*The article begins with a brief discussion of the Christian coffeehouse (I think it's called Ebenezer's) going in at 2nd & F. Here's a link if you want to know more about the Evangelical church that is going to run it.
*The corridor was already in decline before the 1968 riot (the riots basically just sealed the deal).
*I would be interested to see a list of the 30 new shops that have opened on H Street in the past 3-4 years. Does "shops" include establishments serving food? Are businesses that opened & closed within that period (e.g. Quimby's Shoe Emporium) included in the numbers?
*The H Street CDC is pretty controversial. There have been alllegations of financial mismanagement.
*The CDC project at 8th & H remains controversial. A decrepit, but old building was demolished (not redone as the article states) to make room for the new development. Some local preservationists were not amused. Many residents felt & still feel that the building does not blend well with its surroundings. The building has a more modern feeling that many of H Street's structures & its fake 2nd floor is often the target of criticism.
*The CDC project at 8th & H is controversial not just because of the building, but also because of the businesses it contains. The article touches on the footlocker discontent when it mentions that "some residents complain that there are now four shoe stores within a few blocks." The other issue with Foot Locker is that it is a national chain. This brings up two related concerns: some residents dislike the idea of chain stores & would rather see funky one-of-a kind places, & chain stores can afford to pay higher rent, thus potentially contributing to rising rents all along the corridor. I'm not saying that the neighborhood as a whole objects to the Foot Locker, just that some people have done so rather vocally & the article ignores this fact. The 8th & H building is also home to Blimpies (pretty much ground zero for the ANC's fight against fast food places improperly being given matter-of-right restaurant licenses by DCRA).
*The issues with the Cohen development are not that "some longtime residents opposed new development." He has since added fences & removed the debris, but here are some photos that I took of the site from last spring.
*Loree Murray is more than just a longtime resident. She is also the founder of the well known community group Near Northeast Citizens (aka Near Northeast Citizens Against Crime & Drugs).
*Plenty of area rowhouses are selling for way more than $400k.
*I would also disagree with a couple other of Anwar Saleem's comments, but those are opinions, not factual issues.
Also see a post on the same topic on Rebuilding Place in the Urban Space.
10 comments:
One of the articles I forgot to mention that were similar to the article today was after Hechinger Mall opened, in 1981 (it's in the archive at the Lib. of Congress).
OTOH, I do think that the inflection point has been reached, as evidenced by the Abdo project. But as I have discussed many times in emails on local listservs and in my blog, and in testimonies to DC government agencies and the City Council, how and what is built really matters.
I argue that the reason that commercial district improvement lags improvements in the residential part of the neighborhood is because of the discongruent development that has been constructed heretofore, pretty much as a result of the H Street Urban Renewal Plan developed after the riots, and despite more than $100 million of DC/HUD monies (probably more when you consider that DC Government has paid rent separately for the two office buildings on the south side of the 600 block since 1988-1989), things haven't really changed much in the commercial district, except as a result of independent investment--H Street Playhouse first on the eastern end, and the efforts of David Bernhardt on the western end.
I could go on and on...
I also found it odd that the article was slim on news of positive developments on the Eastern end of H Street with the Joy of Motion, Martin Lounge, Clothes Cafe, Pug etc....
Articles like that won't help spur investment. Does H Street have a person designated to help generate it good press to entice investors?
Excellent point. I only focused on element present in the article that I felt were mischaracterized, or not fully explained. It does seem very strange that the Post would do an article on the revival of H Street & then neglect many of the signs of revival. The coffee shop that the article focuses seems a bit obscure. Why not look at some of the open businesses that we have.
The headline is misleading. The print version has a map that shows development around Union Station and is titled as such; thus the focus on the coffehouse at 2&F and other developments at the Western end of H Street NE
The graphic is available online here.
The map does say that it shows development near Union Station, but the map covers pretty much the whole H Street Corridor.
True, I was actually (mis)remembering the map from memory. I think they pulled the listing of projects from the dc Marketing center's development search (thus they typo for Senate Square.) Really crack reporting, I would agree.
The buildings that H Street CDC has constructed are the best proof that the H Street corridor needs a design overlay in addition to the land use zoning overlay. Note the differnce between Abdo's approach and Bill Barrow's:
Abdo: preserve old building, build high-end luxury condos.
HSCDC: demolish old building, build low-end down-market strip mall.
Also, HSMS should be doing PR for the corridor, but... ahem... no one's handing out grants to do PR, so I don't think HSMS is too interested in that part of their job.
The name of the coffee shop to be at 2nd & F NE is "Ebenezer's".
My mistake, I'll fix it. Thanks.
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