Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: WEDNESDAY, April 17, 1991 TAG: 9104170396
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: B8 EDITION: NEW RIVER VALLEY
SOURCE: KIM SUNDERLAND NEW RIVER VALLEY BUREAU
DATELINE: CHRISTIANSBURG LENGTH: Medium
Planning Commission members recommended that council not close West Alley because water, sewer and gas lines run under it.
They recommended that East Alley be closed and they told council to close the Cross Street right-of-way but retain utility easements.
Town Council, with W. Scott Weaver absent, voted unanimously to accept the recommendations.
The Planning Commission had received requests from several owners to abandon the 30-foot unimproved Cross Street right of way - 200 feet southwest of and parallel to Park Street - which runs between East and West alleys.
Residents don't mind the road being used by utility maintenance vehicles, but wanted to keep other drivers from using it as a thoroughfare.
Abandonment of East and West alleys also was considered because both - which run from Park Street to Montague Street - also are unimproved and exist only on paper.
"You can't see them on the ground," said Town Manager John Lemley.
One resident complained that his family has had "problems with undesirables using the alleys to drink beer at 2 or 3 in the morning."
But Montgomery County school officials believed closing West Alley would eliminate flow-through traffic from its parking lot to Park Street. The school office is on Junkin Street.
"It already gets real congested there," said Larry Schoff, director of facility maintenance and transportation.
Schoff added, however, that the School Board did not oppose closing Cross Street because traffic could be better controlled.
Other residents who wanted West Alley to remain open were Jim Mensh of Mensh Insurance in Christiansburg and his wife, Betty, who live on East Main Street. Their property backs up to West Alley and if it were abandoned, it would limit access.
Closing West Alley also would "drastically impact the market value" of Mensh's neighbor Walter Baker's property, according to Baker's attorney, John Dalton, who also attended the hearing with about 15 other people.
Lemley said the Bakers hope to build another home on their property that would need access from West Alley.
Attorney Rod Crowgey, representing Ann and Paul Trout - who live on Park Street and whose property backs up to Cross Street - said Cross Street should be closed because it "never existed except in the the mind of the map-maker."
by CNB