Giant bureaucracies aren’t known for responding to the complaints of the little guys. But enough locals applied pressure, and the Virginia Department of Transportation (VDOT) (www.virginiadot.org) yielded to concerns expressed by hundreds of residents in northwestern Albemarle County: The Free Union VDOT facility will remain open.
Responsible for day-to-day maintenance like snow plow-ing and pothole patching, the Free Union headquarters was originally among 91 facilities on the chopping block as VDOT restructures in the wake of changing responsibilities and stagnant State funding. Yet when VDOT announced initial plan for closures, several Albemarle citizens raised a ruckus and spread the word. They got local officials involved—principally, State Del. Rob Bell along with County supervisors David Wyant and Dennis Rooker.
Around 200 people showed up December 1 to a meeting in Free Union with VDOT officials, asking questions about how much VDOT is saving by closing their facility and about how much local service would be affected. Lo and behold, when the restructuring plan was finalized last week, four facilities were spared—including the one in Free Union.
“We went back and looked at some of the information that had been brought to us by the folks up in Free Union and northwestern Albemarle as far as the topography and the way that those roads run through the community,” says Lou Hatter, regional VDOT spokesman. Many secondary roads in Free Union “are treated like primary roads because they’re really the main routes of travel for not just the Free Union community but for northwestern Albemarle to get out to 29 and get into Charlottesville,” Hatter says. To save some money, the Yancy Mills facility, in western Albemarle near I-64, will become a “subarea headquarters.” The superintendent for Free Union will head both facilities, and an office support position will be eliminated. VDOT is saving $4 million to $6 million in salaries and benefits. It hasn’t calculated savings from facility closures.
Two of the primary citizen organizers, Dick and Joanne Hayden, say they’re pleased —and surprised—that area citizens were able to galvanize VDOT leaders to alter their restructuring plans to keep the Free Union headquarters open. “They were pretty much going down the road to close it, and it was a surprise that we could get the people together to change their mind,” says Dick Hay-den, a retired GE worker and Free Union resident for 20 years. “It would have had a massive impact on the community,” adds his wife, Joanne.
