Ghentite

This is all hypothetical but an interesting situation may arise. Cordish partnered with Comcast to build Xfinity Live in Philly, which Waterside will almost replicate minus the sports theme of everything. Comcast is behind this NBA to Va Beach push. Could VB/Comcast/Cordish work a deal to take this waterside proposal to the beach instead of Norfolk?

I think the last we heard anything was City Council was going to begin negotiating with Cordish behind closed doors. Hopefully, that's happening now.

There was a lot of movement on this in February, with a number of townhall type meetings with the current residents over there. Frank Duke also gave briefings on this during a couple of City Council Meetings. This was also during all of the Waterside Activity so it seemed to take a backseat to that. Anyway, here's the city's site on St. Pauls. http://www.norfolk.gov/planning/SaintPaulsQuadrant.asp

Domino's Pizza coming downtown: http://norfolklive.blogspot.com/2012/08/dominos-pizza-coming-to-granby-st.html

Chrysler Museum of Art begins bigtime expansion. http://norfolklive.blogspot.com/2012/08/norfolks-chrysler-museum-of-art-to.html

Norfolk to start installing Bike Lanes: http://norfolklive.blogspot.com/2012/08/norfolk-to-become-bike-friendly_15.html

New brewery to open in West Ghent. http://norfolklive.blogspot.com/2012/07/smartmouth-brewery-coming-to-west-ghent.html

Urban Outfitters to open soon. http://norfolklive.blogspot.com/2012/07/urban-outfitters-ribbon-cutting.html

Apparently, the Norfolk Design Committee rejected the design of the Chick-Fil-A on Monticello Ave. because it didn't fit in with the urbanized vision that they have for that area. That's pretty interesting. http://norfolklive.blogspot.com/2012/07/chick-fil-design-back-to-drawing-boards_19.html

Some new mixed use might be on its way to the west end of 21st St. http://norfolklive.blogspot.com/2012/07/new-mixed-use-development-coming-to.html#more

Norfolk City Planning Commission has the design plans posted for the new Chick-Fil-A on Monticello. http://norfolklive.blogspot.com/2012/07/monticello-chick-fil-design-released.html#more

It's going to be called Cook Out. There are some other restaurants coming too. http://norfolklive.blogspot.com/2012/06/normal.html#more

Construction of the Governor's School consolidation in the Monroe Building on Granby has begun recently. http://norfolklive.blogspot.com/2012/06/governors-school-expanding-downtown.html#more Apparently, the renovation of the old building has resulted in an entire population of cockroaches trying to find a new home in and around TCC. That sucks.

Yeah the Pilot ran a story this weekend on it. Sounds like they've got some decent people working on it. http://norfolklive.blogspot.com/2012/06/building-transformation-into-urban.html

That said the recommendation is just one man's recommendation to the council. They still haven't had a vote so nothing is a done deal at this point...

Jones made his recommendation a month ago. Today they had Cordish on hand to go in depth a little further to City Council and answer any questions the city might have. http://norfolklive.blogspot.com/2012/06/cordish-cos-field-waterside-questions.html#more In watching the video, I must say it was refreshing to see that the City Council isn't just thinking about Waterside with this, but they're thinking about development all the way to Harbor Park.

I like this idea of moving the Greyhound station. Put everything together and the Harbor Park area would develop rather quickly.

Well this is pretty cool. http://norfolklive.blogspot.com/2012/05/grow-interactive-takes-initiative-to.html

Harvey Lindsay isn't giving up yet. I hope City Council can give them the time of day. This whole thing was too rushed. http://norfolklive.blogspot.com/2012/05/harvey-lindsay-not-going-away-quietly.html

Anyone see the WVEC story on cordish? http://norfolklive.blogspot.com/2012/05/glimpse-of-cordish-waterside.html

I think it may depend where you live, but I vote at Taylor Elementary School in West Ghent. If you go to the city's website, it probably says somewhere, or if you run a quick google search.

Well May 1 is a great opportunity to get some of these old-timers out of office. For example, Jesse Scaccia, who runs AltDaily and has put in countless hours over the last 4 or 5 years into trying to make Norfolk an exciting city to live in, is running against Barclay Winn for Superward 6 (most of Ghent and Downtown). In a recent Pilot poll, he was killing Winn in votes. Now it's just a matter of getting people to show up on May 1.

And now there's this. Norfolk, are you serious?!

I'm over in West Ghent too and one silver lining in this is outdoor restaurants/bars on the water. And I'm with you that they must be quality chains, such as Yardhouse, Gordon B's. My wife and I rode our bikes downtown 2 saturdays ago when the weather was incredible and our plan was ride along the water (huge disappointment unless you're in the mood for hooter's crappy wings) and then stop on Granby and get lunch and beer somewhere outside. There were absolutely ZERO places to go...minus the Granby Bistro which had open outdoor seating for lunch (6 tables that were all full). We had to circle around back to Ghent and found our way to Cogan's instead. I just don't understand it, it's our downtown but there's nowhere to eat outside on weekends?! So that's one plus, we can go somewhere to enjoy a nice view of the river and have a cold brew. It will be hopping for TownPoint Park events too. Another positive is the hope that they continue development towards Harbor Park. It's hard but I'm trying to find some pluses... Edit: I had some more time to think about this and updated my blog with some more thoughts. Feel free to read.

City Manager is supposed to give his recommendation tomorrow at 4:30 You can view it live on the city's website here. Hopefully, they don't do anything stupid.