These are complicated times for anyone who’s tracking the details of how new housing gets constructed in Charlottesville. While planners and builders are still learning how the new development code works, staff in the Department of Neighborhood Development Services are hoping to adopt the first set of amendments by the end of the year. A […]
These are complicated times for anyone who’s tracking the details of how new housing gets constructed in Charlottesville. While planners and builders are still learning how the new development code works, staff in the Department of Neighborhood Development Services are hoping to adopt the first set of amendments by the end of the year. A […]
When the COVID-19 pandemic hit just over five years ago, child-care providers struggled to find ways to stay open amidst social distancing rules. Congregation Beth Israel “pivoted to a forest school model, embracing outdoor learning to keep our doors open for families,” said Jill Abbey-Clark, the director of what CBI calls its Forest School. To […]
Charlottesville has seen many periods of growth since its founding in 1762, and new development rules adopted in late 2023 point the way to a more dense future. Along the way, city leaders have made decisions about whether some buildings should be preserved, assigning the Board of Architectural Review—the governing body that makes such decisions—a […]
When an investment firm purchased the former Cavalier Crossing apartment complex on Fifth Street Extended last year, affordable housing advocates were horrified that the intent was to convert the 144 existing units to market rate. Now Bonaventure has filed plans with Albemarle to rezone the property to allow construction of 165 new units and comply […]
When City Council adopted a new zoning code in late 2023, the action granted property owners the ability to build many more houses and apartments than under the old rules. Charlottesville’s housing program manager said that has made property more valuable. “We have occurrences of rising land costs [and] speculative development that may happen within […]
One of the areas Albemarle Board of Supervisors has identified for industrial development is along Broadway Street in a land-locked section of the county only accessible via roads through Charlottesville. The future happens one application at a time and the Board will soon consider whether it wants to allow the owners of a project called […]
Over the last few years, analysis from the Charlottesville Area Association of Realtors has captured a trend of fewer homes being sold in the region, while the average purchase price continues to climb. There were 1,287 homes sold in the fourth quarter of 2020 compared to 879 sold in the last three months of 2024. […]
There are many ways to make it more affordable for an individual or family to own a home. One of them is to separate the cost of land from the cost of the structure itself. That’s the business model of the Piedmont Community Land Trust, an entity created in 2008 by the Thomas Jefferson Planning […]
The arrival of spring brings the end of the season for PACEM, a network of churches that provides overnight shelter for hundreds of unhoused individuals in the Charlottesville area each year. Since 2004, the group, officially known as People and Congregations Engaged in Ministry, has since 2004 operated cold-weather shelters across a rotating set of […]
In the past year and a half, at least three different Charlottesville congregations have purchased former churches for a permanent place of worship. Now, there is another example. In January, one non-denominational Christian group purchased a home and a large property on Dairy Road for its growing flock. The Church in Charlottesville paid $990,000 for […]