URGENT—meeting july 9th to help make shaw a better place

(for the record, i am clearly in favor of a park, not a parking lot, for this space)

there has been a TON of back-and-forth regarding the future of the parking lot behind the old bundy school in shaw (located on the 400 block of P street NW). it's clearly led to some frayed nerves for both proponents and opponents of a more public use for the space. either way, come out and make your voice heard at a community meeting tomorrow (thursday) evening, at 7 pm at the scott montgomery elementary school, located at 421 P street NW.

click on the flyer below, or check out the language from that flyer below the image:

Would you like Green Space or the Largest
Private Parking lot in Shaw at Bundy Park?

• The City’s plans for private parking for government officials
exceed the needs for the Bundy School building

• DC government building codes indicate that there should be
only one parking space for every 600 sq ft of floor space; the
Bundy School should need no more than 25 parking spaces

• The City has not offered a compromise on their parking plans

• Careful planning can accommodate the convenience of the
building employees and the needs of our community

• Help us get rid of a dark, desolate, dangerous eyesore locked
away from the community and a haven for crime

• Within the past month, two people have been shot within
yards of the Bundy Park

• The Friends of Bundy Park support a green space for neighbors
to replace the vacant lot at 400 P Street NW

• We support a place for the community to safely come together

• More eyes and feet on the street will deter crime

• Replacing a vacant lot with green space will bring a lively and
friendly activity to a deserted stretch of 400 P Street NW

Stop the Parking Lot!

Come to the Office of Property Management public meeting
7pm, Thursday, July 9, 2009
Scott Montgomery Elementary School, 421 P Street NW
www.FriendsOfBundy.net

new crosswalk striping coming to 1st street nw

photo by Dan_DC

here's an email passed along from alice thompson of the mayor's office of community relations and services:

Great news community!! As promised from the Mayor's Walk-Thru in the Bloomingdale Community in December 2008; a safer First Street, from Michigan Avenue NW to New York Avenue NW has arrived as of today.

As we all know -- speed humps can not be installed on First Street. Thus, we have elected to install Car Box Lines and Pedestrian Friendly crosswalks.

DDOT has started lining from the south end of First Street NW.

The Car Box Lines will guide and assist our citizens with parking closer to the curb. It's major feature will give the allusion that the street is narrower. Thus, drivers will slow down because it appears -- they are too close to parked autos.

The extra, extra wide crosswalk stripes will also slow drivers down; thus making them more conscious of the pedestrian.

Please give a shout out to DDOT Gloria Bosse-Kouabo, for her diligence in pursuing this much needed safety feature for our community.

i'm personally excited to get (what sounds like) the zebra-stripe (or piano-keys, whatever you like to call it) crosswalks. automobile drivers seem to ignore standard crosswalks in this city, but they tend to notice if there's more white paint on the street letting them know without a doubt that there is a space where pedestrians have the right to cross the street.

some will argue that the zebra-stripe crosswalks instill a false sense of security in pedestrians, leading them to step out into the street without paying the utmost attention to oncoming traffic. i agree that this is a concern, but i also believe that we have more to gain than lose by seeing pedestrians gain at least a little more attention in the eyes of our city's traffic engineers.

well. george will is weird #8

it's been months since the man has graced us with the world's best one word non-sentence sentence, but thankfully, it has returned! check out the beginning of the next to last paragraph here. i was beginning to think he had cured his tic. guess not!

baraki update—construction commences

it was mentioned first on the eckington listserv, but i thought people would like to see some photos—visible construction at baraki (the bar that will be opening at the southeast corner of 1st and T streets nw in bloomingdale) hopefully soon!




they're tearing up the concrete along both first and T where the outdoor seating will be (to replace it with another surface? bricks? i'm not sure—there was no one there to ask this evening).

it's exciting to finally see some progress! maybe we'll finally have a place where eckingtonians can come over and discuss the finer points of how cool a neighborhood bloomingdale is over a pint. :)

historic district facade grants

over at and now, anacostia, dg-rad shows some photos of houses whose exteriors have been made beautiful thanks to grants from the district's historic homeowner's grant program. there is a sliding scale for eligibility based on income.

houses in ledroit park can qualify for these grants as well. here are some before pictures for a pair of houses on the north side of the 200 block of rhode island avenue. i'll put up some after pictures soon.

new mural in bloomingdale

interesting new mural on the side of the house at 73 W street nw (took these pictures minutes before the fire on tuesday in the post below)

fire on the unit block of rhode island avenue nw

View Larger Map

sean had it here first. right after i got off the bus this evening, five fire trucks, a couple ambulances, police cruisers, and other fire department vehicles came down rhode island avenue from both the east and the west, converging on what i believe was 67 rhode island avenue, the house to the left of the cream-colored house in google street view above (i couldn't verify this completely as i couldn't get that close. i'll correct this post if i was incorrect).

below are a few pictures of emergency vehicles on 1st street, rhode island avenue, and in the alley. it smelled like an electrical fire. does anyone reading this have any more specific information?

met branch trail—is pepco backing out on its deal?

it's been a long time since i last wrote about the metropolitan branch trail, but the folks at eckington (way better than spotsylvania) have been staying on top of things, and they found a potential doozy this week.

the plans for the trail have included connections to many eckington streets, with the southernmost one happening at the right-hand side in the above image, in the bend of harry thomas way, across what is (or has been) pepco property.

the local communities, eleanor holmes norton, ddot, waba, and everyone else who has been fighting for the construction of the trail have spent years cajoling, pleading, and urging pepco to allow a connection to be built across their right-of-way. according to this post, it looks like pepco has reneged on the deal to allow bikers to cross this short stretch of ground.

now, i should stress looks like. we're not sure yet, and eckington (wbts) has promised to update us as they look into it. if the trail connection has been cut, though, i think it'll be time to use the gears of persuasion and get our elected officials to twist pepco's arms (again) to make this happen...

more old houses lost

i've written about my distaste for tearing down houses before, and i really hate to see us losing traditional row houses. the area in the triangle between new york avenue, florida avenue, and north capitol street (on the east side of north capitol) used to be full of them, but one by one, they get torn down, and the city loses some of its history.

sure, these houses probably weren't worthy of capital losses, but they still could have been fixed up.

there has been a lot of discussion about demolition on the eckington listserv, where some neighborhood residents were thrilled about the recent demolition of an old house. i was opposed to the demolition. i understand the this specific house was probably beyond saving (though it wouldn't have to have been that way if the city had just enforced the law and made the owner take care of the house before it reached this state). but it sets a terrible precedent, especially in the mind. i fear that people just think vacant=tear it down when it comes to a lot of our old buildings.

anyway, here are some pictures of row houses on the unit blocks of florida avenue and p street NE being town down. i spoke with one of the men on the destruction crew (can't call it construction, can you?) and asked if they were recycling the bricks. he said no, they would simply use them as fill for the hole in the ground that would remain. i told him that people would be willing to pay for nice old bricks like that to be recycled, and he seemed interested, but it was too late for much of that.

i asked what was coming to this space, and he said an apartment building.

when i asked if it would be as ugly as the place next door, he told me he hadn't seen any plans...

pictures from the northeast corner of 1st and seaton

courtesy of lana labermeier, proprietor of big bear cafe here in bloomingdale, we have some photos of the interior of the commercial space at 1821 first street nw (the northeast corner of 1st street and seaton place in downtown bloomingdale—the link will take you to the listing on redfin.com).





there has been a lot of speculation regarding what could happen with this space. i've heard various stories of local residents or groups of residents wanting to put in a pizza place (which seems to be the standard bloomingdale rumor!), a deli, a bar (another go-to rumor until we finally get a bar), or even a taqueria. of course, someone's going to have to buy the place first, and do some substantial rehabbing before anything happens there.

now, in addition to the interior photographs, i promised exterior shots yesterday, and here they are, courtesy of my roommate nolan:






here's hoping something moves in that can utilize that great, wide space that's screaming for cafe seating on seaton place!