Posts by Alison Crowley

For a neighborhood that has been the recipient of two of the Obama Administration's most celebrated community development efforts, there's been little fanfare in the city outside this small patch of Ward 7. Fortunately, that's not holding the DC Promise Neighborhood Initiative (DCPNI) back.

DCPNI is a new 501(c)3 organization led by Irasema Salcido, founder and CEO of the Cesar Chavez Public Charter Schools for Public Policy, which has a Parkside campus. DCPNI organized a permanent Board of Directors in October 2011 and has been working since to pursue its goals for 2012. A January 2012 report by the Urban Institute outlines in great detail how DCPNI plans to transform the neighborhood.

Kenilworth-Parkside sits squeezed between the Anacostia River and DC-295 to the east and west, and a sprawling decommissioned Pepco plant and the District border to its north and south. The disadvantageous geography and years of disinvestment left Kenilworth-Parkside sinking further and further into disrepair.

Despite having Kenilworth Aquatic Gardens and its acres of green space in the neighborhood, Kenilworth-Parkside still shows all of the typical indicators of urban blight.

Statistics on the residents in the DCPNI footprint are dire. Median household incomes are barely half of the city's median. Rates of teenage births are some of the highest in the nation. Single females head 90% of families.

Yet, at least until now, it's lacked any kind of investment which many of DC's now "up-and-coming" neighborhoods have received.

Enter DCPNI. In 2008, Salcido launched the Initiative based on the principles of Geoffrey Canada's Harlem Children's Zone. DCPNI launched their efforts after winning funding from the US Department of Education.

The 2012 plan is ambitious. DCPNI is proposing home visits to pregnant women and mothers of young children. They want to build a community library of children's books. For the neighborhood's school children, they will launching an experiential learning program to visits to local museums and monuments with directed classroom instruction.

DCPNI, which holds tours of the neighborhood on the fourth Thursday of every month, is perhaps the city's foremost example of a place-making initiative. They are taking all of the most current research on comprehensive, services-based community development and applying it to one unique geographic area.

DC should keep its eye on Kenilworth-Parkside. Stakeholders of the Choice planning grant will inevitably apply for implementation funding when it becomes available in an effort to revitalize more than 300 units of dilapidated public housing. In June, Educare, a brand-new early childhood education center serving 175 Headstart-eligible children, will open its doors.

Victory Square, a new senior affordable apartment building built by Victory Housing, began accepting applications this week and will open in the spring. And all the while, DCPNI continues to establish partnerships with local businesses and organizations and organize programs that aim to strike at the core of Kenilworth-Parkside's ills in just the way that Canada tackled a swath of Harlem.

Over the next few years, as the 21 Promise Neighborhoods get to work across the country, community development advocates will learn whether or not federal money can be applied to local community development initiatives successfully and efficiently to improve public health, housing and education outcomes.

Lucky for the DC region, there's a site right in our backyard to follow, support, and learn more about. You just have to know where to look.

I distributed a questionnaire to 5 participating candidates, and received responses from Bondi, Garvey, and Kim Klingler. The questionnaire asked about the candidates' positions on the Crystal City Sector Plan, the Columbia Pike streetcar, the need for more affordable housing, and more. The candidates also participated in a January 4th debate at GMU's Founder Hall that featured many similar questions.

While the 3 respondents agreed on many points, key distinctions emerged. Bondi and Klingler offered more pointed, direct suggestions for bolstering Arlington's affordable housing stock, while Garvey's experience serving 15 years on the Arlington County School Board gave her detailed knowledge of the ACPS system's current efforts at mitigating the capacity crisis.

All 3 candidates, when asked about the County Board's October 2011 decision to approve Boeing's new regional headquarters in Crystal City, cited concerns with poor urban planning and citizen involvement throughout the process.

Below are exerpts from the candidates' positions on some of the most significant urban issues in Arlington County right now.

What do you see as the most pressing issue facing Arlington County today?

From the need for more affordable housing to transparent governance, each candidate expressed a different view on Arlington County's greatest challenge. What all three candidates appeared to agree on in their answers, however, is the need for collaborative, systematic planning between the County Board and the County's citizens for Arlington's growth.

Melissa Bondi:

I think the most pressing issue is to mitigate the continued threats to, and losses in, Arlington's affordable housing stock. A significant portion of our diverse Arlington population, from immigrants to seniors to persons with disabilities and young families need access to safe, decent affordable housing.

Kim Klingler:

As Arlingtonians, I believe our most pressing issue is to be able to maintain our identity, diversity, and quality of life as we continue to grow as a community. Therefore, we must pay special attention to:
a. Smart Growth and Transportation.
b. County/Schools Collaborative Planning.
c. Maintaining a Diverse and Caring Community.

Libby Garvey:

I think the most pressing issue is the need for more intentional and transparent systems for planning and improvement to manage growth: an overall strategic plan with clear goals, measurable data points and monitoring systems to see if we are progressing towards our goals and working as efficiently as possible.

What are your thoughts on the practicality and cost of the Columbia Pike streetcar? Is this project a good use of funds?

Arlington plans a $261 million streetcar project along Columbia Pike, which leaders say will drive economic growth and improve mobility far beyond what buses can provide, but critics charge is too expensive to justify the benefits. Bondi is a strong supporter of the project, while Garvey and Klingler expressed some doubts in their answers.

Garvey:

While I can see many benefits from a streetcar, the question for me and many people is, are those benefits worth the cost. Arlington needs a clear cost benefit analysis for the streetcar so we can make an informed decision as a board and a community.

Klingler:

In order to determine whether this $261M investment is justified, we need to take a step back and address the following:
a. What do Arlingtonians want? What is their strategic vision and plan for Arlington?
b. How will the street car project be implemented?
c. Can we afford it?
d. Do we have the resources to appropriately manage the contractors?
With the appropriate planning I think the Columbia Pike streetcar could be a promising investment; however, per my points above, I would need to be convinced that now is the right time.

Bondi:

I am a supporter of the Columbia Pike Streetcar, as an integral piece of Arlington's transportation network that will insure mobility for the residents of Columbia Pike in the near term, and for the region in the long term. Major transportation efforts, like a modern streetcar system, require extensive planning and are subject to rising costs. We need to be able to explain any changes in costs and to provide context that helps to reinforce the overall value Arlington residents will realize through such an important investment.

What is your opinion of the Crystal City Sector Plan and its impact on the economic development of Crystal City?

In response to the Base Realignment and Closure (BRAC) process, which could take up to 18,000 jobs from Crystal City and leave millions of square feet of office space empty, Arlington embarked on a years-long planning process to develop a Sector Plan to shape the neighborhood's future growth.

The plan calls for a modified street grid and a shift in demographics to better balance workers and residents. In their responses, Bondi and Klingler are supportive of the Sector Plan, while Garvey is skeptical that Crystal City residents truly had their voices heard throughout the planning process.

Klingler:

If it can be fully executed, the plan will favorably impact the economic development of Crystal City. [However], the plan will need to be updated to address: offering competitive pricing per square foot, lowering and maintaining emergency response times to Crystal City, planning for additional school and health services, and designing appropriate transitions between denser areas and traditional neighborhoods.

Bondi:

Among the positive achievements I see in the plan are: 1) generally better urban design, more walkable streets, enhanced parks and public spaces; 2) affordable housing targets, perhaps the most ambitious yet included in an Arlington sector plan; 3) a commitment to transportation infrastructure, especially streetcar, which is essential; 4) inclusion of a vehicle for on-going citizen participation and monitoring in implementation, through the "CCCRC," a permanent advisory body led by residents.

Garvey:

Residents of Crystal City value the underground networks for their convenience and protection from the weather. They value the small open spaces that provide relief from many tall buildings. [With the Plan], these amenities will be lost. I've heard from several the sense that excellence in planning, emphasis of transit use and preserving the amenities valued by residence were not included in the plan. Only two residents were on the task force and many residents who tried to participate and work on the plan as citizens, finally quit the process in frustration and anger. This is very unfortunate.

Tomorrow, we'll post Bondi's, Klingler's, and Garvey's responses on the impact of defense spending cuts on the Arlington economy, the capacity crisis in Arlington County Public Schools, and what each candidate would most like to improve about Arlington County.

• Melissa Bondi's questionnaire responses
  
• Libby Garvey's questionnaire responses
  
• Kim Klingler's questionnaire responses

What seems even more appealing is a bike ride: at 26 minutes, travel time is half that of walking, and I would still burn around 143 calories. With a Capital Bikeshare station right outside of my office, and another one near my home, I'm tempted to take the app's word and try out a new method of shortening the evening commute.

Reroute.it has its limitations. It does not allow for a combination of modes: when I'm trying to get home from 17th & U St NW in DC to Arlington, I can't choose to walk the 1.1 miles to Farragut West, the closest Orange Line stop, and then Metro home, or even half a mile to Dupont Circle with a line change. Instead, I can either burn off half of my day's meals with a 96-minute walk home, or spend 42 minutes on an unspecified type of transit.

The transit variable utilizes Bing Transit Routes API, which pulls route information from data provided by participating transit agencies. Here, both WMATA and the DC Circulator have provided their data to Bing, making it difficult to tell which method of transit Reroute.it is referring to when it provides travel time.

Currently, the only cities whose transit fare data are incorporated into Reroute.it's approximations are San Francisco and Seattle. As a result, the cost of riding public transportation is always listed as "not applicable" in any DC-area search. As I used Reroute.it this week, I mentally set a flat transit cost of $4 for comparison purposes against alternative means.

From a cost perspective, Reroute.it's most helpful contribution might be displaying the approximate cost of driving, parking excluded. Using AAA's 2011 average cost per mile calculation, currently set at $0.585, the app highlights a cost that drivers frequently forget, or don't know how, to factor in.

When trying to decide how to travel from my Georgetown office to a meeting after work in a neighborhood east of the Anacostia River in Ward 7, I was surprised to find out that the approximate cost of driving my car was $5.03; it was a far cry from what would have been a $17 cab ride, and only a few dollars more expensive than taking what would have been a very long bus ride, or a combination of Metrorail and bus.

Until Washington-area transit agencies share their fares with Google's General Transit Feed Specification (GTFS) format, Reroute.it will never be able to program its transit costs to reflect the actual cost of traveling via Metro or bus.

Reroute.it provides an innovative service in drawing disparate data together into one interface, drawing much-needed attention to the benefits and drawbacks of varying forms of transportation. Some simple improvements, and cooperation from local agencies in sharing data, could greatly increase the app's utility. With wide use, Reroute.it can help further encourage a proper balance between multiple modes of transportation as viable and popular ways to get around the area.

"Solar Roofpod" may not be winning in the Solar Decathlon's ratings, but the inventive design has sparked plenty of talk about the feasibility of its premise. At less than 800 square feet, the home resembles in size many Manhattan apartments, but claims to reduce utility expenses by $2,500 annually by generating 11.6 megawatt hours of electricity per year through its solar panel system.

Situated on a rooftop, the home has direct access to light, wind, and water, which the team claims will help reduce overall energy costs in conjunction with the energy-conserving design. The module doesn't neglect to take its "host building" into account either: a steel beam Dunnage Garden built around the home helps protect the building below from absorbing the pod's radiation, and provides space for a rooftop garden.

Despite Team New York's obvious ingenuity, its current standing at number 18 out of 19 participating teams doesn't bode well for the potential feasibility of the project on a larger scale.

Although not all of the ten judging metrics have been scored yet, TNY did not fare well on Affordability, coming in second to last with a rating of 61.4 out of 100 possible points. Affordability is an extremely significant metric in this contest, as the Decathlon touts "cost-effective, energy-efficient, and attractive" home design ideas. Though, perhaps unsurprisingly, the judges' dismal score hasn't hurt the public's impression of the Solar Roofpod. Team New York is currently in second place in the People's Choice Awards, in which the public votes on their favorite house.

From an urban planning perspective, the Solar Roofpod offers a space-conscious solution for building new single-family units in an already fully-developed neighborhood and promotes greater use of solar photovoltaic panels and rooftop gardens. There may not be much room in New York's densely packed streets to build new detached townhouses, but there's certainly open space available on top of its existing buildings to give an individual, or perhaps a couple, room to stretch out.

Solar Roofpod's popularity seems to indicate willingness on the part of Americans to suspend their disbelief and imagine what a city like New York might look like if, on top of large office and apartment buildings, one might be able to look up and see a diminutive home. But because of its shortcomings in practicality and livability—Team New York came in dead last in the Comfort category earlier this week—the idea may fade into the sunset once the Decathlon ends.

In contrast to Vonier stood Ward, who turned to the Washington Monument as an ideal example of a minimalist solution to security concerns. The Monument received a security facelift in 2003 with the addition of sunken walls that naturally curve around the base of the hill on which the Monument stands, providing additional security without encroaching upon visitors' privacy.

Unlike Vonier, Ward seemed more inclined to respect historical precedents and maintain the natural order of a space to the greatest extent possible. He lamented the 18-foot descent that pedestrians endure when approaching the Capitol Visitor Center, a sensation he described as the antithesis to the entry experience one expects of such a grand building.

Jenkins and Vonier both suggested civic authorities reduce security risks from vehicles by creating pedestrian roadways with reduced or no car and truck access. London developed the "Ring of Steel" after a series of IRA attacks. This is a perimeter of Closed-captioned Television (CCTV), police, and bollards within the City of London, Greater London's financial district. According to Jenkins, as a result of the "Ring of Steel," the streets have been "pedestrianized," and commerce is thriving.

Ward, however, disagreed with adopting a similar approach. "We don't have the density of pedestrians" to eliminate cars from certain roads, he said. Ward also suggested that the economy would not support such changes in traffic patterns, which could "kill businesses."

The panelists bandied about a number of solutions to the question of how to simultaneously provide both security and amenity. Vonier referred to the classic necessity of more eyes on the street to increase vigilance against threats. He suggested that police and civic authorities encourage proprietors to take ownership of the sidewalks and streets in front of their businesses, creating a "defensible space."

During the question and answer session, Jenkins suggested that in order to make the public more accountable for security, governments must improve education and communication, helping individuals to better understand policy decisions and security protocol while empowering them to be more vigilant.

Disappointingly, some of the pricklier subjects, such as congestion pricing, closed circuit surveillance, and defense against airborne security threats were mentioned in brief but not explored much further.

Many questions still remained unanswered. How can design engage the public in the provision of their own security? At what point did Americans become passive potential victims, as many of the latest security measures suggest? Which works better: the prototypical Parisian cafe-style of surveillance, or the large setbacks and empty spaces prevalent in front of federal buildings?

Nobody seemed fully equipped to provide answers, largely because the issue frequently turns into a matter of subjective opinion, as the talks showed. At the very least, however, the panelists could all agree that many existing security features around DC, like the Jersey barriers outside of the Federal Aviation Administration's building, can and should be improved to reflect stronger urban design and a better connection to the pedestrian experience.

Crowdsourcing has evolved into one of many tools in an urban planner's toolkit to seek input on a specific issue that impacts the region. It eliminates much of the legwork associated with gathering public opinion and often reaches a much wider audience than just attending a handful of ANC meetings or holding a public forum could.

The website for "Start in September" features inviting pin-up bulletin board graphics for its visitors, who are entreated upon to describe what would create a "greener, healthier, more livable District." DC, which has already been recognized nationally for boasting the most expansive LEED green building pipeline and the highest bike share participation, could likely gain much from the ideas of its residents who have supported these efforts.

In its current form, "Start in September" resembles a much larger, similar initiative that recently took place in New York City. Prior to the Institute for Urban Design's annual Urban Design Week, the organization launched "By the City / For the City," a crowd sourced initiative to "improve the city's public spaces, systems, and social fabric."

Between June 1st and July 31st of this year, "By the City / For the City" collected more than 500 ideas on topics as wide ranging as urban community gardens to the re-use of highway underpasses and the creation of "graffiti parks" intended purely for urban artists to tag their work freely.

Perusing the list of ideas on the website feels a lot like looking at the ideal metropolis: Combine every contributor's good idea, and you've got a Sim City of sustainable, smart growth perfection.

"Start in September" hasn't yet quite picked up the momentum that the Institute of Urban Design's effort achieved by summer's end, but the District is off to a good start. Already the website has drawn 51 new suggestions, filed under the somewhat vague categories of "Define It" and "Do It," which feature ideas like creating a District Conservation Corps, making city-wide recycling bins larger while making trash cans smaller, and disconnecting all gutters from drains that lead into sewer systems.

Whether because the effort of posting a photograph exceeds just sharing an idea, or because of lower publicity thus far, the NCPC site has only 4 comments thus far. They criticize ugly Jersey barriers at the US Department of Transportation, and praise more artistic bollards in New York's financial district.

Online participation is just one component of public involvement, and both initiatives couple it with other more traditional ways to be involved. NCPC's panel discussion will run from 6:30-8 pm tonight at the US Department of Commerce Auditorium. Enter from 14th Street between Constitution and Pennsylvania. RSVP here.

As for DC's sustainability initiative, "Start in September" is intended to be the first stage in a months-long planning process, and is also intended to spark community discussions on the topic. The site aims to draw the crowdsourcing off of the Internet and into single member district, tenant's association, and other local meetings.

If you're planning on leading, or attending, a community meeting this month, grab a discussion guide from sustainable.dc.gov and crowd source your neighbors. You may be surprised with what you hear.