When you retire at the end of this September 2 and wake up the next morning, please check the calendar to ensure you did not skip ahead to September 14! For today marks the day in 1752 when Great Britain’s adoption of the Gregorian calendar went into effect and everyone’s schedule was adjusted. Eleven days simply disappeared. Will we ever again have such a day, and is there any chance a time machine could dislodge what vanished? It is doubtful any answers will be made available in this installment of Charlottesville Community Engagement. I’m Sean Tubbs and I’m still not sure if I’ve ever made the adjustment.
On today’s program:
The Charlottesville School Board gets an update on the reconfiguration project and learns of cost increases
Amtrak announces ridership has grown on Virginia-financed train service across the Commonwealth
A new podcast from the UVA School of Data Science seeks to demystify the subject
The Bureau of Labor Statistics releases its latest employment figures
The area’s transportation-decision making body agrees to trim back the scope of funded suite of improvements at U.S. 29 and Hydraulic Road
First shout-out: Rivanna Trail Foundation to mark 30 years
In today’s first subscriber-supported shout-out: The Rivanna Trail turns 30 this year and to mark the occasion the Rivanna Trail Foundation is throwing a party the weekend of September 24. It’s also the annual Loop De Ville which is being expanded this year.
That Saturday is National Public Lands Day, and if you want to walk the 20 mile loop of the Rivanna Trail or take place in a run of the circuit, go ahead and register now. What about a mountain bike ride? The first 25 registrants for each will get free admission to that night’s Rivanna Roots Concert at the Rivanna River Company.
Visit rivannatrails.org to learn more about what’s happening on Sunday, including a 15-mile mountain bike ride with the Charlottesville Mountain Bike Club, a family-friendly walk at Riverview Park, and a five mile run. That’s followed with a celebration from noon to five at the Wool Factory. For all of the details, visit rivannatrails.org.
VMDO working against inflation as design for Buford expansion continues and estimates increase
Work continues on plans to renovate and expand Buford Middle School in Charlottesville to accommodate the city’s sixth graders as part of the first phase of a major reconfiguration. The School Board got an update on the project Thursday night.
In April, Charlottesville City Council adopted a budget for FY23 that includes $2.5 million toward reconfiguration with $66.3 million in funds projected for FY24. That gave enough of a greenlight for the project to move forward.
“After the City Council approved the project and moved forward, we worked out the next phase and started working about May 1,” said Wyck Knox, a project manager with VMDO. (review the presentation)
The School Board hadn’t been presented with any updates since February, but learned that the project is still on track to be ready to make the reconfiguration is made in the 2026 academic year. Plans for Buford are at what engineers refer to as the 60-percent design.
“Things will really pick up speed here and the goal is to get this out to bid February 1 because we all think it’s really important to have a price back from a contractor before the city finalizes their budget decisions next year,” Knox said.
The last estimate was generated at the 30-percent design phase, and was $76.8 million and that included renovating the auditorium.
“What got approved by the City Council was to proceed designing the whole project so we could bid it and see where we ended up and bid the auditorium building as well as certain site amenities as alternates so we would have some choices and flexibility on bid day,” Knox said. “At the time that was estimated to be $68.8 million.”
Knox said the estimate for the smaller version number has now increased to $75.3 million and the total with the auditorium is at $82.2 million.
“I don’t think I have to explain to anyone about the inflation that has occurred in the economy,” Knox said.
Knox said bids for school construction projects across Virginia are all coming back in over estimate and he expects costs will continue to rise.
As such, Knox and his team have suggested further reductions to the design, including not building basketball courts, additional parking, and rebuilding a walking track at the field that will be removed when construction begins. The Schoolyard Garden will also not be rebuilt as part of this project.
However, Knox said the city will continue to plan for a minimum of a 1,050 student capacity.
“We feel like 1050 was a number that we already kind of came down a little bit on, three grades of 350,” Knox said. “We don’t want to reduce the size, the square footage of the project.”
Knox said cuts made to get from 30 percent to 60 percent have already reduced the square footage per pupil to 141 square feet, lower than the state average of 151. Knox also presented other architectural details, including a renovation that will keep each grade in its own space.
If the project goes to contract and moves forward next spring, soon after that it will be time to decommission the existing gym at Buford so it can be demolished.
“I think we’re all excited about tearing that thing down soon and then anything with the garden that needs to be relocated and moved including the soil, there’s some concern about that, and finding a spot either on site or off site or a combination of the two,” Knox said.
The schedule included in the packet shows that a final cost estimate will be developed and presented sometime in mid-November as pre-bidding work continues.
Stay tuned to Charlottesville Community Engagement for more on the design as it moves forward.
Ridership increases on Virginia-funded Amtrak trains
In July, more than 110,000 passenger rides were taken on Amtrak trains whose cost is partially covered through the Commonwealth of Virginia. Amtrak released figures for July this week and that month was the first with two new roundtrip services including an additional train between Roanoke and D.C. that serves Charlottesville.
Around 27,375 riders took the Roanoke route in July, up 27 percent from 21,654 in June. The year-to-year increase 72.1 percent for a service that also stops in Alexandria, Burke Center, Manassas, Culpeper, and Lynchburg. An expansion to Christiansburg is planned for the next few years.
The July 2022 numbers were up 31.4 percent over the last summer before the pandemic. A roundtrip service to Newport News was suspended for a portion of the shutdown, but has been resumed.
“Every route saw an increase in ridership with Newport News topping the list,” reads a press release from Amtrak.
Mike McLaughlin, the chief operating officer of the Virginia Passenger Rail Authority, said the ridership increase demonstrates demand is there for the service.
“With the launch of two new roundtrips and the resumption of another, we know that rail works for the Commonwealth and look forward to further expanding service throughout the state.”
Have you taken the train recently? Share your experience in the comments below.
UVA School of Data Science has a new podcast
The University of Virginia School of Data Science is currently under construction in the new Emmet-Ivy Corridor on what used to be land on Charlottesville’s property tax rolls. The school is the result of one of the largest gifts in UVA history, and at least some of that funding is being used for a new podcast called UVA Data Points that seeks to explain what data science actually is and how it can be used to change the world. Here is host Monica Manney in a preview episode.
“What is data science?” asks host Monica Manney in a preview episode that posted late last month.
“It's kind of weird that you'd have a School of Data Science for something that doesn't have a definition,” said Raf Alvarado, the director of the residential master’s degree program at the School.
In the podcast, Manney will explore concepts related to data science, which can encompass almost all disciplines. The preview explores one model for a definition built around what Alvarado refers to as the data pipeline.
“It’s this model that serves as the structure for the series,” Manney said.
“The 4+1 model is an analytical tool and so what I did was I took this composite view of what data science is and realized the pipeline that was being described is really more of an arc,” Alvarado said. “In other words, if you look at what the point where data comes in to the system, and compare that to where data comes out of the system, they are not opposite sides of each other. They’re actually in the same place which is the world.”
The first full episode was released yesterday and the guests are Cathy O'Neil, author of Weapons of Math Destruction and the Shame Machine, and Brian Wright, Assistant Professor of Data Science at the University of Virginia. In this conversation on ethical data science the two draw comparisons between data science problems and knitting, as well as discuss educating future data scientists. (listen now)
National unemployment rate slightly rises despite new jobs
There were 315,000 jobs added across the United States of America in August, but the unemployment rate increased by 0.2 percent to 3.7 percent. That's according to the latest report from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics.
In July, employment levels had dipped to below those from February 2020, the month before the emergency declarations for the COVID-19 pandemic.
To take a look at the numbers yourself, visit the press release. To learn more about what the numbers mean, take a look at a frequently asked questions page on the BLS website.
Second shout-out: Save the date for Rivanna Conservation Alliance’s Community Watershed clean-up
In today’s second Patreon-fueled shout-out: Mark your calendar for the Rivanna Conservation Alliance’s third annual Rivanna River Round-Up community watershed cleanup coming up on Saturday, September 24. The RCA organized the first round-up in September 2020 as a safe way for the community to give back to the river during the COVID-19 pandemic. Over the last two years, a total of 245 volunteers have cleaned up 67 miles of streams, nearby trails and the Rivanna River, removing 192 tires and 213 large bags of trash from the waterways. Registration is now open and you can sign up for the Rivanna Conservation Alliance newsletter at rivannariver.org.
MPO supports request to amend Hydraulic Road / U.S. 29 projects
The final project in what’s known as Route29 Solutions is making its way through the last steps of the planning process. Last week, the Charlottesville-Albemarle Metropolitan Planning Organization Policy Board got an update on the status for a future project that includes five separate components at the intersection of U.S. 29 and Hydraulic Road.
“We’ve kind of gotten to a situation right now where we’re over budget based on updated estimates and some of the things that we’ve looked at it,” said Sean Nelson, the administrator of the Virginia Department of Transportation’s Culpeper District.
Ideas to improve traffic conditions at this intersection have been discussed for years, including the US-29-Hydraulic-250 Bypass Intersections Study from the early 2000’s. There are books that could be written about why projects get selected, but while planners ponder, engineers keep monitoring conditions.
“Currently there are poor operations and congestion that exist in the area, particularly during peak hour conditions,” said Hal Jones, a project manager with the Virginia Department of Transportation. “There are few places that currently cross safely U.S. 29 in this area so this is one of the reasons we’re working on the project.”
The project has a $24 million cost estimate and is moving to the procurement stage, which is when VDOT will put the project out to bid for someone else to build it. To get there, they have to spend a lot of time and money getting the plans ready for someone else to construct it. However, in this climate, the project is more expensive than originally thought.
“Our estimate exceeds our budget and next month in September [at the Commonwealth Transportation Board] meeting we’re planning to ask for additional funds,” Jones said.
To step back a bit, the Route 29 Solutions was a package of projects that were funded after a Western Bypass of U.S. 29 in Albemarle County lost support from the state and federal government..
At the time, the Smart Scale process that funds most highway construction projects in Virginia did not exist and the money was used locally for other projects that were in the Long Range Transportation Plan. Some of the funding was leftover and the balance was put toward a suite of projects funded in the fourth round of Smart Scale. Jones explains one of the components.
“The main idea here was to increase green time, signal time, for north and southbound traffic by removing Hydraulic left hand turns onto 29,’ Jones said. “We also added a protected at-grade crossing for pedestrians with signals.”
The second element is a Green-T intersection at Angus Road to keep some lanes on northbound U.S. 29 to continuously flow. The third element is a pedestrian bridge that would connect Stonefield with the Seminole Square Shopping Center.
“Element D shows a roundabout at Hillsdale and Hydraulic intersection and Element E shows an extended shared-use path and improvements at Michie and Brandywine Drive, restricting left turns from those streets,” Jones said.
A design public hearing was held in May, followed by meetings with business stakeholders who might be affected. Some slight changes have been made since then. One of the changes at the roundabout to provide better access to Charlottesville’s middle Kroger.
Back to the shortfall.
“So, the question that’s kind of been posed to the MPO is would there be an appetite to remove one of the elements to ensure that we get the biggest benefit out of the other elements in the project,” Nelson said. “And the one element that we’ve been looking to remove is the Green-T.”
Nelson said that could be built in the future, but there are also concerns from business owners in that area.
One City Councilor supported this proposal.
“I think that it’s a reasonable compromise,” said Brian Pinkston. “I think getting the other pieces done certainly takes us a long, long way to making that set of intersections much more useful.”
Charlottesville Mayor Lloyd Snook agreed, as did Albemarle Supervisors Ann Mallek and Ned Gallaway. Gallaway said not moving forward with the Green-T might give more time to figure out how to solve another problem. As CBS19’s Carly SImon reported earlier this year, there are three chicken-themed restaurants on one block of southbound U.S. 29.
“I guess the only comment I would add in addition as we think to that in the future and as I know some of you have had conversations about figuring out what to do with ‘chicken row’ and some of the issues that we’re dealing with for all the people trying to get Cane sauce and what have you,” Gallaway said. “But it is a real issue so it’s something that those businesses will need some help on that side the Green-T doesn’t necessarily go to address.”
Supervisor Mallek agreed this is a problem that counterbalances infrastructure intended to improve southbound traffic flow on U.S. 29, a statewide corridor of significance.
“You cannot go anywhere when two of the lanes on the west side are completely full of people sitting,” Mallek said. “It’s incredibly dangerous. People call me all the time and complain bitterly.”
Nelson said VDOT is aware of the issue.
Mallek also asked about the status of a project to coordinate traffic signals on Emmet Street south of the U.S. 29 / U.S. 250 interchange. In June, the City Council officially killed an older project as a way of rebooting the city’s work with VDOT, but Nelson said it is on his agency’s to-do list.
“We are going to be working with the city regarding what upgrades are needed to ensure we have a synchronized system through there so our operations people on our side of the house will be meeting with the city at some point in the future to try to figure out what we need to do to get those upgrades in and what type of funding stream can we use to make those types of improvements,” Nelson said.
Stay tuned to Charlottesville Community Engagement for more coverage of things that happen at meetings
Housekeeping notes for #426
Up front let me explain that I know I got my math wrong yesterday and that 425 times two is not 950 but is in fact 1,083 and a quarter. That may be wrong, too, but either way, I want to thank the reader for pointing this fact out. I am not infallible and make corrections when I get things wrong. I have nearly 30 years of experience of trying not to get things wrong but being professional enough to acknowledge when I do.
You’re not wrong if you’re interested in signing up for a paid subscription to this program. I’m going to spend Labor Day weekend on content, and hope to have two “first look” items for those who have made an investment in my work.
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Music in the podcast version comes from a musical entity known as Wraki, a musical entity you can sample more of if you purchase the album Regret Everything on Bandcamp. Pay what you want, but today is Bandcamp Friday so all of the proceeds will volley to Wraki.
September 2, 2022: Inflation escalates cost estimate for Buford expansion and school reconfiguration; MPO eliminates one component from Hydraulic/29 project