The Wrap: Bird scooters, eliminating plastic bags, women’s equality, and shuffleboard

Photo: Sky Noir

The week in brief

Good afternoon, faithful Wrap readers. We’ve finally got a few days of solid, low-humidity, dry weather. Get out there this weekend and enjoy it! There’s plenty to do outdoors–get caught up in our Weekend Event Picks below. Let’s get to it, shall we?

What’s being billed as the world’s largest indoor shuffleboard bar and social club, coming in at 18,000 square feet, opens this weekend in Scott’s Addition. Tang & Biscuit, a venue named for the puck and stick used to play the game, will open its doors Sunday. Here’s what you can expect.

Bird Scooters continue to be the talk of the town. The electric scooters, which can fly down the road at almost 20 miles per hour, made their way to Richmond when the company dropped a batch of them off around the city. Ever since then, they’ve been playing a cat-and-mouse game where city officials pick the scooters up, and then the company leaves more around town overnight. It’s a genius business model if you’re Bird, because there aren’t really any regulations surrounding scooters here in town, and now I’m told City Council is scrambling to find a way to legally vet them on the streets. Don’t hold your breath though–Richmond still has no Airbnb laws on the books years after that service launched in town. Anyway, I finally found and had the chance to ride one yesterday, and man are they fun and convenient (and so cheap!). I really hope the city embraces them. In the meantime, here’s a fun RVA News In Brick headline that Richard Hayes put together on the city’s ongoing scooter collection efforts.

Fall, and the Folk Festival, are both right around the corner, and tonight Champion Brewing downtown will host the release of the annual Folk FestivALE, a collaboration brew with the Richmond Folk Festival. Fourteen additional artists were announced for this year’s lineup this past week; here’s who will grace the seven stages October 12th through 14th.

The monument to Confederate Lt. General A.P. Hill in Northside was doused with red paint early Wednesday morning. The vandalism comes a couple weeks after the same was done to the Robert E. Lee monument on Monument Avenue. More here.

The idea to rename the Boulevard for local tennis legend Arthur Ashe is moving forward to the community feedback phase. Councilwoman Kim Gray will host a meeting that includes a public comment period at the VMFA on September 13th. Here’s how you can make your thoughts and opinions heard.

UMFS (that’s United Methodist Family Services) provided an update on its plans to develop an empty tract of land along the front of its property facing W. Broad and Hamilton Streets this morning. The nonprofit will sign a 99-year ground lease with Spy Rock Real Estate Group, who will build two mixed-use buildings that will house apartments, retail, and office space. This is one of the last undeveloped tracts of land that exists in this area of the city. Read on here.

We got a sneak peek at chef Mike Ledesma’s new Scott’s Addition restaurant, Perch, that will take over the former Joy Garden space, yesterday. And man is it coming along nicely. Check out the photos and find out when the restaurant plans to open here.

Kroger is doing its part to reduce waste, announcing this week that it will phase out single-use plastic bags in all of its stores by the year 2025. That’s great news and all, but last I checked it was 2018–what in the world about eliminating something as simple as plastic bags takes seven whole years? Anyway, I digress–you can read on here.

Five things you should know

1. Virginia ranks as the fifth-worst state in the country for women’s equality, according to a new study.
2. The city is seeking 200 paid election officers to serve in the upcoming November 6th elections
3. Police have made an arrest in the triple shooting that took place outside of a Shockoe Bottom nightclub this past week.
4. Henrico School Board member Lisa Marshall tendered her resignation this week as she battles breast cancer.
5. You can enjoy free admission to the Science Museum and prepare for the unknown at this weekend’s PrepareAthon.