The Shortline 3-8-24
The shadow of JMU's Ivory Tower • Harrisonburg's school bus driver shortage • Data center site sales in NOVA • Why urban density is the surest way to reduce mobility-related emissions
Davarian Baldwin, author of the book In the Shadow of the Ivory Tower: How Universities are Plundering Our Cities, spoke at the Massanutten Regional Library on Tuesday. Baldwin’s presentation about the extractive town-gown trends he has studied across North America included observations about James Madison University’s relationship with the City of Harrisonburg. He suggested that the answer to the familiar refrain, “What would Harrisonburg be without JMU” should be, “What would JMU be without Harrisonburg?”
A few takeaways from Baldwin’s lecture:
JMU’s acquisitions of centrally-located properties have pushed key community institutions like RMH and HHS to the peripheries of the city, or out into the county.
As a tax-exempt entity, Baldwin said that JMU’s property acquisitions have diminished the property tax base in the city by approximately $1 billion. (See previous post about taxable land value per acre: 3D map shows non-taxable land.)
The lack of adequate stock of on-campus housing relative to new admissions has pushed housing prices up across the city. As more people move to Rockingham County (which has no public transit) in search of housing they can afford, the regional vehicle miles traveled (VMT) increases, along with carbon emissions.
As the largest employer in the city and county, JMU’s comparatively low wages keeps the wage floor in the area low. The university’s contract with Aramark (although common for universities) stands in contrast to the approach taken by the University of Winnipeg and social enterprise Diversity Foods.
These trends are not unique to JMU and Harrisonburg, they are happening at state schools across the country. If the nonprofit status of a university is based on the presumption that it is serving the public good, there should be certain benchmarks to measure those social goods.
Baldwin pointed to the Downtown Commons in Winnipeg as an example of town-gown collaboration done right. He also promoted PILOTs, community benefits agreements (CBAs), and community-based planning boards as partial solutions that could begin to reverse the extractive nature of universities in cities.
Baldwin cautioned that none of those changes will happen without sustained community organizing and public pressure.
The Valley
The CSPDC is exploring the possibility of a regional land bank for affordable housing in the Shenandoah Valley. The possibility was mentioned at the Consortium Group Meeting for the Regional Housing Study on Thursday in a presentation from HousingForward Virginia. The presentation also emphasized the need for local zoning reform. (recording)
The Harrisonburg City School Board is still wrestling with a shortage of bus drivers. The school district has 46 school bus drivers employed but only 37 assigned to bus routes. At least 65 total drivers would be needed to transport middle and high school students around the same time. (The Citizen)
⏸️ The local (and nationwide) bus driver shortage is a direct result of how we have built our cities to prioritize the needs of cars above the needs of children getting to and from school. The low-density suburban style of development in much of the city, combined with car-centric, pedestrian-hostile infrastructure has made walking or biking to school unsafe an many areas of the city. Getting kids to school became a lot more complicated in the age of sprawl:
“In the 1960s and ‘70s, when developers began to build housing on the peripheries of urban centers, they often neglected to consider the importance of locating schools centrally. Instead, schools were often built on even more peripheral (and inexpensive) land, and a lack of pedestrian infrastructure made walking to them difficult and dangerous.”
Sound familiar? Anyway, back to the round-up. ▶️
Rockingham County has announced it will be working with VDOT and local law enforcement to mitigate the negative impacts of commercial truck traffic in the area just North of Harrisonburg, particularly on Gravels and Buttermilk Creek Roads. (WHSV)
VDOT is set to continue roadwork on Interstate 81 and Route 33, while other continued roadwork to Route 33, Route 253 and Route 340 is set to have an earlier completion date than originally planned. (Daily News-Record)
Virginia
Microsoft recently bought a site in Gainesville for an eye-popping $465.5 million, marking perhaps the most expensive data center deal in the region, ever. The tech giant’s new acquisition comprises about 124 acres. (Washington Business Journal)
Youth For Tomorrow, which provides services to at-risk children and teens at its campus in Bristow, sold 70 acres — nearly half of its land — to Stack Infrastructure for a data center site for $81.3 million (Prince William Times)
The Halifax County Board of Supervisors put halt on solar applications after a crowd of anti-solar activists descended on a meeting this week. Supervisors are considering a ban on new solar development in the county. (The Gazette-Virginian)
A bill that would create a state fund to help pay for building public electric vehicle charging stations in rural areas is trucking along after a near death in a Senate finance subcommittee last week. (Virginia Mercury)
Virginia lawmakers are poised to strip plans for a new Wizards and Capitals arena from the state budget, which would prevent efforts to bring the teams to Alexandria using public money. (The Washington Post)
Elsewhere
A new study draws attention to the importance of mobility in small and mid-sized cities. Restricting urban development to certain distance to center and density thresholds appears the surest way to reduce mobility-related emissions as cities grow. (Science Direct)
Real estate tech company Redfin is adding climate factors such as flooding, wildfire risk, and low air quality, to its menu of items to consider when shopping for real estate. (My Northwest)
The push from an affluent community in South Carolina to kill a plan for 60 subsidized apartments brought into public view how hard it is to give low-income families access to opportunity-rich neighborhoods. (The New York Times)
Modular houses assembled from factory-built components are cheaper to build. They won't solve the housing problem but can be part of the solution. (Governing)
Unhoused people receive a disproportionately large percentage of jaywalking fines in Washington state — at least 41%, according to a report published earlier this year — despite being only about 0.4% of the population, according to the federally required Point-in-Time count. (The Seattle Times)
SpacesShared is a Toronto-based home-sharing startup that has worked with a slew of colleges and universities to pair college students in need of affordable housing with seniors in need of companionship. (Next City)
New research suggests that botanical gardens are the most effective green space at cooling streets during heatwaves. (The Guardian)
Driving has a special status in many societies, despite its health and environmental harms, which Walker and his colleagues call “motonormativity.” "Until we collectively and individually acknowledge that our relationship with cars is not harmless, I don't know how much progress we can make." (BBC)
Survey after survey has shown that business owners overestimate how many of their customers drive to their stores, versus walking or biking. The results show that making streets friendlier for bikes — and sidewalks friendlier for pedestrians — is actually good for business. (Business Insider)
Renewable power company BrightNight has been given the green light to develop Wyoming’s first “agrivoltaic” project, a positive step for both clean energy and the state’s many animal ranchers. (The Cool Down)