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New GRTC Chief Outlines Five Strategies to Grow Public Transportation

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Increasing overall reliability, creating partnerships, and making our public transit system truly regional are among the foremost goals of new GRTC CEO Julie Timm.

The new CEO of Greater Richmond Transit Co. has a vision of how to build on its recent breakthrough success of increased ridership, and it involves boosting regional commitment.

CEO Julie Timm, a Hampton Roads native, returned to Virginia after serving three years as the chief development officer for Nashville Metropolitan Transit Authority and Regional Transportation Authority of Middle Tennessee. On September 23, she turned her focus toward continuing the growth of public transportation in the Richmond area. GRTC is increasing its numbers of passengers, dodging a national trend of declining ridership. 

From 2014 to 2017 bus ridership nationally dropped by more than half a billion riders, according to a 2017 report by the National Transit Database. But GRTC reported over 16 percent growth in the past fiscal year, according to its ridership trends report.

Timm wants the regional network to become more dynamic and target cluttered streets.

“We definitely have traffic issues here. But I think this is the right time to be addressing them,” she said. “If you wait until you have gridlocked traffic to try and address where the cars go, the cars are already here, and you can’t address it anymore.”

In an interview with Capital News Service, Timm detailed five key components that she thinks will help the region build its public transportation and offset vehicle congestion: partnerships, developing a true regional transportation system, investment from local governments, improving service reliability, and transit-centered development.

Julie Timm, new CEO of GRTC. Photo by Mario Sequeira Quesada, via CNS

Forming Partnerships

Timm acknowledged Richmond’s recent double-digit population growth and its impact on traffic. She believes it is vital that GRTC connects with local and state government, educational institutions, public services, and private businesses to ensure that as the city grows, so does the accessibility to transportation services. 

“If we don’t address how to move in an integrated way of all the different modes and how they share our limited infrastructure we can find ourselves gridlocked,” Timm said. “When you have the city or the state, or you have agencies who provide benefits to people for transportation, it reduces their barriers to be able to work, live, and play.”

For instance, with the partnership between GRTC and Virginia Commonwealth University, VCU students, faculty, and staff can ride the bus for free through a three-year deal. The university sealed the negotiation in June for $4.6 million, paid to GRTC in three annual, increasing payments.

According to VCU, over 95 percent of students and employees expressed support for continuing the GRTC service. The VCU community accounts for approximately 12 percent of GRTC’s total ridership, averaging 87,400 trips a month, the university said. 

Partnerships like this help with vehicle congestion and also provide economic relief to citizens, Timm said. 

“To be able to provide those benefits to people, it supports their ability to maintain their housing and their jobs and their education,” she said. “I just can’t speak highly enough about how important it is for people to come on board and provide those benefits to the community in partnership with GRTC.”

VCU/VUU Pulse Station. Photo by Mario Sequeira Quesada, via CNS

Regional Transportation System

GRTC serves the city of Richmond, and Henrico and Chesterfield counties. The organization is “handcuffed” because it is not an independent authority, Timm said. It operates under policies set by its Board of Directors, which consists of six members who serve one-year terms but are eligible for annual reappointment. Three are appointed by Richmond City Council; three are appointed by the Chesterfield Board of Supervisors. 

The organization’s internal structure restrains its expansion, Timm said, and those issues have to be addressed in order to become a true regional transportation authority — or to partner with one.

“How we do that and how we move forward is something that needs to be established by the board and by our partners and by the state legislature in combination,” she said.

Timm said the groundwork must begin soon. “I’m hoping that we can have an answer over the next year in the development of a regional system that we can all embrace, we can all buy into and that everyone’s voice can be heard in it,” she said.

Investment from Local Government

GRTC generates revenue from bus fares and through advertising. The agency also receives money from federal, state, and local government entities such as the Federal Transit Administration, Virginia Department of Rail and Public Transportation, Richmond, Henrico, and Chesterfield. In some cases, money that comes from these sources can only be used for certain purposes.

But it is local funding from the districts covered by GRTC that is so vital for the company’s growth.  

“We can’t function without that local funding because the money that we receive from state and federal sources requires a local match,” she said.

Timm pointed to Henrico as an example of how impactful local funding can be. Henrico recently budgeted its largest transit investment in 25 years, resulting in a 400 percent increase in the county’s ridership across all routes, according to GRTC’s 2018 annual report.

Bus Stop for GRTC Buses. Photo by Mario Sequeira Quesada, via CNS

Reliability of the Service

A big challenge Timm believes GRTC faces is the perception of public transportation.  The organization is working to change those views.

“People, sometimes, when they think about public transit, they think about the buses from 50 years ago,” she said.  “They think about the school buses they rode that used a lot of diesel.”

Providing a reliable service that offers accessibility, safety, and consistency is the key Timm believes will help change the culture of public transportation. 

“To have that level of frequency, that level of reliability, you will see people respond to it and people will start using it,” she said.

Rider Marina Williams said she celebrates the efficiency of the Pulse line, which runs every 10 minutes in the day over a 7.6-mile loop through Richmond and parts of Henrico. Williams said the other lines aren’t as convenient. 

“I wish they had more buses on some routes,” Williams said. “It is very inconvenient to rely on buses every 30 minutes.”

Church Hill resident Marcel Cheatham agreed that the Pulse is a good service and that other lines are plagued by too many delays. “It takes me two hours to get to work and two hours to get back; the buses don’t stop frequently enough,” he said. “They need more buses.”

Timm agreed that many routes need to run more frequently and for longer hours.

 “Of course, we can only provide as much service as we have funding for and for which we can show there is good demand to serve our current and future riders,” she said. 

She said they are looking for opportunities to increase service to help passengers access a variety of resources.

Inside Pulse. Photo by Mario Sequeira Quesada, via CNS

Timely Planning of City Development

As the city population grows, so do its businesses, services, housing and infrastructure. Timm urges local leaders and developers to include and prioritize transportation access in their planning. Timm hopes development will target high density corridors where GRTC already has infrastructure in place or can connect to it.

“As we look to grow, and as we look to provide that access, think about mobility first, think about it as part of an integral part of the process. Not later,” she said.

Timm appreciated that Richmond Mayor Levar Stoney factored in public transportation in the Navy Hill redevelopment project with the proposed GRTC Transit Center. The project is still under review by Richmond City Council, but it includes a 65,000-square-foot connection hub for bus passengers that would replace the current temporary transfer center on 9th Street. GRTC was already seeking a large space to build a “multi-modal transportation hub” that could help streamline and coordinate scheduling and provide a secure place for waiting passengers. 

“I think it is amazing and exciting that it is part of the conversation,” Timm said. “Too many times you see development and infrastructure and cities grow without having the conversation for how to embrace transit.”

GRTC has concluded the first stage of the Greater RVA Transit Vision Plan and is now under consultant review before the second stage starts, according to spokesperson Carrie Rose Pace. Part of the review is identifying incremental goals that can be implemented in the next five to six years over current service areas in Chesterfield, Henrico, and Richmond, Rose Pace said. 

Timm’s watch is just beginning, but she is optimistic that GRTC can provide the public transportation Richmond wants and needs.

“It’s important to show that when you provide good, frequent, reliable transit … people will use it,” she said. “Slowingly reducing the barriers of how public transportation is perceived will help the growth of ridership.”

Written by Mario Sequeira Quesada, Capital News Service. Top Photo: Pulse arriving at Willow Lawn Station, by Mario Sequeira Quesada, via CNS

GRTC Connects: Route 75 – Willow Lawn to University of Richmond

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The sixth installment in a monthly series in which a hometown Richmonder who has spent over a decade abroad explores the many different neighborhoods accessible by GRTC bus lines to discover the ways transit connects us all.

Willow Lawn:

If the city dwellers of Richmond and the suburbanites of Henrico sometimes seem so distinct as to be entirely different species, then Willow Lawn is the brackish water where the two intermingle. During the day, VCU students ride the Pulse out to meet their needs at the closest thing the city has to a traditional mall. In the evenings, the commuters of Henrico’s many bedroom communities stop off to pick up last-minute items on their way home. On weekends, the ebbs and flows of city and county residents transform into a full-on whirlpool of shoppers, indistinguishable in their consumerist flurry.

From the very beginning of Willow Lawn’s existence, the appeal of this place has always been as a halfway point between two worlds. When the shopping center was first opened in 1956, this collection of strip malls was on the cutting edge of retail. Americans no longer wanted mom-and-pop-shops along a walkable main street. They wanted to drive, park, and buy all the latest national brands.

This model worked for a generation; however, the 1980’s brought the dawn of a new way to spend, see, and be seen: the mall. After a decade of shop closings and dwindling retail options at Willow Lawn, in 1986 the Federal Realty Trust acquired the property, enclosed the middle, and added in a food court to complete the shopping center’s transformation into a mall.

Photo via WillowLawn.com

Willow Lawn’s sales began to sag again at the turn of the century as the malls of the 1980s lost their appeal. In response, the shopping center reinvented itself in 2012 by returning to its open-air model of yesteryear (today branded an “outdoor mall”) and assumed a new name for a new era: The Shops at Willow Lawn. 

This adherence to the evolution of the shopping experience is the lifeblood of Willow Lawn; the website even boasts, “Since its grand opening in 1956, both the landscape and structure of Willow Lawn has evolved to keep consumers happy and stay current with shopping center trends.”

Perhaps it was the stale Hanson song playing over the loudspeakers — no, not “MMMBop,” which may have actually been refreshingly vintage — but as your correspondent walked around The Shops, it was hard not to feel as if the outdoor mall is just the latest iteration of the shopping experience that’s slowly falling out of favor. With one rival, Stony Point, struggling as another, Short Pump Town Center, rapidly urbanizes, what works about Willow Lawn today are all the things the shopping center was designed to eschew.

The 2012 renovation infused the area with an air of astroturfed urbanism. Apartments now sit atop many of the shops. A central plaza features a variety of seating, a canopy, and even a water feature to mimic what people love about public parks. Almost being run down by a car while walking from shop to shop, though, reminds one of what does not work about Willow Lawn: it’s hard to walk, bike, or just be a human that’s not in a car or store here.

All across our region, urban spaces are enjoying a revival. From Main Street Ashland to downtown Hopewell, Virginians are increasingly choosing places with a walkable, bikeable vibe in which to live, work, and play. Perhaps the next redesign of Willow Lawn will reflect the latest model shoppers favor: authentic city streets.

The Ride:

After checking the Transit App for the arrival of the Route 75 bus, the five minute delay provided the perfect amount of time to buy a GRTC mobile pass. The $3.50 day pass wasn’t a bad option for a person like myself that planned on taking a ride somewhere and back, but the absence of a single-ride option proves perplexing.

The lack of a reloadable card system similar to WMATA’s SmarTrip cards makes it unnecessarily hard for the casual rider to catch the bus without exact change on hand. Drivers’ inability to give people change is good for saving time and keeping the buses moving quickly, but the frustration of having to give up a larger bill for a ride valued at $1.50 is especially punitive to low-income riders.  

The addition of a one-way trip to GRTC’s mobile pass options, and/or the introduction of reloadable tap cards, should be priorities as the system innovates to attract more casual riders.

A kind driver welcomed us onto her empty bus as the first afternoon run of the 75 got underway at 4:00pm on a weekday. Route 75 may be the least frequent bus in the entirety of GRTC’s system. Its schedule reveals just twelve westbound trips to the University of Richmond, and oddly only ten eastbound trips to Willow Lawn, per day. As of this past Spring, the 75 runs every half hour, up from just once per hour, during the morning and evening rushes — roughly 6 to 9am and 4 to 6pm, respectively.

A few people hopped aboard at the Libbie Place Shopping Center. A couple passengers got off at Saint Mary’s, apparently to begin evening shifts, based on their scrubs and uniforms. Libbie and York, along the cheery strip of businesses which divide Westhampton and Three Chopt, proved to be the stop with the most people to board or alight the bus. The relatively few points of attraction along Route 75 mean the line has an incredibly high on-time arrival record.

We actually arrived on the UR campus ahead of schedule, and departed the bus with a handful of  students and staff. After helping one other rider with Transit App’s live-tracking GO feature, I instantly became the route’s top rider. With school now back in session, hopefully my reign won’t last long.

The University of Richmond:

The majestic Collegiate Gothic structures of the University of Richmond campus belie a long and often sordid institutional history. The stains upon UR’s legacy reach far into the university’s past and even into the ground upon which it stands; at least one building on campus was built atop a slave burial site.

In 1830, Virginia Baptists founded the precursor to UR, a manual labor college in which men did agricultural work in exchange for training to become ministers. At the start of the Civil War, the entire student body formed a regiment and went to war to preserve slavery. During the fighting, Richmond College — as it was called back then — served as a hospital for Confederate troops. After investing all of its funds into Confederate war bonds, the college was left bankrupt when Robert E. Lee capitulated in 1865. Today, the Thomas Hall building on campus is named after the man who donated $5,000 to reopen Richmond College.

Serving as its president from 1894 to 1945, Dr. Frederic W. Boatwright oversaw sweeping changes in order to chart a new course for the struggling college. In 1914, he raised a small fortune to move the campus from downtown to Westhampton, and in the process opened the Westhampton College for Women. In 1920, the institution was renamed the University of Richmond, with the men’s college assuming the title of Richmond College.  

Photo via University of Richmond/memory.richmond.edu

The school’s dedication to missionary work brought the first non-white students to campus in the early 1920s; however, the coterie of Chinese who matriculated into UR were still “subject to racial stereotyping and endured racist language.” Black students, on the other hand, weren’t allowed on campus until over four decades later in 1968, but according to UR’s website, “integration was half-hearted and incomplete at best. In 1969, there were still only 6 black students. Even through the early 1970s, the majority of the black students on campus would be recruited track athletes.”

During this year’s Black History Month, the blackface admissions of Governor Ralph Northam and Attorney General Mark Herring reopened the wounds left by UR’s own blackface scandals in the 1980s. In a picture in the 1980 yearbook, a black student stands on a table with a noose around his next, a drink in his hand, and a smile on his face as five white students hooded in Ku Klux Klan uniforms surround him. Such terrifying pictures have been the subject of much debate on campus and “bring into question the comfort of public racism at the University.” 

Photo via University of Richmond/memory.richmond.edu

The separation of the sexes — underscored by Westhampton Lake as a barrier between the two sides — endured even longer. As UR staff member Kim Catley explains, “It wasn’t until 2002 that men and women began living on both sides of the lake and 2006 before residence halls went co-ed.” Even today, men and women at UR are still pointlessly sorted into Richmond and Westhampton Colleges, based on their gender.

While the history of UR suggests the institutional culture of Richmond’s top private university to be stodgy and traditionalist, student life and campus policies present a different picture. UR’s two gendered colleges readily work with transgender and non-binary students to help them switch to the college in which they feel most comfortable. Today, UR even produces Common Ground, a campus-wide inclusion effort, and has designated a point person to help trans students. This enlightened culture arose out the work of Joh Gehlbach and Jon Henry — leaders of UR’s Student Alliance for Sexual Diversity — who in 2011 gathered over 1,000 signatures in support of updating the university’s non-discrimination policy to include gender identity and expression. The change made UR only the third school in Virginia to do so.

Although much of the visible diversity on campus comes from international students, recently UR changed its admission policy to encourage low-income Virginians to apply. Leveraging its $2 billion endowment (among the 40 largest in the country), UR now provides in-state students with a family income under $60,000 financial aid packages without loans that cover full-tuition and room and board. Also, the children of all UR staff — not just faculty and administration — receive free tuition if accepted.

Although VCU earned a lot of press for its collaboration with GRTC to give its students, faculty, and staff unlimited access to the bus system, UR was already offering this. To get a free GRTC bus pass through UR, students only have to fill out this simple online form. UR actually fought to add Route 75 into the redesign, and later to increase its frequency, as many faculty and staff rely on it to get to and from campus.  

Why the university continues to pay hundreds of thousands, if not millions, of dollars to maintain its six private shuttle routes instead of investing that money into increased frequency for the 75 or new GRTC routes is a question for students, faculty, and the board of trustees. Ridership of Henrico’s lines nearly doubled after they expanded coverage of three lines to nights and weekends.

Willow Lawn and the University of Richmond long prided themselves on being places away from the rest of the city — somewhat suburban enclaves of refined retail and higher education. Today, they are discovering newfound strength thanks to their increasing relationship with the city of Richmond, its creative people, and its vibrant culture. If Willow Lawn and UR continue to lean into their connection with the rest of the River City, the whole region will be stronger for it.

Photos by Wyatt Gordon, except where otherwise noted. Top Photo: Wyatt’s friend Que (far right) takes in the seating arrangement at Willow Lawn.

Exploring The Richmond Arts District Car-Free

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From its highly walkable layout to easy access by bus and bike, the Richmond Arts District makes it easy to leave your car at home.

Finding parking and navigating one-way streets downtown can seem daunting and inconvenient to even the most experienced Richmond drivers. Luckily, the Richmond Arts District is easily accessible without the use of a car. With its own bus station, multiple bike share locations nearby, and a multitude of activities in one space, it’ll leave people questioning why they ever bought a car to begin with.

Even if cost and ease of parking are not concerns for the prospective Arts District visitor, there is another important factor to keep in mind when making transportation choices: carbon. Cars release harmful air pollutants like carbon dioxide, which can contribute to global warming. Having less vehicles on the road will alleviate some of the pressure put on the environment.

“Transportation is Virginia’s largest source of carbon pollution; about 45% of all of Virginia’s carbon emissions come from transportation,” said David Oglethorpe, Communications Manager for Virginia Conservation Network. 

Public transportation offers a way to get from place to place quickly and reduce the carbon footprint of transportation. GRTC offers public transportation for the City of Richmond, including the GRTC Pulse, which was introduced the summer of 2018. 

“Our [Pulse] buses are fueled by compressed natural gas, CNG for short, and that has lower emissions than of course gasoline would,” said Carrie Rose Pace, GRTC Pulse Director of Communications. “It’s a shared ride, which means you are taking advantage of sharing a ride with a vehicle deliberately placed to mitigate your footprint.” 

The GRTC Pulse is a modern, high quality, high capacity rapid transit system that serves a 7.6-mile route along Broad Street and Main Street, from Rocketts Landing in the City of Richmond to Willow Lawn in Henrico County. It’s straight up and down Broad — just make sure to get on the bus going the correct direction and you’ll soon arrive at your destination.

“The Pulse is definitely the easiest route if you’re not used to using [mass] transit,” said Pace. “All of the stations were intentionally selected to connect with what are called activity centers” — parts of Richmond that offer a lot of things to do within a small area. The Arts District has its own station located right beside Tarrant’s Cafe, Max’s on Broad, the Maggie Walker statue, and The Mix Gallery.

Each ride costs only $1.50 for standard customers and there are opportunities for seniors, minors, and people with disabilities to qualify for a reduced fare ride. Tickets can be purchased from kiosks at any Pulse station. “You can get a day pass for $3.50 to use to hop on and off whenever you want, which is great if you’re trying to explore Richmond,” Pace said. The GRTC even has an app that tracks the busses, shows stations, and can help with purchasing a bus pass.  

To get some extra exercise, there is also the option of walking or biking through the Arts District. “If you can bike, if you can walk, think about that first,” Oglethorpe said. “It’s going to be more cost effective and significantly cut down and reduce your carbon footprint.” 

Richmond is making strides to becoming a more bike-friendly city. On Franklin Street there is a two-way protected bike lane. Louise Lockett Gordon, the director of Bike Walk RVA, suggests that new bikers try a cycling class with the Richmond Area Bicycling Association to help them get used to biking in the city. 

Bikes are available for rent all over Richmond through RVA Bike Share. They have two stations in or near the Arts District. There is a station beside Abner Clay Park in Jackson Ward, one by the Dominion Energy Center at the corner of Grace and Sixth Street, and one at City Hall. RVA Bike Share offers memberships, daily and weekly passes, or just a one-way trip. With 20 stations, the bike share service allows you to bike into the Arts District all the way from Scott’s Addition or Church Hill. 

“Being out of a car and walking or biking, you’re not in a sedentary position,” said Gordon. “We’re using our cardiovascular system, we’re using our muscles, all of our systems are being used if we’re walking or biking, as opposed to just sitting in our car.”

Walking and running isn’t easy everywhere in Richmond — there are lots of uneven sidewalks and busy roads. However, the Arts District has wide shady sidewalks on Broad and Grace Street, as well as wide open areas around the Virginia Capitol. You can also visit Abner Clay Park in Jackson Ward. 

Once you make it to the Arts District, there is plenty to do and see. True to its name, the Arts District is packed full of art galleries, including the 1708 Gallery, Gallery 5, Quirk Gallery, The Mix Gallery and more. At the beginning of every month all of the galleries stay open late for First Fridays, which is a great way to see all that the galleries have to offer. However, for those looking to avoid crowds, the galleries are open during normal business hours as well. In additional to visual art, there are opportunities to see performing arts at the Virginia Repertory Theatre and the National Theater.

For history buffs, there are museums such as the Black History Museum and Cultural Center of Virginia, and the Maggie L. Walker National Historic Site. Both of these are located in the Jackson Ward neighborhood which is a National Historic Landmark district. 

In between all of the art galleries and museums there are plenty of places to eat. The Arts District is home to a variety of restaurants including classics like Tarrant’s Cafe and Perly’s, fine dining like Max’s on Broad and Bistro 27, and fun spots like Bar Solita.  

If all of this seems like too much to do in a day there are plenty of hotels including the boutique hotel Quirk, where visitors can stay overnight.

Regardless of how you make the trip, the Richmond Arts District is always worth a visit. And that visit will be easier, more pleasant, and way better for the environment if you go car-free.

GRTC Connects: Route 14 – Bellevue to the Arts District

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Here’s the next installment of a monthly series in which a hometown Richmonder who has spent over a decade abroad explores the many different neighborhoods accessible by GRTC bus lines to find the ways GRTC connects us all.

Bellevue:

Bellevue positively radiates springtime cheer. Manicured lawns brimming with perky daffodils and blossoming dogwoods line Fauquier Avenue — the grand boulevard designed to lure Richmonders at the corner of Brook Road and Laburnum into the belly of Bellevue.

In the lush median a small historic stone arch emblazoned “Bellevue” mimics its larger brother, which frames the entrance to Pope Avenue from Hermitage Road. This larger original, the Bellevue Arch, memorializes John Pope: developer, business partner (and rumored lover) to Lewis Ginter, and founding father of Bellevue.

In the late 1880s the two men bought several farms north of the city to develop into picturesque streetcar suburbs for Richmond’s burgeoning bourgeoisie. Shortly after the completion of Bellevue’s iconic arch in 1894, Pope passed away, leaving the implementation of his grand plans to his less enthusiastic heirs. Construction boomed during the Roaring Twenties, crashed in the Great Depression, and by the end of the 1940s most lots in the neighborhood had been populated by independent owners with the Tudor Revivals, Bungalows, Colonial Revivals, Foursquares, and Spanish Colonial Revivals visible today.

Those Richmonders already familiar with this idyllic area probably have Bob Kocher in part to thank. The two tiny commercial corridors along MacArthur and Bellevue Avenues were nearly vacant save for Dot’s Back Inn, which — like Joe’s in the Fan — functions as much as a local institution as a restaurant and bar. Realizing Bellevue’s potential, Kocher snapped up much of the retail strip along MacArthur and opened Once Upon a Vine. With alcohol to anchor the area, many other independent businesses soon began moving in, leading to today’s thriving, tight-knit community Bellevue is beloved to be.

I met my longtime friend and companion for the day, Ginna Lambert, at Stir Crazy Café on MacArthur. With its cozy interior and fine roasted coffee, this underappreciated gem deserves a reputation as the best coffee house on the Northside. Cold brews in hand, we sauntered toward our next destination on Bellevue Avenue, while being greeted by many a neighborhood cat and one friendly resident on his porch.

As a born and raised Southerner, my heart melts for a perfectly baked biscuit, and if it’s topped with gravy as good as that from the Early Bird Biscuit Company’s latest location, then my morning is made. One order of their “biscuits & crazy” always hits the spot. Stomachs full and spirits high, we moseyed through verdant Bellevue toward Hermitage Road to catch the Route 14 bus downtown.

The Bus Ride:

Studies show that people waiting for a bus at a stop devoid of amenities perceive the wait to be longer than it actually is, while those at stops with benches, a shelter, or a real-time arrival sign perceive the wait to be much shorter. Unfortunately, no seating or shelter greeted us; no route map or timetable was posted.

Standing under the cement columns along Hermitage, which once powered the Lakeside Streetcar Line and today serve as mere utility poles, Ginna navigated GRTC’s website and trip planner (which simply takes you to Google Maps) to see we had a seven-minute wait till the next bus.

I instead checked the Transit app, which uses real-time, crowd-sourced data from its users to let you know when your bus will arrive. Transit showed a 24-minute wait, 17 minutes longer than GRTC and Google’s estimation. We stood (remember the lack of a bench?) and waited. Two northbound buses and twenty-four minutes passed before our southbound bus finally arrived, just as Transit predicted.

This 17-minute discrepancy leads one to wonder why GRTC doesn’t scrap its own app, deploy the savings to expand service, and declare Transit their official mobility app, as other underfunded public transit agencies have done.

A friendly driver welcomed us on board the empty bus as we began to zip through Northside toward the Arts District. On the way, we passed popular spots like the Arthur Ashe Athletic Center, the Diamond, Hardywood Brewery, and Virginia Union University.

At the Maggie Walker Governor’s School, kids sat on the sidewalk waiting on the 14 bus. At the Lombardy Kroger, a dozen elderly women and several families with small children crowded the sidewalk, holding their bags of groceries with nowhere to sit. Along that entire stretch with two dozen stops, just two on Broad Street had benches, and only one stop — in front of VUU — featured a shelter.

The Arts District:

The stretch of Broad Street from the Institute for Contemporary Art to The National — loosely referred to as “the Arts District” — should best be understood less as a formal neighborhood with concrete borders and more as a particularly lively stretch of downtown cobbled together by history, its prime location, and regulatory and financial incentives. The spine of the corridor, Broad Street, wasn’t always the vast, 15-mile-long artery of the city it is today. Until the turn of the 19th century, Broad Street was no more than “a country road with corn fields and cow pastures on either side and here and there a house.”

Railroad trains delivering passengers and goods from up north ran straight down the middle of the street until the end of the 1880s. The throngs of people disembarking their trains patronized the many stores, restaurants, and theaters that sprung up along Richmond’s stateliest of boulevards. Commerce and commotion became the hallmarks of the area, as Broad Street grew into the Commonwealth’s premier place to be. Over the following decades, furniture factories, dense apartments to house their workers, and the world’s first electric streetcar line transformed the area into a raucous mix of residences, retail, and entertainment.

The Supreme Court’s decision to integrate schools in 1954 and the white flight that followed heralded the end of the area’s heyday; however, this prestigious section of Broad Street managed to largely dodge disinvestment until the eruption of the race riots that engulfed cities across the country following the assassination of Civil Rights leader Martin Luther King Jr.

On the night of April 6, 1968, a group of 300 men started breaking storefront windows, overturning vehicles, throwing firebombs, and looting. Police quickly quelled the chaos, and by morning the violence and destruction had been fully contained in our capital city, which prizes stability and authority. Witnesses reported “at least one store on nearly every block along Broad Street from Adams to Seventh Street had [to replace] broken windows with plywood or makeshift boarding.”

Many of the abandoned and boarded up storefronts that blight Broad Street to this day date back to this spasm of America’s underlying racial tensions half a century ago. The corridor’s reputation was sullied; its many businesses began migrating to Henrico and Chesterfield. Over the 1970s and 80s, suburban shopping centers and mega-malls sapped the area of investment.

The revitalization of this segment of Broad Street and its eventual branding as “the Arts District” is inextricable from the rise of Virginia Commonwealth University in the 1990s. VCU’s aggressive expansion, combined with historic rehabilitation tax credits from the Federal Park Service and the Virginia State Department of Historic Resources, piqued the interest of private developers like local grocery mogul Jim Ukrop. Galleries and cafés catering to students abounded, and old furniture factories morphed into multi-family apartments.

Two decades later, pawn shops and payday lenders seamlessly blend with hipster boutiques and fine-dining (and drinking) establishments like Tarrant’s, Bistro 27, and Comfort. The explosion of first-class coffee houses such as Urban Hang Suite, the Lab by Alchemy, or Lift Café have brought in daytime foot traffic that used to exist here only when a show was on. Perhaps no other business better embodies the ongoing restoration of the Arts District from a long neglected corridor into one of Richmond’s chicest milieus than Quirk Hotel, with its posh gallery and rooftop bar.

Anyone looking to experience the district at the peak of its artsiness need only join in on a monthly First Friday, when the area’s greatest galleries, such as 1708, Black Iris, and Candela, open up their doors to art enthusiasts and revelers alike. Between the National, Coalition Theater, the Hippodrome, and the Virginia Repertory Theater, one could fill nearly every evening with live music, comedy, and drama.

With Central Virginia’s first Bus Rapid Transit line, the Pulse, speeding more people than ever in, out, and through the Arts District, Broad Street is beginning to feel more like the paragon of progress it was a century ago, when its wide streets, linear aesthetics, and electric street lights represented an idealized future of order and prosperity. Perhaps only in Scott’s Addition is the feeling of excitement about the future as palpable.

The corridor’s potential is undeniable. Currently, vacant structures can be converted to dense housing and charming new storefronts. The Pulse offers residents the first Richmond neighborhood in which they can feasibly live, work, and play, all without having to own a car.

Will the further development of the Arts District move in a civic-minded direction, guided by the many noble nonprofits in the area such as the Elegba Folklore Society, Housing Opportunities Made Equal, Code VA, or the Better Housing Coalition? Will this rising neighborhood take an unfortunate turn towards soulless, profit-driven enterprises, embodied by the slated Common House — a “social club” that charges members a $300 initiation fee and $150 monthly dues to access its excessive amenities?

Since its inception over two centuries ago Broad Street has symbolized the exciting future of our capital city. Hopefully the relatively recent addition of the Maggie Walker statue at North Adams and Broad, in the heart of the neighborhood, focuses minds on the power of investment to uplift and integrate historically marginalized communities. The tension between exclusion and inclusion has always existed, and Richmonders will decide which side wins out going forward in Bellevue, the Arts District, and the entire city.

Modern photos and screencaps by Wyatt Gordon. Historic photos from The Valentine’s archives


Op-Ed: VCU’s Partnership With GRTC Is More Than An Investment In Transit

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For VCU student Adam Lockett, the VCU-GRTC partnership represents an important opportunity for the University to give back to both its students and employees, and to the city itself.

The future of access to Richmond’s bus system is in jeopardy. This month, the Greater Richmond Transit Company (GRTC) and VCU will decide whether or not to continue a successful partnership which affords VCU students and employees unlimited access to all GRTC routes at no cost. Although the benefits of this partnership far outweigh the costs, details about the beginnings of talks to greatly reduce this service if additional money is not appropriated to GRTC by VCU were recently made public.

Ridership data tells us that the partnership is doing overwhelmingly better than projected: VCU riders make about 82,000 trips per month, making up about 12% of GRTC’s ridership overall. At a price tag of $1.2 million, the VCU community is riding the buses more frequently than the university’s contributions cover in fares.

What is at stake in current talks is negotiating a new deal where the University continues to cover costs. Otherwise their support will only afford rides along two routes, instead of all 40 within the network.

Limiting access to the VCU community will come down to two generally East to West routes: Route 5 and the Pulse. Route 5 serves Cary and Main streets from Carytown, through VCU, into downtown, and to the Whitcomb neighborhood. The Pulse runs along Broad and Main Streets from Willow Lawn to Rocketts Landing.

Most notably, restricting VCU’s free student and employee use to these two lines will cut off access to bus routes running North to South in the city. An employee who lives in Forest Hill, Southside, Manchester, or Northside — who has been able to rely on this service — may have the benefit of a no-cost ride to work suddenly stripped from them.

This is not the first time that VCU has gone to bat with GRTC to make a deal. In 2012, the University contracted GRTC to run the Campus Connector route, between Monroe Park and MCV campuses, at a cost of $1.7 million. That year, they opted to switch to a private third-party operator, to drive their VCU branded buses between the campuses for an annual cost of $1.82 million. Both of these amounts of money exceed the $1.2 million the University agreed upon in the summer of 2018 to fund the current partnership with GRTC, the benefits of which cover a wider student and employment body than existed six years ago.

If you give people access to transit, they will use it.

Canceling the full partnership is not the only detriment to transit that VCU may be responsible for. The school is looking to reduce comprehensive transportation by discontinuing the Campus Connector service as well. They are now in talks with City Council to grant permission to fund a detour for the Route 5 onto Broad and 11th Streets, in order to replace the service with an existing GRTC line — one that would remain free for VCU students and employees, even under the reduced support currently being discussed.

Altering this route would place interest in the university over the needs of those who rely on this frequent route daily. The proposed quarter-mile detour will be costly and slow down the bus. Canceling the third-party operation is not necessarily a bad thing — it’s probably long overdue. However, canceling the third-party operation at the same time that the scope of the partnership with GRTC is being reduced would result in disastrous consequences for VCU students and employees who rely on the current bus system.

This change would severely limit those who travel between the two campuses, whether they are coming from work, class, or home. A much better option is to use the savings from ending the third-party Campus Connector program to sustain the full GRTC partnership for the entire city bus network. After all, GRTC is more than a replacement for the Campus Connector bus; it is a gateway to the full spectrum of what Richmond has to offer, far beyond Monroe Park and MCV.

Back in October 2018, VCU’s Office of Parking and Transportation was proud to report on Facebook that “More than 40 [VCU] parking subscribers have already turned in their permits to use [GRTC] instead.” But would this sort of thing continue if access to most GRTC routes were discontinued? Not every student and employee lives in The Fan or along Broad Street, and can take advantage of just two bus routes in order to ditch their cars at home. Cutting access may bring those parking subscribers right back, congesting the streets and fail to fulfill a key goal of the “One VCU Master Plan” to reduce greenhouse gas emissions.

No matter how you slice it, the VCU partnership with GRTC is worth it. Not just for the students and employees, but for all GRTC riders. Even those unaffiliated with VCU benefit from the University’s participation; the extra operating funds paid in by VCU improve the bus service for everyone. As the most prominent public institution and the largest employer in the city, VCU must continue funding full access to the GRTC bus network. It is an investment in their students and employees, as well as in education, arts, culture, and civic engagement — indeed, in our city itself.

VCU relies on talent and infrastructure from Richmond City; it should actively participate in making the city better.

Note: Op-Eds are contributions from guest writers and do not reflect RVA Magazine editorial policy.

Photo: VCU, via Facebook

GRTC Connects: Route 1 – Manchester to Ginter Park

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The first installment of a monthly series in which a hometown Richmonder who has spent over a decade abroad explores the many different neighborhoods accessible by GRTC bus lines to find the ways GRTC connects us all.

Manchester:

Walking down Hull Street it doesn’t take much imagination to envision Manchester in its glory days as the seat of Chesterfield County — and later a proudly independent city — that flourished in the Reconstruction era.  

Manchester Courthouse and the Mechanics & Merchants Bank remind visitors of the building boom and prosperity of the 1870s and ‘80s, as newly freed blacks abandoned plantations to find work at the city’s bustling docks, to open shops and eateries, and to make something of their newfound freedom.  

The Late Gothic Revival style of the First Baptist Church of Manchester (today “South Richmond”) personifies the confidence and hope of the day that inspired our city’s oldest independent black congregation to build such a grandiose church along Manchester’s main boulevard.

From the Valentine’s Cook Photograph Collection.

The shuttered storefronts and dilapidated homes tell a very different tale today. Beyond Manchester’s remnants of grandeur, one begins to notice a pattern of neglect. It may be tempting to blame individual property owners or generic urban decay; however, such facile logic belies the systemic abandonment of “Dogtown” — the derogatory nickname Richmonders came up with for their Southside sister city.

After the Supreme Court ruled “separate but equal” schools unconstitutional in 1954, wealthy whites began to flee urban Richmond in favor of the mushrooming suburbs of Chesterfield, Henrico, and — to a lesser extent — Hanover. The failure of Massive Resistance only expedited the trend, leaving large swaths of Manchester abandoned.

Since the 1930s the federal Home Owners Loan Corporation deemed Manchester investment grade D due to its “infiltration of a lower grade population” (read: blacks).  This practice of redlining excluded residents from mortgages and other lines of credit available to those who lived in wealthier and whiter neighborhoods.

The Urban Renewal policies of the 1960s struck another blow to Manchester as federal funds financed the removal of “blight” (i.e. dense, black communities) in favor of public housing like Hillside Court. In the decade after the Housing Act of 1949, 425,000 units of housing were demolished in black communities across the country while only 125,000 were built.  

Suburbanization meant retail flocked ever further south and west, with the construction of Southside Plaza and Cloverleaf Mall, respectively. Several smart investors recognized the opportunity in Manchester and opened pioneering Southside businesses like Croaker’s Spot and Legend Brewing in the 1980s and ‘90s; however, the revitalization of this charming historic neighborhood didn’t truly take off until the early 2000s.

The establishment of the Manchester Historic District and the rezoning of the area’s former tobacco warehouses to loft apartments triggered a wave of investment. The expansion of Capital One and the addition of amenities like the Floodwall Walk and the T. Tyler Potterfield Memorial Bridge have brought new attention, new residents, and new tensions to Manchester.

The renovated Hull Street Library, Dogtown Dance Theater, and all the sleek new lofts represent the dawning of a new era for this Southside neighborhood. The Manchester food scene may soon become its own genre of Richmond’s culinary boom, thanks to standouts like Camden’s Dogtown Market, Pig & Brew, Ironclad Pizza, Soul-Ice, and the Butterbean Market & Cafe.  

Across the street from the Butterbean & Hot Diggity Donuts, the owners of those two establishments are also opening Dogtown Brewing Co. — complete with a scenic, fourth floor rooftop bar that feels like something from Washington, D.C.’s U Street.

Your correspondent began his day with a delectable $3.25 cup of cold brew from Brewer’s, a sum on par with any other quality coffee shop in the city that still feels unattainable to many who live in Manchester. Just across the street from Brewer’s, new housing is going up, filling a block long left empty with new life.

Dogtown Brewing Co. (via their website)

This is the contradiction of modern Manchester.  The area’s sprigs of growth promise a better future and higher quality of life, but many of today’s residents question whether they will be able to afford to stick around and enjoy it in a decade.

After boarding GRTC’s 1A at Commerce Road, your correspondent enjoyed the river views while crossing the Mayo bridge, trundled through Downtown and up Chamberlayne Avenue, and alighted the bus in Ginter Park at Westwood Avenue in under twenty-five minutes.

Lewis Ginter, From “Historic VCU: A VCU Images Special Collection” VCU Libraries, James Branch Cabell Library (CC BY 2.0, via Wikimedia)

Ginter Park:

While visiting Melbourne, Australia in the late 19th century, tobacco magnate Major Lewis E. Ginter was awestruck by the lifestyles of the local elite, as they retreated each evening after work back to their country manors. Upon his return to Richmond, Ginter acquired several hundred acres of farmland in Henrico so he could realize his dream for a suburb “where a gentleman could ride to and from work without the sun’s glare in his face.”

Ginter immediately set about crafting his eponymous neighborhood in a meticulous manner. First he laid out an extended street grid and divided the parcels into single-family lots, so that each new resident could build their home of a size and style of their choosing. Next he gifted Union Theological (today “Presbyterian”) Seminary a large plot of land at the center of the community in order to lure them from Hampden-Sydney in Farmville and serve as the anchor of his development.  

If the artesian well water and shade-lined boulevards weren’t ritzy enough to entice investors, Ginter even finagled the extension of Richmond’s first electric trolley line up Chamberlayne Avenue (mirroring today’s GRTC Route 1) so residents could enjoy a fifteen minute commute downtown for just a nickel.

Unfortunately, upon the magnate’s death in 1897, only a few cottages had so far been constructed. Ginter Park wouldn’t begin to boom for another decade. Post-1908, construction raced along until a brief slump during World War I, but quickly picked back up during the Roaring Twenties. This prolonged period of building created a rich architectural legacy, with homes ranging from humble cottages to grandiose mansions.  

To this day, Ginter Park remains one of the best parts of town to explore a wide variety of styles nestled comfortably together: Spanish Colonial, Arts and Crafts, Bungalow, American Foursquare, Queen Anne, Colonial Revival, Shingle Style, and Tudor Revival.  The elite status a Ginter Park address conferred led Richmonders to dub the neighborhood “the Queen of the Suburbs.”

The rise of the automobile and the desperation of the Great Depression caused residents of Ginter Park initially to welcome Chamberlayne Avenue’s designation as U.S. Route 1 — the great North-South corridor that served as the precursor to I-95. However, the resulting heavy traffic and many large trucks began to deteriorate residents’ quality of life and destroy the fabric of the neighborhood.

By the end of the 1950s, many of the area’s once-luxurious manors and mansions had been converted into tourist homes and nursing homes, or were completely demolished in favor of multi-family apartment complexes. Much of the rezoning which so tragically altered Chamberlayne Avenue’s character excluded the rest of Ginter Park, thus allowing the majority of this verdant suburb to dodge ugly redevelopment.

Although former Governor Doug Wilder and Senator Tim Kaine call Ginter Park home, perhaps the legacy of the area’s other most famous resident, Joseph Bryan, best encapsulates the arc of the neighborhood’s character. The newspaper man behind the Richmond Times bought land off of Laburnum in 1883 and built himself a palatial brick mansion, which the Bryan family later donated to Richmond Memorial Hospital. After serving as the hospital’s east wing for decades, the entire structure was renovated in the late 2000s to become luxury condominiums.

Canopy at Ginter Park (via their website)

With multiple massive apartment complexes in the pipeline for Brook Road and Chamberlayne Avenue, one can understand the apprehension of Ginter Park’s residents toward further development, even if one may not agree. For many, their neighborhood’s delicate balance between historic homes and condo complexes hangs in the balance.

If Richmond pundits were right that the debate over the Brook Road Bike Lane was really a referendum on the future direction of the area, then the resounding defeat of Councilmembers Gray’s and Hilbert’s ordinance to block the bike lane may signal Northsiders’ increasing demand for the dense, walkable trappings of New Urbanism — the currently en vogue planning movement towards sustainable, mixed-use communities.

Walking along Ginter Park’s many leafy lanes, it’s not hard to imagine all the empty lots and aging apartments being replaced with more tasteful, denser housing in the coming decades. Indeed, if the GRTC Pulse ever expanded to include a North-South route, the lure of a convenient commute from Northside through to Manchester may prove irresistible for developers and locals alike.