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Charlottesville Tomorrow has a great feature on the upcoming changes to the Downtown Mall. If you recall, we discovered that the changes were being made to accommodate ghosts.
I’m not sure if the changes are for humans or meta-beings, but you can visit the official downtown mall site to find out more.
Who thinks these design changes all resulted from one flaw in the mall? I do.
What is that flaw? Women can’t walk in heels because of the cobblestones. I’m telling you some hot date/wifey complained to her man that she couldn’t wear heals and *BAM* millions of dollars are spent on fixing the cobblestones.
Don’t forget to voice your opinion in the online survey.
Related posts:
- Movie Filming on Downtown Mall?
- City to Sell Original Downtown Mall Bricks to the Public During Restoration
- MIT Has Solution to Downtown Mall Renovation
It’s more than that, Thor. The sight-impaired and handicapped have problems navigating the uneven terrain, as well. Part of the plan is to assure that they are accomodated.
If those changes mean I can walk the mall in my stilettos, without breaking an ankle, well then yay me.
(i know i was being a little silly)
That’s okay. Silly is good!
i pride myself on my ability to walk on the mall in stilettos without falling. it’s one of my (few) talents. and now the powers that be are taking that away from me! do some calf exercises, girls, and deal with it.
Does this include the blind drunk?
Either the Hook or C-VILLE did a great piece about all of the improvements to come and the contracting issues between local/non-local company, and doing a site search for “downtown mall” on either site is going to leave me with too many results. Can someone link this, please? Thanks!
Oh, I deal. Believe me. I work and live on the mall. I’ve mastered the eleventh level of wobble control. I’d just rather be able to shelve that talent.
A-HA!
Read the Hook
oh right, none of you know me. and therefore none of you know that i fall on that mall more than anyone else, and could not appreciate the sarcasm in that comment. ah well…my constantly scraped and busted-up knees are ecstatic about this news!
My opinion?
http://img254.imageshack.us/img254/9420/shoeof1.jpg
i’m just excited because now i’ll be able to ride my segway up and down the mall without looking like a deeeeeeeee-bag.
oh wait, that’s not possible.
Will the better paving attract sk8rs? I hope so. I love throwing shoulders into them as they speed past me.
So much skater hate amongst the villain community. Otherwise a pretty nice place.
i used to be a skater, so i can’t hate too much. it was a major part of how i learned to smoke, drink, fight, and dress like an idiot.
i’m all growns up!
You used to be able to walk down the mall with Stiletto’s.
At least that’s what my sources say….and then about 5 years ago, they stopped doing regular maintenance and upkeep on the brick. Some sections are better than others, although at this point, it’s all pretty bad.
Stiletto’s may be the sexier example, but it has affected the disabled equally.
Our only hope is that they manage to do this renovation quickly and painlessly so that they don’t end up killing the Downtown Mall traffic during the construction…3rd street anyone?
I guess I am busted….But after I complained to my hubby and he didn’t do anything, i called Mary Joy at the city to find out if I needed to start a petition, and she told me that they were already bidding out the project (in October 2007), The depressing part is they are replacing the brick with (holds her breath…BRICK..so forget about heels altogether girls….
two! two! here i am!
I rollerskated from Rapture to Millers in 2000 (I include the year cause it was the last year I was in either place) on Halloween drunk and happy, without falling. I think the alcohol helped keep me steady. I am very proud of this moment and even have the pictures to prove it. Plus I love Parlie.
I remember seeing you that night Roller Girl! grrrrrr!
yeah, I was roller girl and I love Silmo.
hey caroline, sorry i’m late!
listen, i know we’re standing basically in public talking to each other in front of about 5,000 internet people, but, i just want to tell you, i- ithinkyourhairsmellsAWESOME! GRINS!
*blushes
no, there are only 5 people on the internets silly parlie.
Make that 6 beeyotch! You’re really going to be there tomorrow?
Hey 2o4, you’re back in town? *applauds in anticipation of affirmative reply* [both questions]
i know, i have no idea what’s going on.
hips, yes yes my lovely I am going to be there tomorrow beeotch! Now gather up lilith, two and the others and let’s do this thing! I’ll meetcha downstairs at 7:30 with silmo.
You guys are like, cliquey.
Did any yall see the Shel Silverstein bridge stuff tonight? T’was amazing. That place ’s got some good.
No, but I heard that hot local actress LoraLee was one of the readers.
yeah, the silverstein stuff was great – loralee rocked
2o4: A few things I only learned by attending public meetings about the mall renovation project. They’re probably going to be using a material which looks like brick, but isn’t. It wears better, whatever it’s made of. Looks exactly like brick, though.
And although they originally were going to replace the bricks with bricklike items which are exactly the same size, even that is under reconsideration. Apparently, the bricks we have are longer than those available easily, on a commercial level. Because they are longer, their tendency to rock back and forth is higher (leading to a lot of oopsies, over time). Add to it the fact that the only company which makes that size of replacement bricklike item is located in Nebraska, and people generally agree it’s a bad idea all the way round to stick with that size. To be a locally sustainable resource (as was stated at the residents’ meeting last night) whatever the resource is needs to be available within 500 miles of us. Since that’s not the case, and the size we currently have are prone to instability, way likely we’re going to be using a smaller, more stable size.
Also, the problem isn’t so much the brick as how they place it. Or so we were told. Right now, we have brick and morter, on top of a concrete slab. The morter, as we all know, is toast after years of cold, hot and chemical treatments. The plan is to set the bricks on top of the slab in some sort of way using sand. It’ll look pretty much the same, but work better. Any problems walking on the bricks up by the transit center and freedom wall? Nope. And you can tell that problems aren’t likely to happen, any time soon, up there. Those are set using a sand method.
Just in general, as a mall resident, I was pretty heartened by a lot that I heard at the meeting last night. They are adding (if the funding all goes through) a bunch of really, REALLY cool water elements. A tiered fountain, leading down to the mall near the Omni. A street level squirty kind of fountain for kids (or kids like me) to play in when it gets hot, down by the carousel. They’ll turn it off in winter, natch. But I like what they’ve put on paper, so far, much more than I was fearing I would.
It all sounds so wonderful! I’m so glad my taxes are going to things like this and not building houses for those people that can’t afford new ones.
It’s called economic development, gobbles. Must keep mall viable and attractive or people won’t want to eat, shop, work, live here. Of course if no one wanted to live here, housing would be pretty damn, cheap so maybe we should just let the place go to hell
The funny thing is that you forget to mention that the rent is so high downtown that most of these restraunts cant handle even a 2 week slump without going under. Think about it this way, they redesigned the street next to Rapture and that took them 4 1/2 months. Now you’re talking about removing and repaving the ENTIRE downtown area and let me just say it will look different in more ways than the bricks. People tend to not go to places they cant get to, and if you think this will be an over-night job you’re crazy.
The bricks is one of the things that makes the downtown what it is, and if you want them removed because is messes with your little “Sex and the City” image, you’re retarded.