Several whimsical Washingtonians staged a Barnes Dance Barn Dance at Seventh and H Streets in Chinatown on Friday.  (see video above)

DDOT installed the new Barnes Dance crossing late last week and is studying the effectiveness of installing such configurations at some of the city’s busier intersections.

The setup in Chinatown provides three light cycles: one for H Street, one for Seventh Street, and one cycle during which pedestrians may cross whichever way they choose, even diagonally through the intersection.  The Chinatown Barnes Dance differs slightly from a traditional Barnes Dance in two ways:

1. Cars may not turn at any time.  A traditional Barnes Dance provides right-turn arrows during the streets’ respective green cycles.
2. Pedestrians in Chinatown may cross with traffic in addition to the all-pedestrian cycle.

These variations prioritize pedestrian crossings, a priority in line with DDOT’s goal of enhancing pedestrian transportation in the District.

Some in Georgetown are hoping the DDOT installs a similar “dance” at Wisconsin Avenue and M Street.  Greater Greater Washington disagrees with that potential site, as several unique factors render that part of Georgetown unsuitable for a Barnes Dance.

DC development blog DCmud interviewed Grant Epstein, who recently withdrew his proposal for 1922 Third Street NW.  Mr. Epstein’s development company focuses primarily on adaptive reuse of historic properties.

One part of the interview caught our eye, as Mr. Epstein confirms what we have long suspected: ornate houses are difficult to build today because it’s harder to find skilled craftsmen to built custom ornaments:

It’s amazing the amount of craftsmanship that went into these houses on [Capitol Hill]. Detail that it’s very hard to replicate today. So the old townhouses, they inspire me. We’ve lost a lot in our new buildings, in the construction of them. It primarily has to do with the number of pieces that go into a house. There aren’t many craftsmen that know how to do the details.

….

[T]he people don’t exist anymore… the trades don’t exist. For instance, iron staircases. Two or three guys in the area do iron staircases the right way. Two or three guys! Back in the early 1900s there were forty! It’s a big difference. At M Street we found the iron treads from an old turn of the century house and recast the iron posts in order to use the same style that was supposed to be there, but was missing. There were only a couple of guys who knew how to do that.

While walking around LeDroit Park, we frequently notice detailed architectural ornaments that never adorn contemporary buildings.  How many bricklayers today have the experience and skill to lay bricks as was done at the Mary Church Terrell house when it was built?

And how many bricklayers have the experience to construct a façade like this one on the McGill carriagehouse at 1922 Third Street?

The owners of this house on Third Street told me how impossible it was to find somebody to replicate these columns:

Rarely will you find anything like the gingerbread on the Anna J. Cooper house:

Brackets like these require a good amount of craftsmanship to carve and paint:

Contrast these houses with the vacant apartment house at 1907 Third Street NW:

You’ve seen them around DC.  Those tall signs with historic photos and narratives explaining what happened in that neighborhood 70 or 200 years ago.  Several neighborhoods in DC have heritage trails, courtesy of Cultural Tourism DC.

We in LeDroit Park and Bloomingdale are on our way to getting our very own heritage trail, but the LeDroit Park-Bloomingdale Heritage Trail Working Group needs your help.

The Working Group will meet on Wednesday, May 12 at 7 pm at St. George’s Episcopal Church (Second & U Streets) to collect stories, old photos, and to plan how to interview our neighborhoods’ long-time residents.

Do you have an old photo or an old story to tell or are you interested in local history?  LeDroit Park has hosted many notable residents from Civil War generals, to Duke Ellington, to Walter Washington, and even Jesse Jackson!

Come join us Wednesday night and learn how you can help.

Wednesday, May 12
7 pm
St. George’s Episcopal Church
Second & U Streets NW

Last summer reports surfaced of a gambling house on Fourth Fourth Street between Elm Street an Oakdale Place.  After a months-long investigation, the MPD finally swooped in and arrested two residents of the house in late January.  After the arrest the MPD informed the neighborhood that they also found sound-proofing material attached the interior walls to reduce the noise emanating from the house.  Whether this was out of respect for the neighbors or fear of getting caught, one cannot know.

Last month the police and U.S. Attorney obtained a conviction and Lt. Alberto Jova informs us that an eviction is also pending.

The house and carriage house at 1992 Third Street are still on the market after Community Three Development withdrew its offer.  The Washington City Paper ran a story on the current owners’ woes in buying and now selling the property.  It turns out the current owners invested in the house in 2000 with a man who turned out to be a con-man.  After several legal battles with their partner, they were able to obtain the full title to the house and paid $75,000 to repair the carriage house roof, in addition to the expensive legal bills.

In April 2009 they decided to put the place on the market, but the offers fell through.  The City Paper writes,

She had four serious offers, but by then, amid widespread economic uncertainty, nobody could get a mortgage—even a tenured Howard University professor, she adds.

That’s not exactly true, though.  Having bought our LeDroit Park house in May 2009, we know from experience that it was certainly possible at that time to get a mortgage.  The problem was that it was difficult to get mortgages on overpriced properties or for buyers with poor credit.  Certainly these restrictions narrowed the field, but to say it was impossible to get a mortgage is an exaggeration.

Buyers interested in buying 1922 Third Street might want to consider an FHA 203(k) mortgage, a Federally-subsidized housing rehabilitation loan that combines the purchase and renovation costs into a single loan.  Only certain lenders are qualified to make these loans and these loans require a good deal of preparatory work (appraisals, inspections, estimates, permits, etc.), but they provide relatively affordable interest rates that regular construction loans rarely match.

At tomorrow’s monthly meeting of ANC1B, representatives for a fledgling coffeehouse/lounge, The Independent (715 Florida Avenue NW), will petition for a Class C liquor license.  The Independent seeks to serve beer, wine, and liquor to a maximum of 235 people (199 seats) on the first floor and a maximum of 90 people (75 seats) in the summer garden.  They propose these hours:

Entertainment will run 6pm – 2am (Sun. – Thurs.) and 6pm – 3 am (Fri. and Sat.).

Up at 2632 Georgia Avenue, GII Restaurant & Lounge plans to host acoustic jazz bands, karaoke, open mike nights, and DJs to a maximum of 102 people (86 seats). They propose the following business hours: 6 am-2:30 am (Mon. – Wed.) and 6 am-3 am (Thurs. – Sun.). The propose serving alcohol 10 am-2 am (Sun.), 8 am-2 am (Mon. – Thurs.) and 8 am-3 am (Fri. and Sat.). Entertainment will be 6 pm-2:30 am (Mon. – Wed.) and 6 pm – 3 am (Thur. – Sun.).

Here in LeDroit Park, the Elks Lodge at 1844 Third St seeks to renew its license but not without controversy.  In April 2008 the lodge was the site of a triple-stabbing and just a few months ago, the lodge was delinquent in paying license fines.

In addition to the lodge, the following restaurants seek to renew their licenses:

• Alero Lounge, 1301 U Street, Class C
• Crème Café & Lounge, 1322 U Street, Class C
• Little Ethiopia Restaurant, 1924 Ninth Street, Class C
• Portico, 1914 Ninth Street, Class C
• Mesobe Restaurant and Delimarket, 1853 Seventh Street, Class C

As usual, the ANC meeting will be held tomorrow (Thursday) at 7 pm on the second floor of the Reeves Building at Fourteenth and U Streets.

Zipping through the City Paper we came across this mention of two glamorous LeDroit Park residents— a peacock and a peahen— discovered on the 500 block of U Street.

“A person claiming to be the owner of the birds did not know they were illegal to own,” according to the Humane Society. The owner surrendered the birds, which were relocated to a sanctuary in Virginia.

At least it’s a more innocuous form of fowl play.

Community Three Development withdrew its application for 1922 Third Street.  As we wrote before, the developer proposed renovating and expanding the historic main house, renovating the historic carriage house, and constructing a new townhouse on the south side of the lot.

The proposal was set to go before the Historic Preservation Review Board last Thursday, but the developer, while at the meeting, withdrew his proposal and the board ended discussion on it.

In preparation for the board meeting, the Historic Preservation Office issued this staff report critiquing the proposal from a historic preservation standpoint.  One of the most significant suggestions was that the developer remove the “hyphen” section connecting the main house with the proposed townhouse, a concept alteration that would require a zoning variance.  Receiving a zoning variance is by design a costly and protracted process that’s not guaranteed to succeed.

In an email to us, the developer stated that due to these various issues, ranging from some neighborhood opposition to unresolved zoning issues, they could not proceed with their plan.

Regarding the politics of the proposal, the developer wrote:

[T]he economic and physical constraints inherent in the redevelopment of this site require all participants to contribute to a solution that benefits the greater whole, and in this case, we unfortunately found that certain stakeholders were unwilling to do so. We will potentially revisit this project when local pressures realign, but it may be very difficult for progress while these differences remain irreconcilable.

Through this process, we were surprised to the degree to which the developer reduced his ambitions, but ultimately the business of housing is a business driven by public tastes, local regulation, construction methods, and— above all— economics.  If a proposal is financially impractical, it will not get built, unless it is built at a loss as a pet project of a wealthy financier.

Somebody will eventually buy the house, though maybe not soon.  For it to remain a single-family house, as many want it, a potential owner must be able to afford replacing the roof, gutting the interior, building a new kitchen and bathrooms, replacing the wiring, replacing the plumbing, installing insulation, replacing many of the floors, installing a new furnace, replacing much of the drywall, fixing the foundation, and repairing the carriage house— renovations that will likely run near a million dollars, if not more, on top of the sale price.

A condo project with fewer units (and without a townhouse) could still succeed, but the reduced number of units will likely exclude an affordable housing component (only required of projects with 10 or more units).  Furthermore, those fewer units will have to be sold at higher prices to justify the renovation costs.

The neighborhood opposition (far from universal, mind you) unwittingly set a new entry criterion for purchasing the property: if you want to live at 1922 Third Street, you must be a very wealthy person.

* * *

What do you think?  Are you glad or are you disappointed that the proposal was withdrawn?

Heuchera americana

Who maintains Anna J. Cooper Circle?  Well, many people do, and you can, too!

Join your neighbors tomorrow (Friday) at 5:00 pm to help plant some heucheras (pictured above).

We also learned that a group called Community Bridge has a contract with the District to maintain small parks and that they often clean up the circle, mowing the grass and pulling weeds.

The planting, however, is a resident-driven labor of love, so any help this Friday would be greatly appreciated. Bring your shovel if you have one.

Amendments to the zoning code usually proceed at a snail’s pace, but when DCRA recently announced that it would no longer permit any new restaurants along Fourteenth and U Streets, the MidCity Business Association, with the support of other neighborhood groups, demanded an immediate change.

The District government is listening.  The Office of Planning (OP) is poised to hold a hearing on Monday, April 26th to lift the maximum restaurant street frontage restriction from 25% to 50% of the total frontage along Fourteenth and U Streets within the overlay (shaded in red below).

View U-14th-Florida-9th Arts Overlay in a larger map

The proposed amendment will also adjust how the limit is calculated. Currently the limit applies to and is calculated from all properties fronting U and Fourteenth Streets within the zone. (These frontages are marked in red above.)

OP proposes not only to raise the limit to 50%, but also to calculate it per “block-face” rather than as the aggregate of all blocks together.  For instance, on the 1300 block of U Street, restaurants will be limited to 50% of frontage on the south side of the street and 50% of frontage on the north side of the street.

OP also proposes to “clarify” the existing regulation so that “[a]n eating and drinking establishments not located on the ground (street) level of a building shall not count towards the 50% limit.” The ground-level exemption will also apply above- and below-street entrances.

OP also proposes another clarification to stipulate that the limit only applies to lots fronting Fourteenth Street and U Street within the overlay; the existing wording is ambiguous as to whether the restriction applies only to these two streets or to all lots within the entire zone.

Once the 50% limit is reached on a block-face, OP proposes stricter requirements for exemptions.

Check out the full proposed amendment: