be consulted in this case) and they hired an artist from Richmond, essentially freezing out community discussion. The result would undoubtedly be livelier than the status quo, but perhaps a missed opportunity to have something more layered, in line with advanced contemporary thinking on public art.

Tom Tom Belmont Block Party Preview

I went deep on last year's Belmont Block Party, with a free pop-up photo booth and a three-part analysis of how the event came about, how it went and what I got out of it from a community-development perspective. This year I just plan to have fun.

The Tom Tom Festival Belmont Block Party, an all-day block party on Monticello Road, was one of the neighborhood highlights of last year. It's happening again this Sunday, April 19, 2015, and we're very excited. It starts in Downtown Belmont at 9 a.m. with a mandala touch-up. There will be music, crafts and a beer garden from noon to six. After that, a new addition, the Front Porch Concert series (Porchella) will spread music throughout the neighborhood.

I checked in with Carolyn Zelikow (Tom Tom's assistant director) about what to expect and here's what she had to say:

Monticello Road: This the second year for the Belmont Block Party. What successful elements are you repeating and what are you doing differently this year?

Carolyn: It's neighborhood run and focused, like last year. We felt like the party was distinguished by a great sense of community. We're shooting to repeat that and deepen those neighborhood ties by hosting an event called Porchella, where local residents can host acoustic concerts on their porches.

Update on Monticello Road Extended

Monticello Road continues hidden and abandoned on the other side of Interstate 64. There is a plan to bridge + tunnel to that right-of-way for safe pedestrian access from Charlottesville to Monticello.

Our friend Michaux, who is a Monticello Road resident and project participant, was the most recent of several people to ask me about the plan to extend Monticello Road to—ahem—Monticello, via multiuse trail.

Such a connection would be a game-changer for the City and the World Heritage Site with a rare grand slam of benefits: health+fitness, access an unusual ecosystem, both social and political history and non-auto connectivity. When I mentioned it to a planner friend the other day he said, “Oh, you won’t have to sell that idea—it’s obvious.”

It's something I've been monitoring and wondering what's up so I reached out to Chris Gensic, Charlottesville’s trail coordinator, who is the author of the idea and an effective champion. Here’s what he said:

We are working now with Monticello and Mr. Dulaney* to secure trail easements needed. Once those are in place, we can pursue the funding (more than $1million) to build a tunnel under 64 and few bridges to connect the old right of way, which would get us to Route 53 at Michie Tavern. Longer term would include a bridge over 53.

My best guess is it will be at least 3 years before the tunnel is in place, if we can get the funding. We will keep plugging away at it!

I was positively surprised to hear that time frame. We’ll keep checking in with Chris and, when the time come, mobilize to support this amazing plan. Hopefully more soon...

* Mr Delaney owns the gas station at the foot of Monticello Road, as well as other surrounding parcels. The route would directly impact his property and probably pass through it.

The People of Monticello Road: Remembering Alex Caines

Alex was one of the most supportive people I've ever met.

News of Alex Caines’ passing flowed quickly through social media and when a remembrance page popped up on Facebook, one of his friends pointed to the irony that arguably the most social guy in town did not play in that sphere.

“Alex was a live, face-to-face interacting person. I think it's great that Alex never had a need for Facebook or other social media. Belmont and Downtown were his social media.”

Running into Alex on the street or at an event, as happened on a more-than-weekly basis, was the capital form of interaction with Alex. It always led to a conversation and often an invitation to the table for an extended visit.

In an earlier post, I pointed out the well-accepted fact that he was the Mayor of Belmont, with a specialty in nightlife. There was an admiration for his ability to know everyone and to seemingly be everywhere at the same time. He always knew where the action was but now that he’s gone, I can see that there was more to the designation. In a very real way, he was our leader.

Biophilic Art at the Bridge

Natalie Jeremijenko's "Greenlights" filter the air and produce oxygen while providing a pleasant indirect light. They're a great example of biophilic design, which recognizes human affinity for natural forms and processes. Excellent video about Natalie's work.

This past weekend I had the pleasure to meet NYC-based artist and environmental activist Natalie Jeremijenko at the Bridge PAI. Her primary ambition is to reorient our relationship to health, as signaled by the emergency red cross rotated on its side.

In her view, the bacteriological paradigm of healthcare, in which individual bodies are treated in isolation is not only a dead-end but counterproductive. The culprits for the worst public health problems are environmental, so the path toward well-being must be radically decentralized and aimed at fostering more bio-friendly conditions. And it must happen with urgency.

Cities + Nature

There's abundant nature where people live their daily lives but do they experience it? I took this shot during a vacant-lot safari with Sebastian at the corner of Monticello and Carlton Road, a block from our home.
As part of my professional development, I’m taking a class called Cities + Nature at the University of Virginia. It examines the importance of interaction with Nature and ways for planners to make it part of the everyday experience. This post is part of a series on the subject.

My professor invokes the notion of a Nature Pyramid to describe a practical diet of exposure to the Natural World. At the top, one finds rare but intense lifetime experiences such as a safari or a raft ride down the Grand Canyon; in the middle trips to state parks; further down daily or weekly rituals like gardening; and all the way at the bottom views through windows or even looking at art. When I worked in a downtown financial firm, the productive people all had flyers for cruises or postcards pinned to their cubicle walls so they could rest their eyes several times an hour. A pet or a houseplant serves a similar function.

From an urban planning perspective, it makes sense to focus on the bottom half of the ladder, seeking ways to improve the quantity and quality of experience in towns and neighborhoods where people spend most of their time. Do we hear birds or see butterflies? Smell flowers or leaf rot or a skunk’s nocturnal passage? Do possums cross our yard or robins nest in our porch? Can we see the sun rise or set or clouds pass overhead? Feel fresh breezes or crunch on a frosty path?

These are not man-on-cliff confrontations with the Sublime but through a lifetime they add up to a connection with something much larger than ourselves, a centering force that makes us better and healthier.

The People of Monticello Road: Aimee Hunt

Aimee Hunt has lived on Monticello Road since 2007. An artist and educator, she works at the Fralin Museum of Art at the University of Virginia while also studying art education at Virginia Commonwealth. She enjoys, and is part of, the neighborhood’s creative community.

Aimee has made an intriguing contribution to the physical environment through an unconventional home renovation with results that somehow manage to be both subtle and audacious. I spoke with her about it over tea as her two children assembled her daughter’s 12th birthday cake.

I first learned about Aimee’s project when I was visiting her then-neighbors Dan and Serena a few years ago and noticed that her small cinder block home had a tarp where the roof should be. Because of the lot’s wedge shape, it did not make sense for Aimee to build back into it, so she built upward. That decision was in some ways made for her when she discovered structural issues that would have doomed the existing hat.