Good Morning, RVA: Persistent gloom

Clouds, rain, and colder temperatures today.

October 22, 2014; 6:53 AM • by Ross Catrow

Photo by: bram-sowers

Good morning, RVA! It’s 54 °F. Earlier this morning a line of showers moved through the area, so expect everything, roads included, to be cold and damp. A decent chance of showers and temperatures in the low-60s continue throughout the day.

Water cooler

NBC12 has the mayor and police chief responding to the recent, sharp increase in murders over the past week. Chief Ray Tarasovic on the number of murders: “That number was difficult at 37 last year…It was difficult at 30. It was difficult at 25. It was difficult at ten. It’s difficult because we’re talking about not numbers, but people’s lives.”

If you keep your eyes open today and tomorrow, you may see Team USA as they train for The Big 2015 Bicycle Race. They’re in town for a two-day training camp to get familiar with the course, meet some folks, and hangout at some area schools.

It’s Wednesday, October 22nd and that means we’re halfway through the 2014 Fall Restaurant Week. If you still haven’t braved the wide, wide world of Richmond’s restaurant scene this week (it’s for a good cause!), there’s still time. Check out the menus and make a reservation.

Sports!

• Giants took the first game of the World Series against the Royals, 7-1. Game two, tonight, 8:07 PM. Be there from your armchair.
• The 2014-2015 VCU men’s basketball season begins this weekend (kind of) with a public scrimmage. Read our season preview, and try not to get excited, I dare you.

This morning’s longread

Battle cry of British street designer: ‘Remove traffic signals’

What’s more interesting than Dutch street design? Almost nothing! The odds of a pedestrian struck by a car dying skyrocket if the vehicle was moving faster than 20 mph. To reduce those odds, this Dutch street designer did all sorts of crazy things to increase the “friction” of roads and slow vehicles down.

Monderman’s most radical design involved extending a primary school playground across a road in Noordladen, Netherlands. “You can’t drive into the town without becoming intimately familiar with the activities at the school. There are no signs at all. The drivers slow way down, and that slow speed is extended throughout the town,” he says, adding dryly: “An infinitesimally small number of people wish to kill children. It’s very encouraging.”

This morning’s Instagram

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October 22, 2014 6:53 AM 0