INSIDE FIREWORKS FUND page 4 STOP IT page 6 MORE ON ROUND UP page 10 FAMILY ALBUMS page 11 CYMATICS FANATICS page 13
JULY 2015 VOL. 10, NO. 2
Grid Plan Favored for Barnes Lumber Development
ARTISAN DEPOT page 14 WYNOTT FARM page 16 THEN & NOW page 18 LAWN CARE pages 22 TALLY HO! page 23 POTATO SALAD page 24
Duncan Robertson at work on a new mural facing the Starr Hill Brewery Tasting Room on Route 240 in Crozet.
PEACHTREE 11U page 25
Starr Hill Brewery Adds to Crozet’s Murals
NEED TO KNOW page 26 INNATE BEAUTY page 28 MINDSET MATTERS page 29 RUN-OFF page 32 LATIN TALK page 33 PROSTATES page 34 CROSSWORD page 35 THE TALE OF TOM page 37 DISTURBED SOIL page 38 PARK HISTORY page 39 NO CIGARS page 42
Richmond-based artist Duncan Robertson spent two weeks in June painting a mural depicting mountain musicians on a large blank wall across from Starr Hill Brewery in Crozet, dramatically adding to Crozet’s wealth of big wall art. The painting was a project of the Charlottesville Mural Project, which produces two murals a year, and the New City Arts Initiative, and part of a summer mural painting series called Poetry and Painting that aims to incorporate poetry into murals. Project director Ross McDermott helped Robertson, who did the
design, with the initial blocking out of the image. Robertson has done other murals, but this is the largest, roughly 40 long and 35 feet high, and the first to be outdoors. During June, Starr Hill’s Cheers for Charity program, which gives $1 from every pint of beer sold in the tasting room to a charitable cause, donated to the Charlottesville Mural Project. The mural shows a train leaving Claudius Crozet’s 1858 tunnel, a panorama of Blue Ridge Mountain landscape, and two musicians, a fiddle player (Robertson’s wife Shannon continued on page 42
The Downtown Crozet Initiative held its follow-up meeting June 11 at Crozet Elementary School to get public reaction to three preliminary plans for the development of the former Barnes Lumber Company property in downtown Crozet. The plans, which were meant to demonstrate conceptual options, were the product of a well-attended meeting May 27 when developer Frank Stoner asked Crozetians to describe what they thought should happen on the property. Stoner is one of five co-owners of the parcels in Crozet New Town Associates LLC and his development services company, Milestone Partners, is handling the nuts and bolts of their development. “We opened this up to the public and said this needs to be a public-private partnership,” said Stoner. “Without that, I don’t think we can be successful, but with it, I think we can.” Stoner estimated the cost to create a public space in the property at $2 million and warned that the cost of it would raise the price of new commercial space to unaffordable levels for tenants or lot buyers. “If the developer has to bear all the costs of the continued on page 20
Albemarle Looks at New Fee or Tax to Fund Stream Protection Albemarle County officials are weighing two alternatives for funding water clean-up measures that are mandated by state government to help save the Chesapeake Bay. One option would create service districts with varying tax rates that would add to property owners’ real estate tax bills, county water resources manager Greg Harper told the Crozet
Community Advisory Committee at its meeting June 17. The other idea is a storm water utility fee that would be based on the amount of a property’s impervious surface. “Since 2013, the rules are more stringent,” said Harper, “and meeting them is more costly. The state now requires a remediation plan and continued on page 30
Downtown Crozet Initiative Design Concept