A motley collection of one and two-story strip malls in the DC suburb of Wheaton, Maryland is poised to be transformed into a high density urban downtown. Montgomery County officials have declared victory in downtown Silver Spring, where a decades-long redevelopment process injected millions of dollars of new development into what was an economically depressed […]
What Will be the Fate of Washington’s Martin Luther King Jr. Memorial Library?
The future of Washington’s downtown Martin Luther King Jr. Memorial Library hangs in the balance. A bill now pending before the DC Council’s Committee on Education, Libraries and Recreation proposes to construct a new central library on the old convention center site, and lease the old structure as office space to help pick up the […]
Races I Was Watching
With so many candidates and initiatives on the ballots across the country yesterday I thought it would be worthwhile to point out a few items I was watching. Although it was exciting to watch the Democrats take back the House for the first time since 1994, the evening wasn’t without its disappointments. At the top […]
National Mall to Get a Plan
The National Park Service is launching a public process to create a new plan for the National Mall. The process will be kicked off next Wednesday, November 15 at a daylong symposium at the Naval Heritage Center at Navy Memorial where a rotating panel will discuss the mall in the context of the “needs of […]
Considering Washington’s Triangle Parks
Pierre L’Enfant’s plan for the city of Washington included radial avenues named after states superimposed over a grid of lettered and numbered streets. Inevitably, the intersection between the avenues and the grid result in a number of small triangular lots, and many lots with at least one acute, wedge-shaped corner. (This has resulted in many […]
Auto Availablity in Seven College Towns
Percentage of total households reporting “no vehicle available” on question H44 on the 2000 Census, with total number of occupied housing units in parentheses: Ithica, NY (10,253) – 24.6% Berkeley, CA (44,955) – 17.0% Charlottesville, VA (16,851) – 14.2% Madison, WI (88,845) – 11.8% Chapel Hill, NC (17,932) – 11.3% College Park, MD (6,046) – […]
Do You Live in ANC 2C02?
In Washington, D.C. the lowest level of elected government are the city’s Advisory Neighborhood Commissions. Created in the 1970s, they were designed to connect the city’s neighborhoods to city government. These bodies are notorious for their NIMBY tendances and colorful personalities. I’ve long wondered why it seemed like the ANC in my neighborhood never seemed […]