Board delays school land decision

By Barney Breen-Portnoy

Published: April 17, 2008

After nearly an hour of discussion Thursday, the Charlottesville School Board pushed off to its May 1st meeting a decision on whether or not to donate around 8.5 acres at Charlottesville High School to the Virginia Department of Transportation for the Meadowcreek Parkway project.
“This will give us more time to digest this,” said School Board Chairman Ned Michie.
If the land donation is approved, CHS would lose a practice field used by the junior varsity softball team. About 3.7 acres would be returned to the school after construction of the parkway.
The planned parkway would be a two-mile road connecting the U.S. 250 Bypass and McIntire Road in Charlottesville to East Rio Road in Albemarle County.
The board will likely attach several conditions to an approval of the land donation. In a draft resolution circulated by Michie at Thursday’s meeting, the donation would be contingent upon the parkway not being opened until the entire project is completed; safe and efficient means of passage for bicycles and pedestrians being created and maintained at the intersection of the parkway and Melbourne Road, as well as around CHS and the Charlottesville Albemarle Technical Education Center; and replacement athletic space being made available to CHS.
CATEC is located near the northern terminus of the planned parkway.
Other possible conditions discussed by the board included stipulating that a 25 mile per hour speed limit be put in place near school property. The limited-access, two-lane parkway is designed for vehicles to travel 37.5 miles per hour.
“My concern has been and will always be the safety of the students,” said board member Leah Puryear. “No speed short of zero would be safe for students. I have to be assured that the lowest speed limit will be posted and held to without a doubt.”
School Board member Kathy Galvin repeatedly stressed the importance of creating a bicycle and pedestrian path or tunnel near the school so students could safely access the linear park and multi-use trail on the east side of the planned parkway.
“I’m finding it difficult to embrace a two-mile-long road with no east-west connection and 15-18-year-olds at each end of it,” she said.
Charlottesville resident and Meadowcreek Parkway critic Peter Kleeman urged the board during public comment to consider what, if anything, the school division would gain by making the land donation.
“As elected officials representing the interests of the schools, they should look at what are the benefits of this project for the schools,” Kleeman said after the meeting. “I don’t see any. It’s not clear what they get in return other than air pollution, noise and unsafe areas. Why should they do this if there are no benefits?”