Just Say "Alley Ansicht," Which Roughly Translates to "Pipe Outlet Drains Through Alley to Lower Ground"

I've been thinking a lot over the weekend about the last time one of the Schoene Ansicht co-owners attended a Salemtown Neighbors meeting. He attended that meeting in the fall to ask our help in getting Metro approval to install more impermeable pavement at their future Salem Gardens development, which is to be a block down from Schoene Ansicht on Garfield St.

Enough of us were cautious in our response to him, some saying that we would want to hear Metro's reasons for not approving their plans before we could support his request. Given the latest controversy swirling around the corner of 6th and Hume, it looks like our group was very wise to go slow and cautious and be circumspect before giving support to more impermeable surfaces paving over Salemtown greenspaces. Given the buzz I've been hearing on our sidewalks this weekend, I'm not sure that the Salem Gardens ownership team could get much support for any easements or exceptions without making some iron-clad guarantees that they are looking out for their neighbors.

But think about it: at the same time that Schoene Ansicht owners knew that they were going to install a drainage pipe into the alley, quite possibly affecting the drainage across adjoining properties, they were asking their neighbors for more support to convince Metro to exempt them from tighter run-off regulations for another development in Salemtown. And we don't know many of details on Salem Gardens, except that co-owner Steve Yokley has said that its run-off will hook-up to the sewers; which leads to the inevitable question: why did they need our support to put in more impermeable surfaces if the water is going directly to the storm sewers instead of across hard surfaces?