Like mushrooms after the heavy rains, SAVE McINTIRE PARK signs are popping up on lawns along McIntire Road and elsewhere near the park, distributed to residents by members of the Coalition to Preserve McIntire Park. The coalition, led by Independent City Council candidate Bob Fenwick, is attempting to stop the construction of the Meadowcreek Parkway and the YMCA adjacent to the park’s softball fields.
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Talk the talk: Bob Fenwick, who leads the Coalition to Preserve McIntire Park, says that at most, 10 percent of the people with yard signs are active in the group. |
Currently, the Coalition is waiting for a decision from Judge Jay Swett about whether the land the City of Charlottesville gave to the Virginia Department of Transportation (VDOT) to construct the parkway was transferred legally. Though many of the people who sport the signs on their lawns want to save McIntire Park, many of them are not actively involved with the campaign.
“Some man came down and put it up after asking me,” says Roy T. Banks, a McIntire Road resident. He says he agreed to have the sign put in because he “doesn’t want them to take no more land,” but adds that “someone will have to give up something.”
Billy Hunter says a problem with the construction plans is that there have not been any plans released to replace the open space that will be lost in construction.
“The park is something everyone can enjoy,” he says. “For example, the small golf course is something the city thinks people can do without, but it’s the only place for people who can’t afford much to learn how to play golf. I’d like to see things like that remain an option.”
Some residents want more than just a replacement for the land lost to construction.
“I don’t think the Meadowcreek Parkway needs to be made at all,” says McIntire Road resident Melanie Barnum. She says the money should be put toward improving the city’s public transportation infrastructure. “It doesn’t make sense not to have reliable public transportation, especially transportation to Richmond and D.C.,” she says. “That boggles my mind.”
Fenwick, who spearheaded the sign campaign, maintains that residents like Banks, Hunter and Barnum, who are not involved with the Coalition but support the cause, are in the majority. At most, he says, 10 percent of residents participating in the sign campaign are also active with the coalition.
Colette Hall, President of the North Downtown Neighborhood Association, says one way she hopes to get more people involved, in at least the neighborhood association, is to tap more renters.
As a member of the Coalition, Hall says that one location where residents may not be as open to the sign campaign is on Park Street, where some support parkway construction in hopes that it will reduce traffic on other city roads.
Fenwick agrees. “There are a few people who are for the parkway on Park Street, but it’s not a universal thought,” he says. “There is room to make the case that the parkway is not going to be as beneficial as they think.”
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