Tag: business

North Capitol Main Streets event @ the Big Bear

The North Capitol Main Street had a Volunteer Recruitment Happy Hour, but face it, many of us was there cause we wanted into the Bear. Some were there for the free food. Anyway there was a huge crowd packed inside the Big Bear. Big enough that sometimes the easiest way to get from one end to the other was to go out the door, walk outside and make your way to the other.
The crowd was also diverse. Whites, blacks, gays, straights, people with dogs (dogs stayed outside), seniors, babies, and all in between. There were little black girls and little white girls (ages 4-6ish) running around outside, trying to lift each other, while adults warned them about spots where they needed to watch it. There was the trio of middle school aged boys who walked in from somewhere, checking out the scene, scarfing down food and displaying a deep interest in the coffee making machines. There were a couple of babies, they really didn’t do anything ‘cept look cute.
But the main reason for the Bear opening its doors was the North Capitol Main Street org. There were a few speakers who spoke briefly. First was Vicky Leonard Chambers the chair of the volunteer organization. She (I think, I wasn’t taking notes) mentioned that unlike some other Main Street organization, North Cap gets no money from the city and it is completely a volunteer effort (thus the happy hour recruitment). They would like to get funding from the city, but even then the problem is the city hasn’t budgeted a lot to the Main Streets program. Then Elizabeth Price of the NoMa BID spoke, she is new on the job and has no phone, yet. After her a few other NCMS persons spoke and there was a raffle. I left.
Can’t wait till the Bear is open for business.

Quick blog before church

I don’t write about everything that goes on in the hood. I still need to get out the shin-dig over at the still unopened for business Big Bear (yes, in Bloomingdale). And there was some sort of shoot out in the TC this weekend. The big items I haven’t written about, mainly because other Shaw bloggers have, were:
Shaw being the 2nd bloggist neighborhood
The Warehouse Theater in danger of closing because of property taxes
The Shaw EcoVillage bike shop Chain Reaction closing (dang it where am I going to get my bike fixed now!?)

Okay I gotta go.

Florida Market Meeting

The Office of Planning said they’d post the presentation in the next 2 days, so I’m not going to repeat a lot of what was presented. I’ll try to sum up what took place.
They tried to make clear, or distance themselves, from was the New Towns project. No, this was just about the study of the area, which is a more in depth study than the general one that done before. However, because New Town’s running parallel to this study, the confusion was hard to avoid.
There were presentations about the historic and economic aspects of the area. Construction of the market began in 1929 and other buildings were added later up until about the mid-20th Century. The economic presentation looked at possible land uses, but what was interesting about it was pointing out that there is not a lot of land in the District of Columbia zoned for light industrial, thus making Florida Market special.
On the topic of zoning it was pointed out that the area is not zoned for residential. Currently, no residential can go there. Also the New Towns project wants to put in a high rise, and zoning limits buildings to 40 ft in height.
In the citizen commentary and in the presentation by OP there were some valid points made. Yes, the market needs better signage. Apparently back in the Barry years there was a plan for signage but there was no money, so it didn’t get done. Yes, the market is ADA unfriendly. Yes, it is run down and dirty. And yes, it is hazardous for pedestrians.
There were other points brought up that I didn’t agree with that boils down to my fear of the area being sanitized and losing its affordable flavor. First off, the market shouldn’t have to be all things to all people and not every development has to serve a primarily middle class mainstream audience. It serves immigrants (and other ethnic groups), ethnic businesses, small businesses, and people looking for deals. Yes, there is a demand for housing in the area, but more housing doesn’t necessarily mean it will be affordable or available to the very transient student population.
I will mull over the handout I got some more and probably come up with a better post later.

Bricks & mortar in the hood vs the Internet

I have been hesitant to blog something that has been on my mind. My goal is not to poo-poo some one’s dream or hurt business. It is mainly me, as a customer, in my role as a consumer, expressing myself.

Way back, when I first moved here about 5 years ago, residents, newbies and some old timers vocalized a desire for certain businesses that would serve the community. One of those types of businesses was a video rental place. At this moment I have zero interest in a video rental store. Why? Netflix, need I say more. I seriously doubt a neighborhood store would have the variety of foreign with English in subtitles type of movies I like. I’m actually happy with Netflix, and I can’t see myself trudging down to a store to be confronted with 20 billion copies of that recently released Action Rom Com and a few copies of foreign films, half of which are Kung Fu movies.

Another business, not requested but existing, I don’t see myself as a customer. There is a clothing type shop that opened up in the TC recently (in the past year) and I went in with high hopes. However I couldn’t find anything I wanted to buy. There is an online store that I frequent that sells like but higher quality merchandise with more variety, which makes shopping at the TC store unnecessary. I do hope the store succeeds, but sadly it won’t have me as a customer.

There are other businesses around and about the neighborhood that will have me as a customer because I need their physical presence. Like the dry cleaners or quickie mart, because I need milk or a can of tuna, now.

Wifi, and farmers, and bears! Oh my!

Over on the Eckington Listserv there is a flutter of hope about the corner of 1st and R Sts NW. Hopefully in a few weeks ANC Stu will open up Big Bear Cafe. ANC Stu also wants wi-fi. But the big thing that has everyone aflutter is the drive to get a farmers market on that little strip of R St that is between 1st and Florida. It would be a perfect staging area for an open air market, when the cafe opens.
This interests me and probably folks in the northern end of the TC because this is right on the border between Eckington and the 1973 boundaries of Shaw.
The chatter on the listserv is contacting the Stu crew about helping with the market. Apparently some emails got lost, or more than likely buried (with me its the spam filter, which is why you should have a decent subject line). So if you want to help ANC Stu contact him at his gmail account at studavenport@ .

Idle finger food chatter

Tuesday night I attended a private event over at the Old Dominion Brewhouse and ran into Shaw Rez, as well as Kevin Chapple, and some other ANC people. Alex had tipped me off about the event and I did see him but we never got around to speaking.
Someone had asked if the food served up was from the restaurant or was it catered. The food I had seen on the menu before. The time I did go out to ODB with a friend I ordered the shrimp wrapped in thin strips of fried potato. They are good but they need a little something, like ketchup. I saw crab cakes on the menu in some form (maybe as a sandwich) and the mini cakes floating around were okay, but I’m picky about my cakes. Someone else had mentioned the chicken bits were excellent once they were dipped in the honey mustard.
Anyway, there was some mention about ANC stuff. One was something I don’t even want to report on but it involves a deposed mini-dictator and his plans. Another was a sentiment from Gallery Place to not be in the 2C-verse and join up with that area that calls itself Penn-Quarter. I totally understand that sentiment, as GP has a heck of a lot more in common with PQ than MVS. Then speaking with an ANC from 2F, he supposed that once the Whitman and other places fill up there may be a rearrangement of borders. I gather that won’t happen until the 2010 Census.
And lastly, ODB is a minority owned business.

I’d work for food

In the City Paper’s article on our favorite slow cook take out Thai X-ing it seems you can work for your supper. Dang I’d jump in and help just to get my order going faster. I didn’t know you could volunteer. I’ll have to ask next time I’m there.
Another thing about the article, is Bryan Simmons. I don’t know him but he looks so much like his father in the picture. His dad is the co-worker who told me about Taw’s plans to move.

Body and Spirit

This weekend I got B and IT (and later BL) to join me at the Florida Ave Market (or Capitol City Market). The plan was to hit three or four stores to show them what was there. I forgot my shopping bag, so I didn’t buy anything at the places I normally shop. B was in one of his smart-alec moods pointing out what would not appeal to yuppies. No prices on things, no clear lines, etc. He also suggested that if we wanted to save the market the historic preservation people should be brought in. I think I may have actually growled at him.
While the HP people are good at protecting the body, that is the buildings and the structures, I don’t think they can preserve the spirit. The market for me is not a collection of warehouse buildings, instead they are a Hodge podge of businesses, a mix of wholesale and retail banded together, the spirit. What they are housed in to me seems fairly irrelevant. The 19th century structures that are there have attached to them squat ugly cinder block, cinder block that seems to distract the eye from the brick.
The spirit is that thing that is when you have these warehouse businesses all together in one place, some providing retail services, selling goods at a low price, in a central DC location. It is my inner libertarian screaming that if the government places some extra burden on the businesses there, be they HP regs or a ‘temporary’ move or rules to make residential possible, those businesses may fold, leave permanently or pass the expense on to consumers in a way that makes the market less attractive to those consumers.
Even in theological discussions with friends I have trouble defining and describing the spirit. It is a fuzzy thing that I sense and feel. I sense the energy radiating from the people working, pushing handcarts, yelling in a variety of languages. The consumers give off an international, down to business (as the market does service restaurants and other businesses), utilitarian vibe that I feel. And you have the two interacting with each other in a central DC location. If you change the type of business, you screw with the spirit. Change the type of consumers, you change the vibe. Change the location, same thing.
My fear of the city coming in and changing the area is that it will kill the spirit. New businesses would replace the old ones and those new businesses would appeal to a different type of consumer (or a different side of some consumers who do use the market).
At the end of the shopping, at Litteri’s we noticed a petition on the counter. So if you’d like, stop in, by a sub or some pasta or wine and sign the petition to preserve the spirit of the market.