1 minute read
PROJECT STUDY AREA
Dearington is one of Lynchburg’s many distinct neighborhoods and is centrally located in the City’s Midtown. While it shares some of the same challenges seen in other neighborhoods, it is also unique in its opportunities, public assets, and historic issues with former landfi lls. Dearington is bound by Memorial Avenue to the southeast and Langhorne Road to the southwest, Atherholt Road to the northwest and extremely steep topography elsewhere. Langhorne Road and Memorial Avenue are defi ned by a wide variety of small and mid-sized commercial uses, in buildings developed in the middle and latter parts of the 20th century. Current businesses include a few restaurants and convenience stores, printing and sign companies, construction and contractor equipment warehousing, non-profi t and healthcare offi ces, and other professional services. A number of the buildings are also vacant. E.C. Glass High School and Centra Health’s main facility, Lynchburg General Hospital, along with many other businesses also sit at the neighborhood’s edge.
Caroline Street and Chambers Street are the two primary corridors into the Dearington Neighborhood and how most travel to reach neighborhood destinations. Page Street is a known cut-through for reaching Lynchburg General Hospital. Th e majority of streets in the neighborhood tend to be narrow, which may help limit traffi c and speeds, but also often have sidewalks that start and stop at random, making safe pedestrian travel diffi cult. Landmarks include Jeff erson Park, Dearington Elementary School for Innovation (DESI), and the Dearington Apartments, Lynchburg’s oldest public housing development. Most of the neighborhood is characterized by single-household dwellings, which sit in contrast to the rowhouse style development of the Dearington Apartments.
An unfortunate feature of the Dearington Neighborhood is the presence of four historic sanitary landfi lls in the neighborhood, used at various times through the middle part of the 20th century. Th e sites have either been repurposed or currently sit vacant (see “Neighborhood & Park History” for more information).
Despite the landfi ll presence, Dearington has enormous potential. Equipped with valuable public facilities like Jeff erson Park and DESI, nearby job opportunities, a well-connected grid of streets, and a close-knit neighborhood that remains close even after residents move away, Dearington is well-poised to be one of Lynchburg’s most livable neighborhoods.
