The Shortline 11-1-24
The Shortline 11-1-24
Housing crisis weighs heavily in local and national elections • AI data centers driving up costs for Virginia ratepayers • Funded vs. unfunded inclusionary zoning
I wasn’t able to get a newsletter out last week because I fell down a rabbit hole researching the history of railroads in the Valley. I’ll finish the post about W.E.D. Stokes at some point this year. If you know a local rail historian I should talk with, please put me in touch.
The Valley
Across the 48 blocks that make up downtown Harrisonburg, there are 7,900 parking spaces. Of those 7,900 spaces, 87% are in off-street parking facilities — parking lots or garages, like the Water Street parking deck or municipal parking lot off Main Street. The remaining 13%, or about 1,000, are curbside. (Daily News-Record)
Affordable housing dominated city council candidate speeches at the Harrisonburg Rotary meeting. Four candidates are vying for three seats. (Daily News-Record)
In downtown Harrisonburg, wheelchair users and residents with disabilities are upset due to accessibility issues in the city, including cars parking in the bus pull-off area, preventing buses from being able to pull off and let the ramp down. (WHSV)
Rent increases across Harrisonburg leave students scrambling for affordable housing. (The Breeze)
Open Doors announced that because of an unexpected problem, the Navigation Center will not be complete by its Oct. 30 goal. The delay is due to a "life safety function" related to the fireproofing of the building. (WHSV) The irony of telling unhoused people that the building they can't yet sleep in is unsafe is not lost on me.
Record drought hit Virginia this past summer, impacting profits in the largest economic sector in the state, even though programs are available at the federal level to offset losses. On June 24, the DEQ Drought Monitoring Task Force placed a warning, which indicated that “a significant drought is imminent,” impacting 12 counties, mainly in Northern Virginia and the Northern Shenandoah Valley. Less than a month later, the warning expanded to 60 counties. (Virginia Mercury)
Virginia
Virginia’s next building code update isn’t until 2027, but state lawmakers are already proactively thinking about ways it could be tweaked to help foster development on vacant or underutilized urban parcels and encourage affordable housing. (Virginia Mercury)
The DC region had the highest rent increase among major metro areas in the US. Median rent in the region rose by 12 percent during the 12-month period that ended in September. (The Washington Post)
Plans for a 3,500-megawatt natural gas power plant and data center in Pittsylvania County appear to essentially be dead after members of the board of supervisors signal they will not support it. (Danville Register & Bee)
In Virginia, which has aggressively recruited data center development, new data centers alone are projected to increase demand for power up to 50 percent by 2030. Over the next 15 years, the state will need to add electricity supply equal to the amount used by the entire state of New Jersey. (The Washington Post)
The Virginia Department of Environmental Quality is suspending the public hearing process for Caroline County’s water intake project until it receives more information about the proposal’s many impacts. (The Free Lance-Star)
Norfolk officials are considering a request by Virginia Beach developer Bruce Thompson to alter the proposed alignment of a floodwall so his firm could move forward with a “transformative” waterfront development of hotels, residences, restaurants and an innovation corridor in concert with Sentara and EVMS. However, the U.S Army Corps of Engineers has the final say on the design of the $2.66 billion floodwalls. (Virginia Mercury)
Elsewhere
Kamala Harris has framed the crisis as a supply problem, while Trump has frequently defined it as a demand issue, blaming the housing shortage on immigrants — a claim that has been challenged by several economists. (USA Today)
America’s housing affordability crisis is weighing heavily on the nation’s most sought-after voters in places like Wilmington, N.C., where home prices have risen 65 percent since 2019. (The Washington Post)
American cities have two big problems these days: Too much empty office space and not enough affordable housing. Those empty offices could be converted to "micro-apartments" or "dorms for adults" — essentially rebranded SROs, with shared kitchen and laundry facilities. (The Week)
Single-room occupancy units, or SROs, are key to helping house the Pittsburgh region’s lowest-income residents. SROs are typically dormitory-style housing, where residents have their own bed and room but often share bathrooms, a communal kitchen or other spaces. Many SROs were torn down or closed in the 1960s, ’70s, and ’80s, and banned in local zoning ordinances. (WESA)
Unfunded inclusionary zoning backfires by making apartment development a money-losing proposition, sacrificing both market rate and affordable homes. And when unfunded IZ is coupled with legislation to allow more apartments, its policy flaw divides the coalitions needed to pass the legislation. Several US cities are using property tax abatements to fund IZ. (Sightline Institute)
The townhouse is the American Dream, but with a smaller yard. In addition to being cheaper to build and own, townhouses consume less energy and foster healthy habits and social connection better than detached single-family homes. (The Washington Post)
Millions of low-income Americans live in old homes that are crumbling, worsening the housing shortage. Whole-Home Repairs, a first-of-its-kind program in Pennsylvania aims to help whole communities damaged by disrepair. However, Pennsylvania lawmakers did not renew funding for it this year, leaving 18,000 homeowners on the waitlist. (NPR)
In New Jersey, a new "development watch" effort is informing residents of future property development in their neighborhoods – and training them to help shape these projects. (Next City)
Honolulu Council members are looking to Vancouver as a model for their own version of tax on vacant homes. As is the case in Vancouver, the Honolulu tax would be in addition to regular property taxes, and would start at 1% of assessed value before gradually going up to 3% over a few years. (Honolulu Civil Beat)
The Denver City Council has approved a plan to turn 64 acres of mostly empty Ball Arena parking lots into a development that could bring thousands of residents to an expanded downtown. (Denverite)
A new study shows that bicycle lanes calm traffic and make streets safer for everyone. The presence of a separated bike lane (delineator-protected with traffic cones or plastic flex posts) decreases average maximum car/truck speeds by 28%, speed of cars making right turns by 21%. (Journal of Urban Mobility)