Refrigerated Trailer for Rent in West Ashely, SC

West Ashley, the area across the Ashley River from peninsular Charleston, offers a change of pace from some of downtown’s more tourist-centric areas of town. Home to more than 40 percent of the city’s population, the area boasts parks, restaurants, breweries and shopping catered to locals.

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Known to some as the “birthplace of South Carolina,” West Ashley is home to the well-preserved colonial village, Charlestowne Landing. The 184-acre state park off of Old Towne Road offers an opportunity to explore both the city and the state’s modern origins. With walking trails, marsh views and a small zoo, the state park is a site visitors and locals alike can visit multiple times for different experiences.

For the active set, West Ashley is home to Shadowmoss Golf & Country Club and bowling alley Ashley Lanes. Get practice on your swing at Charleston Golf, a combined golf simulator and bar.

Get a breath of fresh air on the 7.8 mile West Ashley Greenway which starts at U.S. Highway 17 and Wappoo Road and ends at Higgins Pier where anglers can cast a line. There’s another opportunity to fish off of Sam Rittenberg Boulevard at Northbridge Park.

For a different scenic walk, meander via boardwalk through marshes and coastal forest at the Stono River County Park in outer West Ashley.

Shopping

Unlike other areas of the city, West Ashley is home to some large-scale retail spaces that make it an ideal place for furniture stores and other specialty shops.

This week we sought reader photos that glisten and gleam.

This week’s winner is Herbert M. Schiller who took a photo of the Hungarian Parliament building in Budapest on the Danube River.

Honorable mentions go to Dale Johnson and Ronald Allen Charles. Johnson’s photo captured glowing, floating spheres at Universal Studios. Charles’ photo was of glowing light fixtures at a shop in Venice, Italy.

Next week’s topic is new, so show off your best photos of new things or new beginnings in honor of the new year.

The rules: Send your best photo to yourphotos@postandcourier.com by noon Thursday. Include your name, town and where the photo was taken. Add your name and the topic to the file. If you want your photo to be eligible to run in the newspaper, it must be at least 1,500 pixels, not have a commercial watermark and not have been published in another publication.

On Fridays, we first announce the editors’ pick of the week at postandcourier.com/yourphotos and declare a topic for the next week. On Saturdays, we publish an online gallery.

On Sunday, the photo pick of the week will appear in this section, Life.

All photos submitted will be considered for publication in The Post and Courier’s yearly magazine, My Charleston. Some images may be selected for other editorial or noncommercial use.

We reserve the right to not publish any photo for any reason.

Get a weekly list of tips on pop-ups, last minute tickets and little-known experiences hand-selected by our newsroom in your inbox each Thursday.

After some last-minute funding maneuvers, Charleston approved the terms of a construction contract for a long-awaited bike and pedestrian bridge connecting downtown and West Ashley.

It now awaits federal approval before the mayor can sign off on it and work can begin.

As construction firms submitted proposals for the project this summer, local leaders became aware that their most recent cost projections were insufficient.

That’s when the estimate ballooned from $42 million about a year ago to about $74 million today. As a result, city officials had to secure more funding from county, state and federal agencies. In addition to dipping into the city’s hospitality tax funds, the Medical University of South Carolina chipped in too.

In total, the city’s contribution to the project via hospitality tax funds stands at $13 million.

Construction bidders attributed the higher-than-expected cost projections to rising interest rates, as well as increased labor and material costs. The winning bid came in at $73.8 million.

City leaders had considered scaling the project back when the new estimates were calculated but Councilman Mike Seekings said South Carolina Transportation Secretary Christy Hall was determined to find additional help from all levels of government to bring the project across the finish line.

“Secretary Hall put her money where her mouth is,” he said.

With Hall’s help securing an additional $30 million committed from various agencies, the city was able to move forward with a contract with civil contractor, Superior Construction.

Charleston City Council voted 11-1 on Sept. 26 to authorize the mayor to sign off on the contract once it gets approval from the Federal Highway Administration. Councilwoman Caroline Parker voted against the authorization and Councilman William Dudley Gregorie was absent.

If all goes according to plans, the contract will be signed within the next few weeks and design work can begin. Signing the contract locks down a “guaranteed maximum price” from the contractor, which can only fluctuate within a certain percentage of the total project cost. Any additional overrun would need special approval from City Council.

Design is expected to take about one year and construction about three years, said Jason Kronsberg, Charleston parks director and the project manager for the effort.

There should only be minor disruptions to road and boat traffic during construction, he added. It will tie into the existing West Ashley Greenway and cross the Ashley just south of the U.S. Highway 17 vehicular bridges.

Despite the cost estimate struggles, city leaders struck an optimistic tone saying that the project will be transformative for the city.

Editorials

“It’s a game changer,” Kronsberg said. “Its a significant infrastructure project that will be just as successful as the Ravenel Bridge bike and pedestrian lane when it was first implemented ... If you build it, they will come.”

Councilman Peter Shahid, who is running for mayor, said the project is not only a recreational amenity but also an important piece of the city’s transportation network. It will provide commuters who travel on foot or ride bikes a safe crossing to the city’s employment hub and also could relieve some traffic on the existing vehicular bridges in the same area.

Danielle and Brent Sweatman understand the complicated relationship between sobriety and the food and beverage space. The couple, who have worked in the industry for years, are two years sober.

“We knew how it feels to be uncomfortable with limited options and wanted to change that,” said Danielle, who with her husband Brent, opened Sweatman’s Garden — a sodary and fondue Lounge at 90 Folly Road Boulevard in the South Windermere Shopping Center.

Brent said they chose the location for a few reasons.

“We live in West Ashley and have been living in Byrnes Down for about five years. Because we love our community, we wanted to provide a cool hangout spot close to home for both drinkers and non-drinkers.”

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According to Brent, he and his wife were happy to fill a much-needed niche in the community.

“There are so many young people in the area that are becoming part of the sober curious movement and it was important to us to provide an inclusive space for the people that would want to take advantage of it,” he said.

And with the rise of mocktail culture, their timing couldn’t be better. According to research conducted by NielsenIQ, the non-alcoholic beverage sector is expanding rapidly as alcohol consumption declines, with popularity soaring over the past five years — a trend driven by Gen Z and millennials.

An Instagram-worthy experience

When the couple moved into what was Florence’s Lowcountry Kitchen, they were presented with a tabula rasa, enabling Danielle, as she says, “to go wild.”

She transformed plain, white walls into ones with a dark green hue and festooned them with dozens of thriving plants. Quirky and colorful seating areas are Instagram-worthy, like the attractive curved yellow couch which faces tufted lilac chairs and is separated by a ‘70s-era coffee table.

“We set them up to appear like little living rooms,” said Danielle, adding that she loves maximalism and color. “I was inspired by an art-deco, 70s funky vibe,” she said.

The offerings

Brent is no stranger to libation creation, having helped open the King Street Diner known as the Rarebit featuring homemade ginger beer, tonic, sodas and bitters.

“We’re doing 12 different taps, featuring our tonic and ginger beer and additional playful, fun stuff when it comes to our sodas, like plum rose citrus and a delicious habanero fresca sweetened with monk fruit, which is currently getting a lot of love, along with our root beer,” said Danielle.

For an additional $5, customers can add their choice of alcohol, or a cannabis-based infusion to their sodas. Sometimes customers opt for both non-alcoholic and alcoholic beverages in the same evening.

“I’ve seen some of them take a non-alcohol root beer break from drinking,” said Danielle

The couple also decided to offer a limited menu featuring fondue.

“We’re serving savory fondue, like Mediterranean and beer cheese and also offering sweet options like white chocolate and milk chocolate,” said Danielle, explaining that she loves cheese and chocolate, but that they also wanted to make the menu a fun, interactive experience that doesn’t take staff too much time to create. For now, the business employs a total of seven staff members.

As for the future, Danielle said they are working on finding their bearings at the moment. “We were intentionally a little mysterious about being open to see what worked and what didn’t, but we may consider live entertainment in the future, if all goes well,” she said.

Stefanie Kalina-Metzger is a contributing writer for SC Biz News.

CHARLESTON, S.C. (WCSC) - From West Ashley to Sullivan’s Island, businesses spent the day recuperating after heavy rains and strong winds caused them to temporarily lock their doors.

Many of the exterior windows at Hay Tire Pros, off Savannah Highway, shattered, and a large part of their ceiling collapsed on the inside.

Vice President Bill Sekula said that they have always expected severe storms to come through with being in Charleston, but that they have never had this much damage before.

“I guess it was like a microburst or something to that effect, but apparently it was raining harder than usual and then the windows started to buckle and snapped over. These windows on the side just kind of came apart and came out of the building,” Sekula said.

Sekula said glass from the windows was even in the back part of their building which is almost 30 yards away. They had to close the business for the day and return all of their customers’ vehicles. He said the incident happened during hours of operation as employees notified him at around 8 a.m.

The next-door business, Etto Leisure Cars, a golf cart dealer, also saw significant damage. Will Harton, chief executive officer, said that part of their awning was ripped off and hit their power box causing them to lose power.

“I said ‘Oh my goodness.’ You know, you live in Charleston long enough, you know a storm is going to happen. Usually, it’s a hurricane. It’s not a microburst like this, but we will be fine and we will move on from here,” Harton said.

He added that he’s glad that all of his employees are safe and that the building and golf carts can be fixed.

First Alert Chief Meteorologist Bill Walsh said the damage could have been from a potential microburst or straight-line wind, but the National Weather Service has not yet confirmed that.

The Co-Op Frosé and Eatery on Sullivan’s Island had around two feet of water inside their restaurant. Their staff members spent the day using buckets to help get rid of the water. They said they have had flooding in the past, but never anything over a foot, so this is the worst they’ve seen.

“This morning, we lifted everything off the floor because we were expecting rain and heavy floods, but we didn’t know it was going to get this bad. So, as we were lifting things off the floor, it started coming in through the back door. Next thing you know there is water all over the place and we started getting buckets and mops and throwing water out. We’ve been throwing water out for the past three and a half hours,” employee Havannah Malan said.

She said that they have had to get their floors redone three times, and she expects the business will have to get them redone a fourth time after Saturday’s flood.

The businesses said they hope to repair the damages quickly, so they can return to normal operation as soon as possible.

Copyright 2024 WCSC. All rights reserved.

CHARLESTON, S.C. (WCSC) - After months of her son being chronically sick, which even led him to temporarily stop walking and talking, one West Ashley woman wants to warn people about the effects of living with mold.

Mold test results allege this is exactly what former tenant Lauren LaMantia experienced while living at The Heyward Apartments.

“There’s nothing more frustrating than knowing something is wrong with your kid and there’s no one that will help you,” LaMantia said.

LaMantia and her son Leo moved into The Heyward apartments in West Ashley in 2020. What began as off-and-on colds, led to a sickness that wouldn’t go away for Leo LaMantia last spring.

Lauren LaMantia says he had constant mucus, an oozing eye and he even eventually stopped walking and talking. He was diagnosed with three different viruses and pneumonia in his right lung.

A specialist recommended getting an environmental test in their apartment, which is when she hired The Mold Girl, LLC and GSL Engineering.

She explained what The Mold Girl, LLC recommended.

“[An employee] said, ‘Based on how I feel after being here and testing, I wouldn’t keep my family here for another day,’” LaMantia said. “So, that night we packed up and we left.”

She took the topical tests to The Heyward management, who then hired a vendor to remediate the area and clean invasively, which she claims only exacerbated the problem.

“It was worse, obviously, than what was just topical,” LaMantia said. “And those spores got thrown out into the air, into the air ducts and contaminated all of our belongings.”

When the two initial companies came out to test again, the results were worse than before.

GSL Engineering’s air quality test says anything higher than a five requires an investigation. The apartment’s levels were 7.7.

In The Mold Girl, LLC’s test, there were a variety of molds found, with some of these also showing in the 95th percentile in Leo’s urine sample.

“When I told the complex that, they considered this matter closed and that they had denied any allegations with my initial concern with sending a vendor out there to fix it,” LaMantia said.

She says The Heyward offered to terminate the lease, under one condition. She was asked to sign a waiver of liability, a confidentiality agreement and a non-disclosure form. When she refused, she had to pay nine more months of rent in an apartment she couldn’t live in.

“Between moving, medical, rent, legal counsel - just consultations - it’s between $40,000-$50,000 out of pocket,” LaMantia said.

The Heyward’s attorney, Thomas Howard, sent this statement in response to the allegations:

Due to privacy concerns, it is our policy not to comment on specific questions regarding any resident. We are aware of the resident’s complaint to which our community representatives promptly investigated and responded. We contest the resident’s portrayal of the facts and our corresponding actions. At Heyward, the safety and well-being of our community residents are paramount, and we treat all concerns with utmost seriousness. Heyward has been nationally recognized in the country for resident experience placing in the Elite 1% ORA Power Rankings (34th nationally) by J Turner Research. The ORA® Power Ranking is based on the relative strength of over 140,000 communities assessed by J Turner Research, a prominent consulting firm that monitors resident satisfaction. This accomplishment reflects the hard work and positive impact of our onsite management team which remains dedicated to providing the best possible environment for all of our residents.

Since moving out, LaMantia says she still experiences memory loss and is on more antibiotics now than she has been in the last ten years. She wants to warn other renters about the dangers mold could present.

“I just hope that people get out of that place,” LaMantia said. “...It’s just a breeding ground for mold... And they have no idea that they’re going to breathe in these terrible things and that could permanently damage them.”

She recommends if anyone is feeling symptoms no matter where they live, to get your place tested.

Copyright 2024 WCSC. All rights reserved.