BeagleAccountant

The way someone says Monticello and Boush tells me whether or not they're locals/hang with locals or not.

Was told that a new Norfolk brewery is moving into one of the spaces at The Colony (IPconfigure's HQ).

It takes less than two minutes to compare the plans and realize that the two are going after completely different clientele.

On the agenda for the May 26th planning commission meeting is an application to open Waters Edge Winery and Bistro at 6464 Hampton Boulevard in Larchmont. This is a new venture from two of the co-owners of Cova Brewery in East Beach.

The groundbreaking for this project is May 18th.

I am not about to speak for other cities, but as a civic league board member I can tell you the process in Norfolk has been beneficial to our civic league. We can get a lot more people to commit to attend and speak with the zoom meetings than I could ever get when it required them to be at city hall. You just need to be organized and register to speak at the meeting well ahead of time.

The public can attend the zoom meetings. I would even argue that since they're held during the standard 9 to 5 working day, the zoom meetings make it so more people can attend.

At yesterday's planning commission meeting, they discussed both versions of the casino; temporary and permanent. If you watch the meeting (link below) you will learn that if the city does approve the temporary casino HeadWaters is required to purchase the restaurant and boxing gym space from the city. And that the casino plans to continue operating it as a luxury skybox (this part was sort of unclear) for casino guests once the permanent casino opens. http://norfolkcityva.iqm2.com/Citizens/SplitView.aspx?Mode=Video&MeetingID=2440&Format=Agenda

Yeesh. Norfolk might not ever recover if it lost the military. The job losses for Hampton Roads would be devastating.

Here's a Pilot article on the temporary casino. It also is pretty clear from him comments that Ken Young doesn't want the casino at the stadium to be temporary: https://www.pilotonline.com/business/vp-bz-harbor-park-casino-0324-20220323-az5x72gbuzfjpiyakjqaypnenu-story.html

Should have just taken an uber over to Dirty Buff or Cogans North. Best sports bars in the area. I will add that I went to a mardi gras (two weeks ago) and st patricks day event (last weekend) at Waterside and it was packed. They do good with those big events and weekend nights at PBR. Otherwise, yeah, it's pretty dead.

Very excited for their installation of the seawall and the docks. And looking forward to spending future NCAA tournaments watching games in their Sportsbook. If I remember correctly, wasn’t there a master plan for SPQ that included a massive park in this area? That park could also act as a place to push water to during Nor’easters.

HeadWaters doesn't need to concern itself with the Portsmouth Casino opening earlier. They aren't going after the same clientele.

They said that construction of this line wouldn’t even start until 2028. Guessing that’s because of how long it takes to get transportation grants.

Harry Minium, ODU writer, wrote that this Publix and the two apartment buildings are a $110 million project. He says some restaurants and shops will be included in the development as well. https://twitter.com/Harry_MiniumODU/status/1499787776497094659?s=20&t=osTZWcim8yrWBCSKHZchfA

I have been looking at ODUs and ODU Real Estate Foundation's available lots and I can't figure it out. In their fund request, they asked for $500k for acquisition. It'll be very telling where they decide to put that on how they see the future of ODU developing.

ODU finally gets the grocery store they have been trying to land for the last decade-plus. The city of Norfolk has approved plans for a new grocery store on this development, roughly 50,000 square feet, and confirmed Publix is the occupant. Looks like the building will be on the corner of Hampton Boulevard and 39th. https://www.wavy.com/news/business/publix-to-open-two-new-stores-in-norfolk-and-suffolk/

Here is the capital request information on this project, notably this is a new 128,626 gsf, multi-story building of standard 50-year construction, built on deep foundation piles. It includes 18 Class Labs, 32 Research Labs, 162 Offices and/or workstations, and over 25,000 gsf of student faculty collaboration space. It will also house an independent server room specific to the data science aspects of Cyber Security and big data analysis. http://publicreports.dpb.virginia.gov/rdPage.aspx?rdReport=OB_DocView&Param1=a560ec6b-cc26-4639-80c0-5c89dccee7af

On the agenda for city council's retreat on Mar. 4th is an update from city staff on the casino. http://norfolkcityva.iqm2.com/citizens/FileOpen.aspx?Type=1&ID=1920&Inline=True

Anyone upset about this project's direction should go drive by the site and tell me this isn't a massive improvement that will have a positive impact on the immediate area around it.

On the Agenda for the March 7th ARB meeting is a new construction approval for building site 1 of this project, as well as some signage review. In addition, including in the submitted documents is this lot layout that shows a drive thru Starbucks in building 1 and a Lidl in building 9 (page 101). Both are kind of boring projects on their own but they combine to be good anchors to pull in more leases for the remaining buildings. I also thought this project might die so I was happy to be wrong. http://norfolkcityva.iqm2.com/citizens/FileOpen.aspx?Type=1&ID=1914&Inline=True

The health sciences building is going vertical. The elevator shaft is a couple stories high now. Will try to get pics next time I'm on campus.

2 of the 3 companies that issued proposals are listed on the agenda with contract negotiations listed right after that agenda item. I believe they are negotiating the contract with each of the three options and then using the potential contract of each to make a final decision. I'm not sure why Pharell's group proposal isn't listed, perhaps time is an issue and they'll have to hold another meeting for that proposal.

City Council has a special meeting scheduled for this Thursday at 4:00. I've attached the agenda below. Looks like they're finally getting close to picking one of the plans.

Tarrants Bay should be removed from the prospective list. MHI bought that property in late 2017, a while after it was originally introduced.