Former Resident of HR

Well this area is what it is. It's pretty middle of the road, bread and butter crowd. However, HR is also very close to quite a few areas that boast a more robust dining experience. My advice to you would be to save some of that extra money that you would be spending if you lived in NYC/DC and make frequent weekend visits to great places located within a day's drive/short flight away: New York, DC, Philadelphia, Richmond, even Montreal and Atlanta are driveable. Austin is a great town but it is an oasis in the middle of Texas, truth be told. California has tons of cool places to eat, but a house there pushes the million mark. Bottom line is that it is your perception of reality that is reality. Probably the number one reason that I am happy to no longer be in the military is all of my co-workers ALWAYS complaining about how HR was not as good as their last duty station/hometown. When I was in Europe, people complained there as well. When you choose to be miserable, you will be miserable. It just gets old to some of us that enjoy our lives here...

There is an overpass on Brambleton (down by EVMS) that doesn't seem to be bothered with trucks that pass under it every day. And they already have the so-called maglev track set up. I have always suspected that the cost of making it ADA compliable (elevators) and of course the fact that no one ever uses those things has more to do with it.

Interesting... that Anytime Fitness is going to be over by the Amphibious Base on E. Little Creek. I looked at the site and they are opening one in the 23517 (Ghent) zipcode as well. Wonder where that will be?

Can't say I didn't see this one coming. I stopped in once or twice but it just wasn't that interesting of a place. Still, sad to see a local business go and another empty retail space in Ghent.... http://content.hamptonroads.com/story.cfm?...&ran=101915

Never, never going to happen with HRT. Never. They are very backwards in their thinking anyway but this effort seems far-fetched.

There is a 52 story round building in Johannesburg, South Africa that has a hollow center. I read somewhere that it had to do with each room needing light. Anyway it is called the "Ponte" but is in an area called Hillbrow that is now a slum. Too bad, it would be cool if the area was nice. Here's a link: http://www.joburg.org.za/2003/dec/dec24_ponte.stm

Wow, I am very interested in what this will look like now. The newer rendering is very postmodern. At first I thought it looked like puke, but I kind of like the way it looks on that Project Close-Up thing. If they could stick with a two-toned color scheme instead of three, it would be a little more cohesive. The parking garage part is very obvious, so intergarting this into the top part would also be a bonus. I don't think this is that awful and I am happy to see that it is not brick/colonial.

Well I, for one, would like to see the "medical center" area fill up all those lots with nice buildings. Even if they were only mid-rises (10-15 stories), it would make a nice, dense area. It would be really cool if some of the buildings would follow the curve of Brambleton in that area and be very modern/glassy.

As Seen on TV? They should have relocated that to Military Circle Mall... Good to hear that they are shuffling stores around and filling up the mall. And as long as the B&N has a magazine rack, there are two other Starbucks to get coffe drinks from...

Well having lived here 10 years, I can say that HR has come a long way in the Mexican food dept. There are a lot more choices now... and there are those of you that look down your noses at anything and will never be happy. I am closer to that end of the spectrum myself, but at least I can admit it. The best mexican food? Well that would be our neighbors Monica and Franco's house growing up (toungue tacos!). Good Mexican is very easy to make at home as well, which is what I prefer to do anyway. There are a lot more authentic Mexican foods available at Food Lion and Wal-Mart believe it or not. As for the Plaza Azteca at Haygood... like most places around here, it is a drown the meal in cheese and beans and rice place. Diego's Tacos across the street is probably closer to authentic lol. The market here is used to the steretypical Mexican food experience (same goes for Asian food as well) so it is like looking for diamonds in the rough.

Macy's in the Northeast are also like this (inconsistant). I think I read somewhere the reasoning behind this is that Macy's tailors its stores to their perceived socio-economic clientele on a store by store basis. Now that Macy's is here and in full force, I think that we will see more of that. The perception from people who have only experienced Macy's in DC or other high end markets is that Macy's is inconsistant. However, this has been their strategy for quite some time now in markets where they are more prevalent. Personally, it makes shopping more interesting when there are some things in some stores and not the same things in others. Going into one mall across the country is like going into a clone of just about every mall. Same stores, same layouts, blah blah blah. I don't find the Military Circle Macy's to be any worse/better than the Hecht's that it replaced to be honest.

Yes I do live on the Southside and moving to the Peninsula is not an option as the other member of my household works in VA Beach. We are halfway in between. Traffic from Peninsula to Southside is much worse so that is why we're here in Norfolk. It's very easy to say "get another job" or "move" but that is not a quick option for most people.

Great, the rink closes right when winter gets here...

There was some talk back awhile ago about how the 3rd crossing would cost $8 to use (in tolls) for the entire route. Who the hell in Hampton Roads can afford a $16 a day trip to work? NYC tolls are $7 but they are only collected one way. I work on the Peninsula and live in Norfolk. Depending on where I am going to be that day, I will take the HRBT or the Midtown-MMBT. The traffic is never ever close to what I had to work in NoVA/MD a few times a month and that was almost ten years ago. Nowhere even close. When they put up tolls, I will probably just use the HRBT, which is the most congested, and so will a few of my cowrokers that I have talked with. Seems counter productive to me. Especially the idea of having current users pay for future upgrades that are nowhere near completion.

I hope it does pass. The reasoning against it is so moronic. "What if you are not driving the car?" does not fly when you get a parking ticket so you shoudl know that if you let someone drive your car and they commit a crime, you'll have to turn them in or take the blame. "Big brother invading my privacy" is as stupid when you are invading others' rights to cross a PUBLICLY OWNED intersection when their light turns green. I mean you can't get money from an ATM or visit a lot of stores without being taped, so who cares? And finally that argument about an increase in rear-end collisions is the worst of all. People rear-end other people because they have faulty breaks or they are FOLLOWING TOO CLOSELY. If we spent half the time paying attention to what we are doing while driving as we do looking for our phones/talking on phones/eating/spacing out, we would have a much less congested area and a much safer area.

I find it odd that we get so many Quebecois tourists down here. Out of curiosity, is there any reason that they prefer VA Beach over all the beaches they have to pass on the way down? Is VA Beach pretty well known there/have they advertised?

If health concerns were as simplistic as making choices about where to eat, things would be great. However, in matters like these, it is the government's obligation to step in and protect its citizens. It is YOUR choice to eat trans-fat but not MY choice when my insurance premiums double because of the unhealthy people in this country who have the right not to be surcharged when their unhealthy lifestyle choices cause medical bills to skyrocket. Simply put, the government needs to regulate things like mercury in the water, lead in paint, asbestos, etc. It is the job of the government to protect citizens from things that are harmful.

Letting the market decide in issues of safety is always a bad idea. Go to Brazil or Mexico and see how safe (unsafe) the cars are there because of the lack of government regulation. And to put the blame on the worker in an issue like this (find another job is easy to say) is absurd. People most often take jobs to financially support themselves and not for the sheer pleasure, especially jobs like waiting tables. Sure they "chose" the job, but for people who work in this field, it is usually out of necessity.

OMG that will be an absolute riot! I am sure that they will be building that for 2-4 years while traffic is supposed to be moving through the area hah hah. Mercury Blvd^10. I think anything that gets the cars out of that underpass mixing bowl would be nice. However, a couple of overpass bridges that aren't linked to 264 would be good too. 264 acts like a huge wall blocking traffic on either side and splitting the city in two.

Well I recently braved the crowds of Wal-Mart at Janaf (shudder) but got to driving around the new stores and realized what a good affect that Wal-Mart has had on Janaf in general. There is a new Panera, Great Clips and Qdoba (first for Norfolk and only a few in the state) on the way. There seems to be no problem filling all the new space there... so I am hoping Norfolk wakes up and starts getting the road situation there sorted out. Hopefully the new Wal-Mart on Tidewater brings that area up a little as well. I think that in small towns, Wal-Mart has a reputation of wiping out a lot of businesses, but it seems that in urban areas, they can bring it back. isn't it ironic, don't you think?

I hate to be negative but... COME ON. When someone is house hunting, she/he should do the routine thing of driving around the neighborhood at day and night and if it is downtown, hanging out around the bars at 2AM. We live in a nation full of people who want to blame everyone else when many times it is their own lack of basic common sense that is at the root of the problem. You should know that there are a bunch of bars and clubs on Granby and that when there is a strip of bars and clubs, they are usually loud at 2AM on the weekends. Lord knows, Granby Street is still basically a ghost town every other time of the day so they should be happy that they are not in a real city with people who actually walk down the street and make noise at all hours of the day and night.

I don't get it... there won't be any entrance from the B&N/TCC Bookstore to the mall? What about the door on the first floor? I dunno, I wish that they would work on the outside of the mall where they are NOT building anything to make it more of an entrance.

Portsmouth would do better by trying to attract some new and unique things as well (IKEA would be nice hah hah). If it's another strip area with the same strip crap that we already have here, it will probably not do well. If it is something interesting and fun, they may attract some fo the people from the west side of Norfolk (which is woefully underserved by bigger retail outlets).

Any Starbucks in a B&N is not a "full" Starbucks. If that was stated, that is an error. They are licensed, which is similar to the arrangement that Starbucks has with any other shared retail concept (Target, Farm Fresh, etc.) The cafe is actually run by B&N, staffed by B&N employees and only serves Starbucks coffee. They don't serve the same baked goods (those come from Cheesecake Factory). The only "full" or corporate Starbucks locations are the ones where Starbucks is the sole tennant of the store. The one anomoly to that arrangement in this area is the Lynnhaven Mall store near the service desk. It is a corporate store. I don't know how much that will affect the no-compete clause but I think that this is an easy way for Starbucks to get around that. I think that if the B&N brings in a lot more foot traffic and is located somewhere near the HMS locations, it may actually boost sales. Why would someone wait in a long line at B&N when they could walk over the HMS owned store? That is provided the prices are the same and not higher...

Well folks, this could spell the end of the 3rd crossing dream for now... http://home.hamptonroads.com/stories/story...&ran=179791 I used to be all for the 3rd crossing but the price is absurd ($4billion? you know that will double-triple before the project ends). Now I just see it as a pet project that is overpriced and does not solve the real traffic woes of 64. All of 64 from HRBT to the 264 interchange is always backed up and well as 264 all the way to Lynnhaven or beyond. If we are paying the tolls/taxes and the state doesn't want to pay their share for us basically building an easy street past new ports (from which we gain no $$), then we need to worry about what is best for us as a region.