The Battle Building will transform West Main’s streetscape.
Odell & Associates

“Building, but not sprawling” was the headline of a recent UVA Magazine story on the school’s $308 million build-a-thon this year— in the face of a recession and UVA budget cutting. But next year one massive project will dramatically alter West Main’s streetscape (something UVA has long been threatening to do): the $141 million, 7-story, 200,000 square foot Barry and Bill Battle Building at UVA Children’s Hospital, which is scheduled to go up on a temporary parking lot beside the 12th Street Taphouse from 2011-2014.

The new building, which will serve as an outpatient surgery and (more)

Comments(16)

Front yard clutter? City zoning inspectors ordered this Cherry Avenue resident to relocate the satellite dish.
PHOTO BY DAVE MCNAIR

Satellite dish in my yard
Tell me more, tell me more
Who’s the king of your satellite castle?

We may not know exactly what Dave Matthews meant in his song “Satellite,” but last month Cherry Avenue resident Susan Blake had no doubts about what a letter she received from the city had to say about the dish in her yard: relocate it within a month— or face legal action with fines up to $5,000.

After losing her job with a construction company, Blake was looking for ways to save money, and switching from cable to satellite television was one of them.

“I was paying $62 per month for Comcast, but now I’m paying $27 per month for DirecTV,” says Blake. “That savings practically pays my electric bill.” Of course, those $27 offers are only good for the first year, but with things so tight for folks like Blake, many people are switching over.

However, that small piece of mind was shaken by the letter she received from (more)

Comments(26)

The RSWA had “no success” fixing billing problems at the BFI/Republic transfer station—- but Van der Linde got sued.
FILE PHOTO BY JEN FARIELLO

For over two years, the Rivanna Solid Waste Authority publicly branded Peter Van der Linde a cheat and attacked the recycler with an anti-mafia statute as part of a $20 million lawsuit, based largely on the unsubstantiated testimony of a disgruntled former Van der Linde employee, now serving jail time for attempted extortion.

But a curious thing happened when the Authority dropped its lawsuit on January 20. As Van der Linde agreed to pay $600,000 to settle it, the Authority’s corporate partner in trash, BFI/Republic, also agreed to pay a six-figure sum.

“The big question,” says vocal lawsuit critic Betty Mooney, “was why BFI agreed to pay when RSWA had never named them in their lawsuit. Is this now an admission that BFI owed funds to the community?”

The Hook asked BFI, RSWA board members, and City Councilors why BFI agreed (more)

Comments(7)

Instead of moving to a retirement community, Lynne and Don Gardener had their Lexington Avenue house rebuilt for their needs.
PHOTO COURTESY ABRAHAMSE & COMPANY

Like so many of the estimated 78 million Baby Boomers circling the retirement ages, Charlottesville residents Don and Lynne Gardner began to think about where and how they wanted to live as they grew older. At age 70, Don had begun battling memory loss, and he required dialysis. And Lynn, a 65-year-old registered nurse, was beginning to worry about the basement stairs her husband insisted on negotiating to get to his beloved workbench.

They had raised two sons in their 38 years in the Hazel Street house, but Lynn began asking herself hard questions: “Could he continue to navigate the basement steps or the second floor and the numerous stairs? How safe was it for us to stay?”

But they didn’t need assisted living, and they weren’t thrilled about (more)

Comments(13)

Wendell Wood’s house on Carter’s Mountain takes shape. Click on the image for a closer view.
AERIAL PHOTO BY SKIP DEGAN

“Why would you want to write about some house I’m building?” That was developer Wendell Wood in a Hook cover story last February, when asked about the mansion he was building. The “real story” he said was the expansion around National Ground Intelligence Center and the prospect of 1,500 new jobs. “Now that’s a story,” said Wood.

Indeed, Wood’s developments along Route 29 over the last 30 years have been an ongoing story that earned him plenty of economic kudos and conservation-minded critics, but as the size of his new house becomes apparent (even from miles away), one may recall his reluctance to talk about it.

“It’s just,” he said with a smile, “that people hate me enough as it is.”

According to County records, Wood’s new house will tip the scales at 15,554 finished square feet with another 14,269 square feet of unfinished basement, decks, and porches— putting it within range of Patricia Kluge’s 23,000 square-foot Albemarle House and making it not only one of the biggest houses ever built in Virginia but also (more)

Comments(31)

A Parham Construction dump truck arrives at owner Ronnie Parham’s residence on Route 20 South January 7 with a load of debris from the Avon Street sawmill demo.
PHOTO BY DAVE MCNAIR

At least since Tuesday, January 5, trucks from Parham Construction, the company contracted to demolish the former Charlottesville Lumber/Better Living Mill Shop building at 310 Avon Street, were discovered hauling debris from the site to company owner Ronnie Parham’s 76-acre home in the 2500-block of Scottsville Road and dumping it on a hillside in the woods. The morning of January 7, for instance, truckloads were still arriving at Parham’s property just 10 to 15 minutes apart and passing each other as they cruised along Route 20 South.

Wait a minute. Isn’t that illegal?

According to Parham, however, he was just hauling cinder block, bricks, and dirt to his property to use as cover on his driveway, something that’s perfectly legal under County zoning code. He says they were also making room at the Avon site to build a detention pond to collect runoff as they complete the demo, which he says should take 75 to 90 days.

According to property manager Caroline Satira, the contract with Parham Construction handed all the salvage to them and provides that the company will “use its best efforts to recycle as much of the construction debris as possible.”

Parham says that copper is going to Cycle Systems, doors will be reused, plumbing fixtures are being donated to places like Habitat for Humanity, and some of the better timber (more)

Comments(29)

University Car Wash on Ivy Road reminds us of something.
PHOTO BY LISA PROVENCE

The University Car Wash on Ivy Road, which has enthralled Hook shutterbugs since it started going up, officially turned on its laser-wash technology December 16 to open for business and clean some cars as Car Lovers Car Wash.

The whole concept as to build something open and inviting,” says owner Matt Bascomb, who says he knew the type of equipment he wanted to use, so it was just a matter of hiring Bushman Dreyfus Architects to come up with the design that makes it the perfect car wash for those suffering from claustrophobia.

“You can see out,” says Bascomb. “If you’re claustrophobic, hopefully you’d have a better experience with us.”

The car wash has drawn a lot of attention while being built, but now that it’s opened, it glows at night thanks to a translucent skin.

“A lot of people didn’t know what it was going to be,” says Bascomb. “A lot say it’s beautiful.”

Has anyone said it looks like a Red Bull can? “I haven’t heard that,” chuckles Bascomb. But he has been told, “It looks like something out of the Jetsons.”

Comments(6)

Charlottesville Mayor Dave Norris celebrates the completion of the Mall re-bricking project, while the uncompleted Landmark looms.
FILE PHOTO BY DAVE MCNAIR

Quite a few additions to our physical landscape in 2009 took a long time to materialize, and others could take a longer time still. Was it worth the wait? And are they worth waiting for? We’ll let you be the judge as we present some On Architecture highlights from 2009.

We’re calling this first photo the “On Architecture Photo of the Year” for the way it brings together two controversial projects in 2009. Charlottesville Mayor Dave Norris, with City Councilor Satyendra Huja beside him, stood in the shadow of what has become Charlottesville’s most famous unfinished building, the $31 million Landmark Hotel, as they presided over a May 29 dedication ceremony for the $7.5 million Downtown Mall re-bricking project. The hotel’s financier, Halsey Minor, and its developer, Lee Danielson, dreamed of a luxury hotel towering over the Mall’s new Halprinian bricks, complete with a roof-top restaurant with spectacular views. But Minor and Danielson had a sudden falling out, and Minor an alleged falling short, leaving us with a very tall eyesore. Will the hotel get built in 2010? Minor has vowed to finish “that damn hotel because I started it,” but that appears to be as likely as Minor appearing, as he once put it, on the cover of the Hook with wings and a halo.

***

Over 300 workers lined the floors of the new Martha Jefferson Hospital.
FILR PHOTO BY BOB DAVE MCNAIR

New Martha Jefferson Hospital

At an October 14 “topping off” ceremony, the final steel beam was secured on the new 500,000-square-foot, $275 million Martha Jefferson Hospital on Pantops Mountain. As part of the ceremony, over 300 workers stood at attention along each floor of the building while MJH president James Haden hoped for their continued safety and thanked them for their hard work. The hospital, which Haden said was 40 percent complete at the time, is scheduled to be finished in 2012. Meanwhile, MJH’s old location on a 14-acre tract  along Locust Avenue will be developed into a $170 to $200 million mixed-use development.

***

Sacajawea descendant Summer Morning Baldwin performed a traditional Shoshone sign language prayer at the dedication.
FILE PHOTO BY DAVE MCNAIR

Sacajawea gets a plaque

On June 10, close to a hundred people gathered at the foot of the Lewis and Clark statue at the intersection of streets called Ridge, Main, and McIntire to dedicate a plaque to Sacajawea, the Shoshone woman who accompanied Meriwether Lewis and William Clark on the first American expedition to the Pacific coast. It was a response to concerns that Sacajawea’s representation, crouched beneath the two men in bronze, underplayed her importance to the expedition. The City invited two of Sacajawea’s descendants to write the text and attend the ceremony.

“When I saw this statue I was very sad, but you are leading the way, Charlottesville,” Rose Ann Abrahamson, Sacajawea’s great-great-great niece, told the crowd. “I believe this expedition had divine intervention, because we are all here together.”

***

The Fry’s Spring Service Station on the eve of its spring sale.
FILE PHOTO BY TOM DALY

Fry’s Spring Service Station

The city’s only historically protected gas station, the circa 1931 Fry’s Spring Service Station, ended its more than 70-year run of car care when sold in April to Fry’s Garage LLC in McLean for $800,000. Run by owner Jimmy Houchens for more than 40 years, it made the Virginia Landmarks Register in 2007 for its Spanish colonial-meets-Jefferson exterior and its Art Deco bathrooms. But a family dispute held up its inclusion in state and national historic registers.

“I’ve been here since I was a baby,” Kristy Houchens, 37, told the Hook at the time of the sale. “It’s an icon. It’s kind of the end of an era.”

Meanwhile, the old service station begins a new era as a restaurant/coffee place/sports bar, according to the folks at the nearby Fry’s Spring Exxon, who say a guy named “PK” has been busy renovating the building. By press time, attempts to reach the owner(s) had been unsuccessful, but you can be sure we’ll keep trying.

***

After a summer squall, a rainbow appeared over the Gleason.
FILE PHOTO BY DAVE MCNAIR

The Gleason

During an open house reception in August atop the downtown ACAC for the topping off of the six-story, 122,000-square-foot Gleason condo building, one of the only planned downtown towers to actually get built, a rainbow after a sudden summer squall appeared to be a good omen. Not counting the new National Ground Intelligence Center and a few behemoths at UVA, it’s the biggest building ever constructed in Charlottesville. As it nears completion, more than half of its 38 condo units have been sold at prices ranging from $339,000 to $1.2 million.

Developer J.P. Williamson admitted the credit situation was grim, but said the demand for downtown residential space remains high. The simple trick for success, he said, was abandoning the old development model that got us into this mess.

“That speculative development model for mixed use condominium buildings— which never really existed in Charlottesville— dominated markets like Las Vegas, Atlanta, and Miami,” he said. “The classic speculative model— option a property, market it, hope to close acquisition and construction financing at the same time with limited equity model– is over.”

***

“I’ve always been proud of my design for the Downtown Mall,” said Lawrence Halprin in June.
PHOTO COURTESY LAWRENCE HALPRIN

Goodbye, Mr. Halprin

On Sunday, October 25, at the age of 93, Downtown Mall designer Lawrence Halprin died at his home in San Francisco. Along with Charlottesville’s Downtown Mall in 1976, Halprin designed the Franklin D. Roosevelt Memorial in Washington, DC, in 1997, Sea Ranch in Sonoma County, California, in 1967, and Ghirardelli Square in San Francisco in 1968. Halprin received the Thomas Jefferson Medal in architecture from UVA, as well as the nation’s highest artistic award, the National Medal of the Arts.

If it wasn’t for Halprin, the $7.5 million Mall re-bricking project might have been a fiasco, as City planners, who had not bothered to consult Halprin, originally wanted to replace the Mall’s old bricks with smaller new ones, not to mention adding a cascading water fall on the east end and a “Sister City Plaza” in front of the skating rink, which they believed would be more stable. However, when the Hook asked Halprin how he felt about the renovation, the size of the bricks was one of his main concerns.

“I feel it’s important to maintain the original brick size and pattern as the ground level establishes the character for the Mall,” he said. “If the bricks need to be replaced, I urge the city to replace them with similar ones.”

Even after Halprin’s comment, however, city planners continued to push for the smaller bricks, claiming that the larger 4 x 12 bricks were made only in a factory in Nebraska and would be prohibitively expensive.

Eventually, after some public pressure, the city heeded Halprin’s advice, somehow locating 4 x 12 bricks  made in Virginia and relatively inexpensive. It was the last defense Halprin made for a Downtown Mall design he said remained “close to my heart.”

Comments(1)

Behind the Lewis & Clark statue, the Mooney Oldsmobile building, which is now an antique shop on the corner of Ridge-McIntire and West Main, survived; but the UR Next Hat Shop, The Midway Druggist, and the Quality Retail Store Grocery weren’t so lucky.
PHOTO COURTESY VINEGAR HILL PROJECT

Just as the City mulls a master plan to redevelop its public housing stock, which could cost an estimated $115.5 million over ten years and increase available units from 373 to 558, digital history students at UVA have created a dynamic visual archive of another redevelopment project— the demolition of the Vinegar Hill neighborhood, which eliminated 29 businesses, 154 dwellings, one church, and ran a four-lane road through the middle of the predominantly African-American neighborhood.

Once the center of African-American business and social life in Charlottesville, the neighborhood was razed under the federally funded Urban Renewal program of the 1950s and ’60s by a largely white, poll-tax-paying voting class that narrowly approved destroying the “blighted” neighborhood and relocating its residents, many to the public housing developments, such as Westhaven (which the city now wants to redevelop.)

Using deeds, maps, photos, oral histories, and other archives, students have painted (more)

Comments(11)

This building adjacent to the Belmont Bridge, once home to Charlottesville Lumber at the turn of the century, is scheduled for demolition.
PHOTO BY DAVE MCNAIR

After over a hundred years, a familiar sight from the Belmont Bridge, and directly across from Spudnuts, is being demolished. It’s a whopper, too; one of the largest building demos in recent Downtown history. Until the early 1980s, the nearly 40,000 square-foot warehouse and retail space at 310 Avon Street was home to Better Living Building Supply and Better Living Furniture, which moved to locations on Route 29, and until spring of this year it was home to and a Rent-A-Center and the Better Living Mill Shop, which moved to a new location in Zion Crossroads.

While not designated historic, the building certainly has some history. It was originally the Charlottesville Lumber Company, which began business in 1893, and didn’t become Better Living until 1969, when Dick Nunley, a son-in-law of one of the original owners, took over the business. In 1997, Nunley’s son, John, took over as president of Better Living.

Other buildings at Avon Court fronting Garrett Street, which share the same (more)

Comments(21)

Downtown’s Victory Shoe Store, as Ethel Crowe remembers it from her childhood.
HISTORIC PHOTO

While the unceremonious demolition of the art-deco glass storefront of the old Victory Shoe Store on the Downtown Mall has angered city planners, preservationists, and fans of the classic storefront—and contributed to some spirited discussion on the function of the BAR, property rights, anonymous comment posting, and “unconsciously bourgeois pathology”—for Ethel Crowe, it’s been like losing a piece of her life.

“It has made me so sick, I can’t tell you what it has done to us,” says Crowe, whose Russian immigrant grandparents, Isaac and Freda Kobre, opened the store in 1921.

“I was born in that store,” says Crowe, “That’s all I ever knew. It has been crushing. I hope they can put it back the way it was. But it will never be the same.”

As Crowe reveals, her grandparents put a new store front on the building around 1947, modifying what was already there.

Crowe says her parents, Tillie (“Miss Tillie,” Crowe says people called her) and Bernie Miller, eventually took over the store and operated it until 1995, when Tillie passed away. Crowe says she managed to keep the store going for another year, but finally closed and gave all the shoes away to charity.

“We were there for 75 years, that’s a long time,” says Crowe, struggling for words to describe the loss.

Crowe said she’s already called the building’s owner, Joe Gieck, to ask why he demolished the store front; his explanation that the glass was cracked was not well-received by Crowe.

“I hope something is done,” she says. “Maybe a petition to have it restored.”

Comments(28)