Falling behind on tree trimming + $544M in Nashville projects proposed

Haunted house lawsuit + cut-through traffic concerns

Happy Wednesday, Nashville! It’s September 30. Lots of updates from Nashville’s neighborhoods, including a haunted house lawsuit seeking up to $1.5 million, what it’ll cost to tear down the old Nissan Stadium, a neighborhood’s cut-through traffic concerns, a wind flag crackdown, and a new Christmas store.

☀️ Weather

Rain chance shifted later to Friday. High: 92, Low: 68. Cooling to 70s this weekend.

🌳 Falling behind on tree trimming

This issue got a lot of attention after the January ice storm left more than 200,000 customers without power, and it appears to be a problem again.

In its current fiscal year, the Nashville Electric Service planned to have 258 miles of vegetation trimmed by the end of August. The CEO said it only trimmed 89 miles.

A few months before the ice storm, an audit found NES was behind on tree trimming, which the audit said could worsen power outages. After the storm, NES announced more aggressive trimming policies like clearing trees up to 15 feet from power lines and other infrastructure instead of 10 feet.

NES’s CEO told the utility’s board that NES “implemented actions to increase production and improve pace.” She said tree trimming contractors are ramping up staff, and “we expected to see some level of transition there.” She also noted that a vendor using LiDAR data to create tree trimming plans took longer than anticipated.

NES’s board voted to allow the CEO to move forward with up to $15 million in new contracts to accelerate tree trimming.

💰 $544 million: which projects get funding

Nashville Mayor Freddie O’Connell just released his new $544 million capital spending plan. It includes a new elementary school in Antioch, three new fire stations, funding to make progress toward a new Richland Park library, and money to finish more segments of the Cumberland River and Seven Mile Creek greenways.

I asked the mayor’s office for the full list of projects so you can look for anything that might impact your neighborhood — just click here. And if you’re really interested in doing a deep dive on a project, you can match a project ID to more details in this document.

Capital spending plans are typically funded with bonds. The proposal still needs approval from the Metro Council.

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🏠 What’s new in Nashville’s neighborhoods

Hermitage

• Up to $1.5 million haunted house lawsuit: A mother sued the Full Moon Slaughterhouse at 3445 Lebanon Pike after one of the actors allegedly chased her 16-year-old daughter beyond the perimeter of the haunted house. The lawsuit claims the girl tripped on an unmarked dropoff while running away and hit pavement. It doesn’t give much detail about her injuries, but it mentions “severe, permanent bodily injury and impairment.” You can read the full lawsuit here. The haunted house didn’t seem to know about the lawsuit based on the response I got yesterday. I shared a copy of it, and I’ll let you know if the business responds. More: a new lawsuit involving a Hermitage pizza restaurant.

• Honoring Phil Ponder: Did you notice new artwork decorating a utility box at the corner of Dodson Chapel Road and Central Pike? It’s a coneflower piece by well-known artist and former Metro Council member Phil Ponder. The new artwork and a nearby mural “give his work a lasting place in Hermitage and will bring color and joy to neighbors for years to come,” Metro Council member Jordan Huffman said. The Hermitage Chick-fil-A recently asked people to sign a card for Ponder after he entered hospice care.

Downtown (and nearby)

• Demolition cost: Tearing down the old Nissan Stadium will cost nearly $24 million, according to a new permit filed with Metro. I shared a week ago that a mechanical claw will begin tearing down the old stadium in March. Demolition is expected to take six months plus another few months to go through the rubble. The new stadium is on track to be open in about five months. This article explains how the stadium project is being funded.

• Public restrooms: While Nashville’s Downtown Partnership looks into possibly adding public restrooms in Downtown Nashville, you’re invited to give feedback at a public meeting today. It starts at 6:30 p.m. at the Museum of Christian and Gospel Music. You can also give your input with this survey.

Near Green Hills

• Cut-through traffic concerns: Traffic calming measures like speed cushions could come to part of Sweetbriar Avenue if neighbors approve. That deals with speeding, but at least some residents seem to be more upset about the volume of traffic with so many people using the road as a cut-through after exiting I-440 onto 21st Avenue South. One resident said “the volume on Sweetbriar is just untenable because it’s just getting worse and worse and you see so many things going up on 12 South and it just means more traffic and more people.” Residents talked about organizing to submit complaints. You can watch the community meeting here. And this website explains how you can apply for traffic calming in your neighborhood.

North Nashville

• Crime surge: Nearly every type of crime is down double-digit percentages since last year if you look at all of Davidson County. But if you zoom into the Metro Police Department’s North Precinct, it’s a different story over the past eight weeks. Violent crimes and property crimes in that period increased 30% compared to the same time last year. It’s not a matter of small numbers that allow deceptive percentages — violent crime cases increased from 119 to 155. Property crime cases jumped from 394 to 515. WTVF recently reported on “2 teens killed in separate North Nashville shootings days apart”. You can see crime maps for your neighborhood here.

Antioch

• Apartment wind flag crackdown: I reported yesterday on Metro Codes going after alleged signs violations on Lebanon Pike. Similar story today with apartment complexes in Antioch. Metro Codes told the owners at 1500 Bell Road (complaint), 1616 Bell Road (complaint), 2900 Hamilton Church Road (complaint), and 5099 Linbar Drive (complaint) to address signs like windflags that don’t follow Metro rules. More: my reporting on a codes audit sweeping through Antioch.

• New restaurant: Bangkok Bites applied for a permit to open at 12637 Old Hickory Boulevard. I wasn’t able to get in touch with anyone tied to the restaurant, but I’ll let you know if I learn more about the project.

East Nashville

• Limited options: A steep hill and driveways on Bullock Avenue will limit what traffic calming measures can be installed on the road. NDOT plans to install one speed cushion at the bottom of the hill between Jones Avenue and Oakwood Avenue. NDOT also wants to add bulb-outs (you can see one at 12:56 in this video) “so we can help vehicles enter and exit the street more slowly than they might be doing today.” People who live on the impacted stretch of Bullock Avenue will receive a ballot in the mail. Two-thirds of respondents need to approve the project for it to move forward.

• Dutch Bros. moving forward: The coffee chain received zoning approval from Metro’s Planning Commission to move forward with a new location at 5001 Gallatin Pike. I haven’t confirmed an opening date. You can see the menu here.

Bellevue

• Trouble at The Mason Jar: It was the Wynot Saloon, now it’s The Mason Jar at 142 Belle Forest Circle. In a new lawsuit, one of the owners claims the business is operating at a loss, and the other owner’s conduct “caused disruption to the Corporation's operations, staff turnover, and the loss of customers and goodwill, and on at least one occasion caused the business to close for the remainder of an evening.” You can read the full lawsuit here. It says each owner holds 50% of the business, so it asks a judge to intervene and possibly dissolve the company or force a buyout.

Berry Hill

• New Christmas store: Spirit Christmas announced it’ll open in November at 2721 8th Avenue South where Spirit Halloween currently operates.

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📰 A few final headlines…

• Historic execution: Christa Pike, convicted of murdering her classmate when she was a teenager, is scheduled to be executed this morning in Nashville. “If her execution goes as planned on Wednesday, she will be the first woman executed in Tennessee in more than 200 years,” The New York Times reported. She refused her final meal, according to multiple reports.

• Anti-terrorism funding for Nashville: “A federal judge ruled that the Trump administration cannot condition anti-terrorism funds to state and local governments on how they administer elections,” Politico said. I reported last month that Metro sued because it claimed funding for chemical and biological weapon detectors, among other things, was in jeopardy unless it made five changes to its election procedures before November. The Trump administration didn’t immediately give a comment to Politico, but it previously called similar lawsuits a “partisan pushback.”

• Two local Starbucks closures: Starbucks announced last week it was closing 250 underperforming stores. A list published by KGW includes two in our area: 1907 Gallatin Pike in Madison and 7083 Highway 70 South in Bellevue.

• Ballet goes on: After the Nashville Symphony announced a suspension of its season due to a financial crisis, the Nashville Ballet said its events will continue as planned. “We are committed to finding ways to work directly with as many of the talented Nashville Symphony musicians who were furloughed as possible, so that they may continue to add to our live performance experience for Music City’s favorite holiday tradition, Nashville’s Nutcracker and Cinderella in February,” the ballet said. More: multiple reports that the Nashville Symphony’s president/CEO stepped down.

• International Black Film Festival: It begins today with events at multiple locations around Nashville. This year’s theme is “Return on Independence.” Here are some links if you’re interested: event schedule, screening schedule, and ticket information.

• Poll results: I asked nash.news readers yesterday whether they support the punishment against Nashville state Senator Charlane Oliver for her protest while the Senate was in session. 48% of respondents said yes. 52% said no.

🧠 Today’s quiz

Test your memory of yesterday’s newsletter.

USPS packages that would normally pass through Louisville, Kentucky, and Evansville are being diverted to Nashville and a facility in which of the following states: Georgia, Ohio, Kentucky, or Alabama?

Here’s a link to the answer.

🍔 MAP: click here for restaurant inspections across Nashville. And here’s a list version.

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Correction, feedback, question? Just reply to this email or email me directly at ryan@nash.news. Talk to you tomorrow! —Ryan