Author
Could trailers be the new face of affordable housing?
Tacky trailers or the new face of affordable housing? That’s the debate policy-makers and advocates are having across Virginia as they work to figure out what role manufactured units should play in addressing the commonwealth’s affordable housing crisis. So far the biggest challenge has been that no one knows exactly how many mobile homes exist […]
Two per train? Why legislation mandating train crew size keeps getting filed.
Every year over the past three years, lawmakers in Virginia’s General Assembly have introduced legislation that would require railroads moving freight through the commonwealth “to operate with a crew of at least two individuals.” This year, it’s being pushed by Del. Jeion Ward, D-Hampton, in a bill that’s been referred to the House Labor and […]
Regional rail vision aims to stitch Virginia, Maryland and D.C. closer together
Gov. Ralph Northam’s recent budget allocation of $50 million to extend intercity passenger rail service from Roanoke to the New River Valley is just the latest in a long line of sizable investments his administration has made into the future of rail in the commonwealth, including a $3.7 billion dollar track acquisition deal with CSX […]
New bike bill hopes to make streets safer for cyclists
Last year cyclists in the commonwealth scored a big win in the General Assembly as part of a coalition backing a hands-free law to prevent distracted driving. This year the state’s bike lobby is backing a bill they say will make Virginia one of the safest states in the nation for bicycles. The Bicycle Safety […]
Norfolk is the next Virginia city to tackle a bus route redesign. Will more follow?
After Virginia’s capital city overhauled its bus routes in 2018, the resulting 17 percent annual growth in ridership made the city’s sole public transportation provider —the Greater Richmond Transit Company — a rare example of success at a time when systems across the country had been losing passengers for years. Norfolk took note and launched […]
Jaywalking decriminalization is coming, 100 years after the auto industry helped make it a crime
Though it didn’t garner as much attention as other police reform measures during the special legislative session that ended this fall, a provision to decriminalize jaywalking in a pretextual policing bill from Delegate Patrick Hope, D-Arlington, means that come March 1, police will no longer be able to stop folks for the act of crossing […]
Rail advocates hope Virginia’s new authority will take ‘politics out of our rail policy’
When former Gov. Doug Wilder sold off the state’s interest in hundreds of miles of track and rail right of way in the early 1990s, the move was applauded by the Republican-dominated legislature as a prudent divestment to help balance the annual budget. Since then, though, the state has spent millions more on track improvements […]
In a shrinking part of Southside Virginia, VDOT is still planning a highway expansion
Highway expansion is often pitched as necessary to combat congestion for a growing population. For opponents, that makes the Virginia Department of Transportation’s planned Martinsville Southern Connector — a $745 million, 7.4-mile highway expansion in a shrinking corner of the state — all the more perplexing. “This project goes against everything this administration, the Commonwealth […]
What’s behind Virginia’s increasing pedestrian death toll and how to reverse the trend
On Thursday evening, friends and family were at the intersection of Jahnke and German School roads on Richmond’s Southside to mourn the loss of 16-year-old Aajah Rosemond, who was killed by a driver while walking to the store. According to police, a collision with a GMC Yukon sent a roughly 6,000 pound Nissan Titan spiraling […]
A budget amendment is laying down the tracks for a Shenandoah Valley rail trail
When Del. Tony Wilt, R-Rockingham, introduced a budget amendment funding a study on creating a new 43-mile long rail trail in the Shenandoah Valley, the odds of the proposal making it into the final budget for the governor to sign looked slim. After Wilt’s amendment was stricken from the House version of the budget, the […]
Debate around statewide definition of affordable housing belies larger crisis
Long before the COVID-19 recession put millions of Virginians on the precipice of losing their homes, the commonwealth already suffered from the country’s worst eviction epidemic. After five Virginia cities landed in the top 10 of Princeton University’s Eviction Lab rankings in 2016, the data served as a clarion call to action for policymakers and […]
Long Bridge rail project barrels forward full speed ahead
With the state budget in tatters and commuter levels at record lows, now might hardly seem the right moment for Virginia to embark upon a $1.9 billion rail project. However, the recent conclusion of the Long Bridge’s environmental impact study has cleared the way for the commonwealth to do just that. The plan to add […]