Rivanna Village: “Nobody likes change”

“Damn right it’s going to change things,” says Bernie Easton. He owns several buildings on Route 250 in the eastern part of Albemarle County, and is in the midst of moving wood with an employee on the site of his furniture store. Right across the road, the “Rivanna Village at Glenmore” is slated to appear on 93 acres, adding up to 521 new housing units and 125,000 square feet for nonresidential use, including space for a grocery store.

“Is that right? A grocery store?” asks Easton, shaking his head. He’s heard of the development being approved, but not all the details—though he knows about all the townhomes slated to pop up. Easton, 70, remembers when this was considered out in the country and talks about how out of hand Pantops development has gotten. “I don’t know what they’re thinking,” says Easton, referring to county government and perhaps the world at large. “They’re crazy.” With all the growth, Easton figures some developer will probably try to buy him out someday soon.

Easton’s Furniture store—packed to the brim with new and used furniture, mattresses and miscellaneous knickknacks —is just on the other side of what is technically a growth area, Village of Rivanna, though there is little out here to suggest it.

Easton’s Furniture is across the road from the pending development, Rivanna Village at Glenmore. “Damn right it’s going to change things,” says Bernie Easton, who owns the store.

The best indicator is the steady flow of traffic heading through the gates of the Glenmore subdivision. During midday, service trucks of all kinds pour down the entrance way—Sysco, Beck Cohen, Robertson Electric—along with a number of shiny SUVs. It’s a gated community, and to get in, I have to visit the sales center and get the Glenmore spiel, which they give me even though I tell them I’m a reporter.

Glenmore opened in 1992 and is now home to 735 families, including UVA football coach Al Groh and former basketball coach Pete Gillen. Rivanna Village at Glenmore is being done by the same developer that did Glenmore, The Kessler Group Associates. But as is often the case, many of the current residents were leary of new development and spoke up at public meetings. A large part of the concern was that the zoning change would allow much denser development than they wanted. One speaker worried about Glenmore’s porous borders and the need for more police presence because of the coming “urban environment.”

When Realtor Angie Decker gives me the Glenmore pitch, which highlights all the private amenities and the gated aspect (“In today’s world, people like that little comfort”), she is tactful in discussing the new development, which is still about six years from fruition.

“The county wants high density, and of course no one wants change,” says Decker.

She thinks it will be great to have and wishes it would be built sooner. For assurances that it will be high quality, she points to the fact that it’s the same developer and that Frank Kessler’s wife lives in the Glenmore manor house.

A drive around Glenmore suggests that residents won’t have much to worry about from the new development. Even the lots closest to the development have a slope to buffer views of all those townhomes. Though a connection will be ready between the two developments, it will only be opened if Glenmore residents want it. And even if that happens, presumably they’ll have another gate to keep out the likes of me.

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