Author: James A. Bacon
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Virginia Consumer Economy: Not So Hot
CredAbility, a nonprofit credit counseling service, regularly updates its Consumer Distress Index, which tracks the financial condition of the average American household. The index combines such metrics as unemployment, credit scores, net worth, spending vs. income, and performance in paying rents and mortgages. Nationally, the consumer economy is slowly improving. Reports CredAbility in its Aug.…
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Public Art and Building for the Ages
by James A. Bacon It’s probably not fair comparing the public art and architecture of Virginia cities, none of which are much more than 200 years old, with Barcelona, whose history stretches back 2,000 years. But I’m going to do it anyway. But before I start, let me be clear about one thing: I am…
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Life and Work on Carrer de Girona
by James A. Bacon If you live on Carrer de Girona in Barcelona, as my family and I have for the past few days, and you have a sudden craving for a green pepper, a bottled water, a Filipinos chocolate treat or a Red Bull at 11:00 at night, you just roll out of the…
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Now, That’s a Street!
by James A. Bacon The city planners of Barcelona, as I pointed out in my previous post, pay great attention to the details of street design. In contrast to the United States, where planners and traffic engineers design streets to optimize the movement of automobiles, Barcelonians endeavor to strike a balance between all users of…
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World-Class Walkability in Barcelona
by James A. Bacon I have spent barely one day in the city of Barcelona and I can tell you three things that I dislike: the ubiquitous graffiti, the giant, ungainly recycling bins at many street corners, and the faint but unmistakable odor of sewage emanating from the city’s subterranean labyrinth. But if I tried…
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Richmond Biking Gains Momentum
Having given wall-to-wall coverage of the bicycling fatality of Lanie Kruszewski (see “Richmond’s First Bicycle Martyr“), the Richmond Times-Dispatch has ratcheted up to top gear on its coverage of bicycle issues. Publisher Thomas Silvestri has been plugging bicycle-friendly policies in the weekend op-ed pages for some time, and now even the newsroom is treating it…
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Bacon on the Move Again
I haven’t been to Europe for nearly 25 years, but this afternoon the Bacon family will be embarking on a 10-day trip that includes a lengthy stay in a major European city, with a side excursion to Normandy and Paris. There will be plenty of museums to tour, architecture to view, one of the most…
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The Poisoned Well
What can a Superfund site in Colorado tell us about potential uranium mining and milling in Virginia? by Rose Jenkins Sharyn Cunningham and her family drank from a poisoned well for eight years. When they bought property in Cañon City, Colo., in 1994, they had their two wells tested—but just for normal water quality issues,…
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Boomergeddon in Virginia: Yes, It Can Happen Here, Too
Over the past five “Boomergeddon in Virginia” posts, I have systematically laid out the findings of the “Report of the State Budget Crisis Task Force” as they pertain to the Old Dominion. It’s a dismal picture. The tax base is eroding. Medicaid spending it out of control. Cutbacks in federal spending will slam both Virginia’s…
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Who’s the Skinflint Now?
One trick used by the higher ed lobby to extract more money from Virginia taxpayers is to show what skinflints legislators are in the Old Dominion compared to the solons of other states who provide far more state support for their colleges and university. While this chart does not tell the whole story — it…
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Boomergeddon in Virginia: Retirement Benefits
When the editorial writers and talking heads speak of the looming retirement crisis in state government, they usually are referring to massive unfunded pension liabilities. This is a major concern and should by no means be underestimated. But the problem is actually bigger than pensions. Most of the 50 states have what’s known in actuary…
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Why People Don’t Like VDOT
What’s a half million dollars in the Virginia Department of Transportation’s multibillion-dollar budget? Not much. But people have reason to worry that a small-scale fiasco in Wythe County, in which a $15,000 liability involving a local farmer, mushroomed into a $505,000 liability, is just the tip of the iceberg. Ten years ago, recounts The Roanoke…
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College Exploitation of Students Still Intensifying — but at a Slower Rate
Students heading to public Virginia colleges and universities this fall can take some consolation that the increase in tuition and fees they will have to swallow will be “only” 4.1% — barely half the previous year’s increase of 7.9%. Adjusted for a 1.7% increase in the Consumer Price Index, that’s a real increase of “only”…
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Boomergeddon in Virginia: Federal Cutbacks
If there’s one thing that pundits of all ideological stripes agree upon, it’s that the federal government cannot continue running $1 trillion-a-year deficits without inducing a Boomergeddon-style fiscal and economic melt-down. The only question worth asking is how we avoid the worst-case scenario: through spending cuts, tax increases or a combination of the two. (It…
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A Settling of Accounts
Upon her reappointment to the presidency of the University of Virginia after a protracted controversy with the Board of Visitors, Teresa Sullivan made a call for unity: “There is no time for residual hostility toward anyone perceived to have been on the other side of recent disagreement. We can go forward with what is best…