'chuck brown way' not where everyone says it's going to be

if you go to chuck brown's website, or read this article at the washington examiner's website, you can see that they all say the unveiling of the 'chuck brown way' sign will take place on saturday (his birthday) at 7th and t nw, but this picture clearly shows the sign is ready to go at the corner of 7th and s nw (apologies for the clarity, this is the best we could do with jaime's phone).

sure, it's just a block down the street, but that has to matter given the official resolution passed by the council, right?

UPDATE: blogroll updates

UPDATE: after looking at things more closely, i realized there were many sites i left out of this update, so i'm including them here. in addition, i removed a few more sites after determining that they really haven't been active for quite a while. if they come back to life, i'll gladly add them back on the blogroll. i also alphabetized everything, with neighborhood blogs first, then other blogs alphabetized at the bottom.

added:

• BeyondDC—not a neighborhood blog, but it covers a lot of topics that affect DC neighborhoods, so i've added this blog that i've long been following to the blogroll.
• DC Address Coordinates—this blog, run by the DC GIS department, offers a fascinating look at how our building addresses are analyzed here in the city.
• The Georgetown Metropolitan—this is an absolutely fantastic blog that gives daily news updates from georgetown, as well as interesting things like a series on architecture, discussion of neighborhood landmarks, and great photography.
• Housing Complex—again, this is not specifically a neighborhood blog, but development in all of DC's neighborhoods gets very good coverage here.
• Preserving DC Stables—a blog that advocates for the preservation of alley dwellings and businesses, which are (sadly) less common than they used to be in DC.
• The WashCycle—the go-to blog for news about cycling in the DC area.

removed:

• Columbia Heights News—this website hasn't been updated since last october.
• Developments in SW DC—there were three blogs that i found almost simultaneously last year that covered DC's smallest quadrant. two of them seem to be thriving, but this one stopped updating in march. maybe 3 blogs was too much for southwest.
• Eckington DC Living—another area that used to have three blogs, eckington, seems to have seen another one peter out. no posts since april.
• Fifth and Oh—one of the many shaw blogs, fifth and oh hasn't posted since january (when it seemed a lot of shaw bloggers got very frustrated after the ANC elections led to continued gridlock on the commission.
• The Goodspeed Update—i'm still following rob's blog personally, but he's moved to boston and doesn't really post about DC neighborhood issues directly anymore.
• just.in.dc—i heart shaw—another shaw blog that became a home for twitter updates for a time, then stopped updating.
• Treebox Vodka—still the greatest blog name of all time, treebox vodka hasn't updated since last september, and hasn't scheduled a cleanup since then.

ORIGINAL POST: i realized my blogroll was well past overdue for an update. there were a few blogs that have reached their end, and some new ones (some of them aren't really "new," but they're new to my RSS reader, so i wanted to make sure everyone was aware that there are more people out there talking about their DC neighborhoods).

removed:

• ANC2C02 Forum—anc commissioner kevin chapple's site was taken offline after a complaint was filed that he was making a profit off of the site. it's too bad, it was an excellent resource. the negative energy side of shaw won this battle.
• Off Seventh—after briefly coming back to life, it looks like brian has cashiered the blog for real.
• Bloomingdale—this was one of my inspirations when i moved into the neighborhood. i wanted to be able to add to what sean was doing, without overlapping too much. i think we achieved that during the last few years. very sad to see his blog come to an end.

added:

• Barry Farm (re)mixed—a blog covering the barry farm area, located between historic anacostia and st. e's west campus.
• Bates Area Civic Association—covers news from the eastern part of shaw (truxton circle, bates, hanover).
• Brookland Avenue—news and observations from brookland here in ward 5.
• Convention Center Community Association Blog—news from the new and very active community association that covers the part of shaw near the convention center.
• C Street NE Project—a narrowly-focused blog, discussing the efforts to make the stretch of c street near RFK into a neighborhood street instead of a pseudo-freeway.
• Deanwood Denizen—only one post, so i don't know if this blog is really going to happen or not, but a voice from the far northeast part of river east would be very welcome in the neighborhood blogosphere.
• in bloom—a new voice in bloomingdale. we lost sean, but we picked up elle! a very nice, clean design, i might add.
• North Capitol Main Street—covering the commercial districts here in bloomingdale, eckington, and truxton circle.
• Park View, D.C.—this blog covers one of the small neighborhoods that frequently gets swallowed up by columbia heights or petworth when people are talking about the areas along the green line north of the old city.
• Rhode Island Avenue NE Insider—a blog that focuses on this long-neglected commercial corridor, from the rhode island avenue metro station to the district/maryland line.
• Rosedale Citizens' Alliance—this blog covers the neighborhood south of benning road and east of capitol hill.
• The Penn Brangler—the first blog covering the penn branch neighborhod of river east.
• Ward 3 DC—this blog has a lot of territory to cover. it's kind of surprising that ward 3, with all it's civic activity, doesn't have more neighborhood blogs.

harry thomas will be at 1st and rhode island on tuesday

photo by darrow montgomery

harry thomas is holding informal constituent meetings this summer, and will be here to talk to folks from bloomingdale this tuesday.

the program, called “councilmember on your corner” will take place from 5 pm to 7 pm at the corner of 1st and rhode island, nw.

five of these events are scheduled, and this is the only one in our part of the ward (others were/are in queens chapel, brookland, lamond riggs, and carver langston).

a quote from his office:

“While I have an open door policy and meet with all residents who come to my office, not everyone has the flexibility or time to make the trek downtown,” says Councilmember Thomas. “Councilmember on Your Corner provides residents with an opportunity to share their thoughts and concerns with me without having to leave their neighborhoods. Plus, I enjoy being out in the Ward,” notes Thomas.

crispus attucks park clean-up day—saturday 8/22/2009

photo by scenic artisan

see this message from molly scott of the crispus attucks development corporation:

Happy Summer Bloomingdale!

Have you been to Crispus Attucks Park lately? Come see us grow! Neighbors have been working steadily throughout the Summer to keep it looking beautiful and we've had a lot of neighbors using the park- we even had a wedding there a few months ago!

Please help us keep it looking great- the Crispus Attucks Development Corporation is having an End-of-Summer Clean-up day on Saturday August 22nd from about 9 am till 2 pm. We don't want to keep people out in the Super-hot Summer sun, so come out early and maybe we can be done faster :)

We have a few projects to work on and maybe more to come:

- weeding
- mulching
- edging
- maybe re-laying some large flagstones in the Memory Garden

All are welcome, we'll have some snacks and drinks- come out and lend a hand!

Thanks!

-CADC

boycott neighborhood stores?

this note was included on thursday's bloomingdale listserv message:

From Bloomingdale resident Joe Levesque:

The little corner grocery stores are the worst offenders. Both the Flagler Market on W ST NW and the blue Mini Market (former A&L) on 2107 First ST NW are two offenders. I spoke to the staff of both stores two weeks ago, and asked them to water the new trees. They agree to. Now all the trees in front of their stores are dead. I even watered them myself, carrying 10 gallons of water 300 feet. When I returned from vacation after 10 days, I noticed that the 3 trees had died from lack of water. These trees would still be alive if the store owners had spent just 3 minutes each week watering them.

We should not support any stores that don't support our community. They are doing us a disservice. We should boycott them.

NOTE: Windows Cafe and Big Bear Cafe have both done great jobs improving the appearance of the neighborhood. They deserve our support!!

We should all report to Scott what other street trees in public spaces have died.

i figured a few photos would be appropriate here to illustrate what mr. levesque is talking about:

here's the micro-market at 2107 1st street nw. (it's kind of funny how timor is painted a bright color, too, but it doesn't seem to be as jarring as this place. maybe it's because of the windows.) the tree in front has clearly died.

to be fair, the house two doors down at 2011 has a dead tree in front of their house as well, so it's not just the businesses in the neighborhood that are neglecting to water their trees.

here's the flagler market at the corner of flagler street and w street nw. the dead tree that mr. levesque referenced is at the left side of the photo (on w street).

here's a closer photograph of that oak tree. note that it had one of the mayor's green team's ooze tubes there for watering, though it clearly wasn't being utilized.

again, to balance things a little (but by no means to let these people off the hook) here's a dead tree in front of the 9:30 club on v street.

so, would you boycott a store because they're not watering the trees in the public space in front of their store?

it seems like many neighborhood residents who might consider such a boycott would do so because of the cumulative effect of many other things that these stores do. perhaps the lack of care for the trees could be the thing that pushes you over the edge and makes you consider such a boycott.

what do you think? the comment section awaits...

empty parking space? nah, i'll just park in the bike lane

another day, another blocked bike lane. and this time, it's just ridiculous to the point of being nearly sublime.

there is a spot reserved for government vehicles in front of the mary mcleod bethune council house on vermont avenue south of logan circle. but this government worker decided that the posh space was just too good for him/her.

they decided to park in the bike lane instead, keeping any other government worker from being able to reach parking nirvana (and forcing cyclists to move out into traffic that frequently is exceeding the speed limit during the morning rush).

kudos to this worker bee for going above and beyond the call of duty.

bike lane, or parking lane?

just an observation from tuesday morning—is there a bike lane on vermont avenue just south of logan circle? i'm not sure. i can never tell because there are ALWAYS cars double parked there...ALWAYS!!!

'dirt drawing' from yesterday's '1st on first' art walk

these are probably being washed away by the rain this morning...

photos from today's 1st on first event

pulling the weeds and cleaning up the sidewalk on first street and mulching the treeboxes was the order of the day to start the morning.

setting up the stage behind windows for the music.


hanging out alongside windows once the stage was set up.

lawn art at 1st and randolph (it says 'the brain').

more lawn art at 1st and s streets.

art in the window at yoga district.