The Shortline 2-23-24
Open Doors to operate Harrisonburg Homeless Services Center • Virginia outlines climate action plan • Examining Buffalo's Green Code
The Valley
The City of Harrisonburg has selected local nonprofit Open Doors to serve as the operator of the City’s Homeless Services Center when it opens later this year. (WSVA)
There is no time at which all JMU student parking on campus is filled to capacity. Every building on campus is within no more than a 15-minute walk of at least one student parking facility that never fills to capacity. (The Breeze)
The Foundry is the most recent residential historic preservation effort in Harrisonburg. The building includes 21 apartments, 16 of which were already occupied as of Tuesday. (Daily News-Record)
Local mental health nonprofit Strength In Peers will soon launch a Recovery Residence on North Main Street. The property was recently rezoned to allow for the new residential use. (Daily News-Record)
Staunton City Council passed a resolution telling the Virginia General Assembly and Virginia Governor Glenn Youngkin they want their voters to choose whether or not a one percent sales tax for school construction or renovation projects is implemented. (WHSV)
A driver traveling northbound on South High Street lost control of their vehicle last Friday and veered into the R13 parking lot across from Memorial Hall. The driver first struck a road sign, then wrecked five parked cars. (The Breeze)
Virginia
Virginia has outlined a sweeping new path forward to cut climate-warming greenhouse gas emissions and transition to renewable energy. Transportation accounts for the largest share of Virginia’s greenhouse gas emissions, about 40%. (WHRO)
The Federal Railroad Administration (FRA) is seeking public comment on an Amtrak Daily Long-Distance Service Study for a proposed route that would have end points in NYC and Houston, TX and would serve the Washington, DC to Bristol corridor through Virginia. (FRA)
Lawmakers are debating legislation that would allow homeowners to build a small apartment (ADU) on their property and rent it out. Another bill would create an advisory group to oversee single-stair buildings up to six stories tall. (ABC 13)
Fauquier County is the proverbial line in sand between suburban Northern Virginia counties like Fairfax, Prince William and Loudoun and the largely rural counties to the south and west. That line was not an accident but the result of zoning, land conservation and other preservation efforts launched decades ago. (Fauquier Times)
Loudoun County officials have in recent years pushed back against proposals to build data centers near housing. But in a unique application to combine data centers and an apartment building on a single site, a developer seeks to do just that. (Loudoun Times-Mirror)
Data centers could collectively pay about $50 million more in local taxes next year under a 72% data center tax rate hike the Prince William Board of County Supervisors has tentatively approved. (Prince William Times)
The Fauquier County Planning Commission voted 3-2 to recommend that any data center over 50,000 square feet undergo a review for a “special exception” permit. The matter now heads to the Board of Supervisors for further consideration. (Fauquier Times)
Ben and Mary’s Steakhouse, once a landmark on U.S. 17, has been converted into four units of affordable housing. The former restaurant now holds two one-bedroom and two two-bedroom apartments designed for lower-income residents. (Fauquier Times)
Elsewhere
The Sundial Building in Minneapolis is a three-story, energy efficient apartment that has no off-street parking. Under the old zoning rules, it would have been illegal to build. More US cities are realizing their own rules may have made it too hard and expensive to build the housing they need. (NPR)
The Buffalo Green Code, officially called the Unified Development Ordinance (UDO) and adopted in 2017, is a form-based departure from traditional zoning practices, aiming to foster a more vibrant, sustainable, and inclusive urban environment. (Resident Urbanist)
The Planning Commission in Parkersburg, WV approved an ordinance that would expand the zones where manufactured homes are permitted without a variance. (News & Sentinel)
Over the past two decades, according to Harvard's Joint Center for Housing Studies, median rents went up a whopping 21%, but the median income for renters only rose 2%. (NPR)
Regulatory requirements for federally subsidized housing programs force households in crisis to wait months to be successfully approved for housing placements while affordable housing units sit vacant. Here are four policy proposals that would shorten that period. (Federation of American Scientists)
Cambridge Mobile Telematics has access to driver data for millions of drivers, who download apps via their insurance companies that measure things like speeding, hard braking, and cellphone use while driving. The huge jump we saw in distracted driving during the pandemic hasn’t come down since. (Vox)
Dublin will become the latest European capital to bar traffic merely passing through its city centre on their way to somewhere else. Private cars and commercial trucks will be allowed access only if their final destination is downtown. (The Straits Times)
Cars have killed 60–80 million people since their invention. Despite the widespread harm caused by cars and automobility, governments, corporations, and individuals continue to facilitate it by expanding roads, manufacturing larger vehicles, and subsidising parking, electric cars, and resource extraction. (Science Direct)
In the compact SUV market segment, premium brand EV buyers are paying just 0.4% more for an EV than a comparable internal combustion engine (ICE) vehicle. On the other hand, mass-market brand buyers are shelling out 18.0% more to own an EV over a five-year period. (Auto Guide)
In the Rural Municipality of Ritchot, Manitoba, there is no way for residents to get around if they don’t own a car. A new rural car share initiative is a pilot project that will help serve that need. (Steinbach Online)
And finally, a quote from Molly Taft in this piece worth reading on Drilled:
When we accept that the market will serve as the solution for climate, it seems only natural that more money would go toward solutions like ammonia, or hydrogen, or nuclear, versus setting up seawalls or monitoring wildfires. Treating climate tech as a hero inherently sets up climate as a long-term problem to be solved on schedules that match the stretched out “transition plans” of venture funds and oil companies —not on the schedule the planet demands. A capitalist system that shrugs off the 1.5 degree mark, when millions of people in countries around the world will inevitably suffer from that shift, is not one that is set up to help those same people adjust to an entirely new way of life.
Great news roundup as always!!