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Battle lines firm up as Wal-Mart finalizes plans for store at Civil War's Wilderness battlefield site
By RUSTY DENNEN In a new online video, Gens. Ulysses S. Grant and Robert E. Lee appear together, able to finally agree on one thing: Wal-Mart's plan to build a Supercenter on a portion of the Wilderness battlefield is preposterous. The re-enactors' point is also driven home in a mass mailer sent by another group last week to 16,000 Orange County households. As the world's largest retailer prepares an application for a special-use permit for a store at the intersection of State Routes 3 and 20, battle lines are being drawn. The video was produced by Wal-MartWatch.com, an anti-Wal-Mart Web site, based in Washington, D.C. It is linked to anti-sprawl activist Al Norman, whom Fortune Magazine once labeled "Wal-Mart's enemy No. 1." The four-page, full-color Orange mailer was sent out by the Warrenton-based Piedmont Environmental Council, which opposes the plan as much for its potential traffic impact as its effect on the historic setting. The PEC says there's a more suitable site closer to Lake of the Woods and away from the battlefield. "I think everybody is waiting to see when the application is filed. Until then, we're not sure what's going to be in it," said Jim Campi, spokesman for the D.C.-based Civil War Preservation Trust, which fired the first salvo in opposition when the project was announced in July. Campi said the national group does not oppose a Wal-Mart per se, just the proposed location. This much is known: The Arkansas-based retailer wants to build a 145,000-square-foot store on 55 acres north of Routes 3 and 20. The developer is JDC Ventures of Vienna. Wal-Mart maintains that, since the tract is zoned for commercial use, a store there would be appropriate. And it has said it would modify the building design, set it back on the property, and add historical markers explaining the significance of the tract. "We looked at a long list of available sites and ultimately settled on this particular location, said Wal-Mart spokesman Keith Morris. "For us, it came down to the fact that it's zoned for this use and has been for some time."
Date published: 12/2/2008
It was in South Dakota in 1992. It was maybe the greatest
store I'd seen in my 40 years. Everything in it was
manufactured (so they claimed) IN AMERICA. Good quality
stuff at great prices. Well, that philosophy sure changed
since then. As far as building something, some of the most
beautiful things I've seen on this planet are great works of
architecture. If Walmart could regain it's original soul and
build something bold, beautiful and unique, maybe we
could have the best of both worlds.(Just dreaming.)
And by the way, Fred could use a bit of an upgrade while they are at it. You don’t really get far very fast when you’re “riding the short bus”. And that’s all we have around here. If we’re going to be a grown up town, then we need grown up transportation. (Yes, I just called the Fred system retarded. Because in terms of sophisticated transport, it is.)
The ideal plan would be for Md. and Va. DOT’s to spend money putting in tracks/stations that join up with metro, instead of wasting money on endless road widening projects. Less cars on the road, less transport time for the population, less fuel consumption, less pollution, better access Not to mention less need for blood pressure, asthma/allergy and anti-anxiety meds. They could run the dog gone thing right down the HOV lanes. No need for them any more and it would save space to build more crap.
I am 51 years old and for as long as I can remember they have been working on and widening 95 and 495. Each project they start is outdated, because of growth before its finished. What they need to do is get some kind of public transport in place to get this traffic off the roads. If they are going to continue to build, build, build, someone needs to make a better plan for all these people to get around instead of dumping money hand over fist into widening roads that will never be wide enough.
Maybe if they (the builders/planers) would incorporate a better transit system we wouldn’t all be caught in that fluster cluck of traffic that surrounds us every day. And it’s not just the Berg. I think that the Metro system should be extended from DC to a minimum of a 50-mile radius outside the beltway, but instead they just continue to widen 95 and the other roads that spiral out from the city in all directions.
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