This photo was taken back in February 2010 of the construction that was to be the Shaw library at Rhode Island Ave and 7th St NW.
Tag: Development
Memory Lane: Richardson Place and Jim’s Garden
Before Common there was a long battle between the residents of Richardson Place and a developer named Mondie. And before Mondie, there was a garden where part of the current shared apartments sit.
The garden belonged to Jim Norris who owned the house next to it. It was a cute and sweet little garden perfect for a bachelor. The houses on Richardson back then were on the very small side. I remember one Christmas, Jim had his whole living room packed with many creches/nativity scenes. He managed to make the best of the small space. Jim owned it from 2001-2018.
9th and O St NW circa 1968
There are buildings at 9th and O that aren’t in the picture that exist now. Use the O Street Giant turret to orient yourself.
Discuss.
DCist Pending comment about CaBi usage
I’m only posting this because I see a comment I made on DCist about CaBi usage is pending, and I’m not 100% sure what I wrote that would warrant a flag. Maybe saying race and income doesn’t explain everything but around here (DC) it is used to explain everything. In the case of the Capital Bikeshare race and income aren’t the major reasons in light of other information.
Looking at this image
So there are rich white areas of DC way west of the park where there are 0 ride per hour yellow dots. The DCist story interprets this as Capital Bikeshare failed to be available to all users because there are so few rides in Wards 7 & 8.
There are more stations in “areas with higher shares of white residents, lower poverty rates, higher income, and higher college attainment,” according to the report. CaBi’s user survey, which it undertakes every two years, bears this out. The 2016 survey found that 80 percent of Capital Bikeshare users were white, with Asian and Hispanic/Latino riders both at 7 percent, and African-American riders at 4 percent.
Yes.
As one of the 4% African American CaBi users, I’ll say there are more stations because there is more demand in my now predominately white, formerly predominately black neighborhood. I know there is lots of demand because if the morning weather is nice I need to get my butt out of the house before 7:30 or else all the working bikes nearest me are gone. And there is lots of demand for slots near where I work, because I will encounter a full dock and try to figure out where is the closest empty dock may be.
Also if you look back at the map, the cluster of yellow is in a highly dense area with lots of retail/ jobs. The yellow along Massachusetts and Wisconsin Avenues NW into the areas of Upper Caucasia also are in dense-ish areas with retail. What do we know about Wards 7 & 8? Not enough retail. Not enough grocery stores. Also it lacks density of say Ward 1.
If memory serves me I think I wrote that I would prefer to see an overlay looking at age and retail rather than race.
Circle of Life for Local Businesses
Well if all goes as planned my hairdresser will retire and sell her building at the end of this month. She’d been in Shaw since the 1970s, which is around about the time my aunt started working in DC. My aunt recommended the S&M Salon to me back in the 1990s when I moved here for work. I do not look forward to finding another hairdresser.
But that’s the circle of life. Local businesses start, fail, succeed, merge, get way too big, move, and eventually close. Sometimes it’s a couple of months, years, or decades.
The Eckington business Workafrolic, which was an awesome idea of workspace, workout space for parents, is closed. I saw on the Bloomingdale parent’s list that this Saturday, (12/15/18) between 11am – 2pm they are selling off their inventory of yoga mats, toddler stuff, bouncers, etc. Cash or Venmo only. Maybe it was the location. North Capitol Street is a tough road.
Richard Layman had a post about the revitalization of 9th Street, that reminded me of businesses gone or moved that helped make that foodie part of Shaw (I’m ignoring 14th St) what it is. Anyone remember Vegetate? They had to battle the churches (Shiloh) for their place on 9th over liquor licenses. That battle needed to happen. Queen of Sheba was part of it, and it remains. In 2010/2011 there was Rogue 24 hidden in Blagden Alley. Now that was some fancy expensive eatin’, and it still is with the Dabney. But I guess I should credit one of the earlier 9th Street restaurants, Corduroy, who is still there and managed to open Baby Wale nearby. Now there are wonderful restaurant options in walking distance should I chose to spend $30-$80 on babysitters.
I’m just thankful entrepreneurs are taking a chance over and over in the eastern parts of Shaw (east of 9th & Truxton Circle), Bloomingdale, LeDroit and Eckington. Some will do okay, some will fail, and others will become so much a part of the neighborhood it will seem that they’ve always been there.
BACA on Langston School
The Langston School on the unit block of P St NW has been vacant, and crumbling for years, possibly decades. The building is in such bad condition, charters who get 1st dibs on DC school buildings have given it a hard pass.
So after decades of nothing from the city, the Bates Area Civic Association (BACA) has decided to attempt to tackle the problem. Take a look at the BACA Resolution in Support of Development Proposal for Langston School. To sum it up, BACA says it has been vacant for too long and is hurting the surrounding area, and maybe the National Peace Corps Association seems interested in it, please let them buy it.
No need for developer hate- who built your house?
So I was reading, okay skimming, through a lot of web posts and articles about housing and there was a fair amount of hate on developers, real estate developers. Apparently all developers care about is money. Okay, but didn’t a developer build your house? Your apartment?
So the newly historic landmarked Wardman Flats were built by a real estate developer Harry Wardman, which is why it is landmarked… Okay it was landmarked because a present day developer threatened the turret at 319 R Street and landmarking is a hammer people can use. Wardman did not build the houses on Square 519 (btwn 3rd, 4th, Florida, and R Streets NW) for charity. He was a builder, that’s how he made money. He built a lot in DC, mainly, for the money.
A few years before Wardman built in Truxton Circle and a few blocks over the Washington Sanitary Improvement Company (WSIC) built flats between North Cap, Q, P, and 3rd Streets NW. Paul Williams has a wonderful blog post about WSIC, so there is no need for me to rehash that history. WSIC wasn’t completely all about the money, more about ‘business philanthropy’. I’m not completely sure, but my reading is that this type of project was to provide dividends to stockholders. So doing good and making money?
My own house is over 140 years old and as far as I can tell, was built by a guy who rented to poor black labors. Can’t find anything that shows he built my house for anything other than the money.
There is no public housing in Truxton Circle. There is HUD subsidized housing, but no public housing. But even city supported or federally subsidized housing involve developers as well. I don’t have any good history about that so, this is where I’ll end this post.
Probably nothing new at the corner of Florida & 3rd NW
So mommy (me) decided she wanted some vermouth and pintxos and so we (me and the baby) sat out on the patio of ANXO. While I was there I noticed the owner of the commercial property across the street and another man talking in front. The other man had a clipboard. It’s probably nothing.
I did see a mention a while back on PoPville about this, but we’ve been on this ride before and it goes nowhere. Many, many years back, way before ANXO, two ladies wanted to turn the building into a wine bar. However, according to them, the landlord was difficult. It has been vacant for years, but well kept.
I also noticed a kitty in the upstairs window. Kitty in the window means the upstairs is occupied. At least occupied by a black and white kitty cat, so I need to take it off my vacant list on my other blog.
Really, probably nothing will change. If it does, I’ll be pleasantly (hopefully) surprised.
319 R Street NW- a sign
So what’s new? A sign.
I attended the Bates Area Civic Association (BACA) meeting on Monday and a neighbor from that block said she spoke with the owner/developer. That person informed her that they would be keeping the place a single family home. Even though they purchased the property back in June 2015 for $750K, they could break even, or profit, by giving it a super interior renovation and exterior restoration.
For those of you just joining us in this story, here’s the quick summary. Back in the 00s a Korean church bought the property to do inner city mission work. Then they sold it to a developer, who then proposed to knock off the turret and build a 3rd story in order to make a 2 unit condo. They hinted that if they were not allowed to do so they would demolish the whole building, as a matter of right. They played chicken, and lost. A hundred years prior, developer Harry Wardman built almost all the buildings on the block 319 R sat on, and this was the reasoning that was used to make the whole square a National Historic Landmark. The landmark status prevented the developers from making any exterior changes. This probably could have been prevented if the turret was respected or if the architects who drew the second proposed drawing incorporated the turret, instead of plopping on a dunce hat on the proposed 3rd floor. It had been done before around the corner on 4th St where a 3rd floor was added and the problem didn’t go past BZA.
Considering Harry Wardman built all those townhouses as 2 story flats, I don’t see why it cannot become a 2 unit building. The building has a tad over 2,000 square feet, so dividing it into half wouldn’t create two too tiny units. But there are costs to dividing up a single unit structure (character preservation vs affordable housing, ‘nother topic for another day) and it appears a nicely (not impressive but nice) renovated corner house like 319 R St NW would sell for 1.something million dollars. One point four if I were a betting woman. The house across the street for $1.25 mil is under contract, and 319 conceivably has 1 parking pad and those are worth gold!
So we’ll see what happens and keep an eye on it.
Scripture Cathedral is no more
Walking to mass Saturday I noticed that a building was missing from the corner of 9th and O Street NW. The Scripture Cathedral that shared a parking lot with Immaculate Conception Catholic Church is now gone. It emptied some time ago, but now it is no more. Probably, luxury condos will go there.
I figure Roadside Development will get around to putting a building on the parking lot space whenever the other developer finishes putting a building on the Scripture Cathedral space.