Posts from March 2008

Public Spaces

No, architecture is not (just) art

by David Alpert   •   March 31, 2008 1:54 pm

A building can be a beautiful object in its own right. A building is also a component of a larger whole. It fits in with the surrounding environment, whether other buildings in a series of row houses or the natural landscape in a more pastoral setting. It interacts with the humans who go in it and those who walk around it.

When we only see a building as a piece of art, we end up with an architectural profession that reveres bizarre buildings that look impressive in a model but don't accomplish their substantive purpose very well. We end up with New York Times architecture critic Nicolai Ouroussoff who never met a famous architect whose plan he didn't like. And we end up with exhibits at the Kreeger Museum on "architecture as art" that train future architects to think they should aspire to buildings like Philip Johnson's.

There's nothing wrong with making spectacular buildings, nothing wrong with being a famous architect, and modern buildings can be beautiful. But I'd like architecture critics to write about a building's influence on the street as much as they write about the "chiseled setbacks and crisp vertical lines". When is the Kreeger going to have Vibrant Streetlife as Art? From the look of their building (designed by the same Philip Johnson), creating outdoor public spaces may be furthest from their minds.

Development

Zoning Review discusses retail

by David Alpert   •   March 31, 2008 12:23 pm

Wednesday's Zoning Review meeting on Retail Strategy discussed the good and the bad of retail.

The previous meeting's notes included a line that the Cleveland Park overlay may not be serving the community well. This brought out several overlay defenders including George Idelson, president of the CP Citizens Association, who argued that the overlay works very well. "Thanks to the overlay, we are not a restaurant row," he said. The overlay may have had some problems, like being hard to change or update, and DCRA hasn't always enforced it effectively.

The group didn't spend much time of this topic, but a few people defended the overlay while a few others criticized it for "retarding vibrancy" and being "too formulaic." I don't know all the history of this issue (please fill me in!) I did find this summary of the conflict over a Cosi last year.

Most of the workshop focused on a series of exercises where people answered certain questions. For example, "Retail and related uses should acommplish the following goals to help our city: they should..." Responses included:

Public Spaces

NPS considers less traffic an "adverse effect"

by David Alpert   •   March 31, 2008 9:21 am

The National Park Service's mission is to "preserve the natural resources of America." Apparently, they consider traffic to be a natural resource.

Back in 2005, the NPS went through a public process to revise the General Management Plan of Rock Creek Park. They considered four options: A) install a few traffic-calming measures on Beach Drive and some trail upgrades; B) do nothing; C) permanently close the parts of Beach Drive that are closed on weekends; and D) close those roads weekdays off-peak but keep them open rush hours.

In the spirit of their stewardship of America's wilderness, the Park Service preferred alternative A, keeping all roads open to traffic all the time. They only included alternatives C and D because of public pressure, but rejected them. Closing the roads, they argued, "would result in a major adverse effect on the existing pattern of park use and visitor experience. Historic park roads are considered a cultural resource. By closing them to motorized traffic, Alternative C would modify some of the design features that define their significance."

So, having the park crowded with cars and filled with noise and pollution is "historic", despite the traffic now being triple the original design capacity and the fact that 60 mph is not a historic speed.

More bafflingly, NPS concluded that "all four alternatives would have fairly similar effects on air quality, the water quality and hydrology of Rock Creek and its tributaries, wetlands and floodplains, deciduous forests, and protected and rare species." The amount of traffic has no effect on the air quality? What school of environmental management did these people go to?

What's going on with the National Park Service? At the NCPC meeting I went to, the NPS representative seemed to be, by far, the least interested in good design and the most eager to simply build anything. Even Bush presidential appointees on NCPC seemed to value the Mall more highly than the National Park Service. Is this bad management from the Bush administration, or has NPS always been like this?

Bicycling

Get involved this week in PG Co., Arlington, DC

by David Alpert   •   March 31, 2008 8:37 am

It's the first week of the month and that means lots and lots of great opportunities to speak up in local government!

Prince George's County: The county is working on a Transportation Master Plan to include new highways, transit lines, and bike and pedestrian improvements. Go speak up at the meetings to make sure the transit and bike trails get the importance they deserve in an area that's one of the region's least transit-oriented, least walkable and least bikeable. There's a meeting tonight in Suitland and Wednesday in Greenbelt. Here's the meeting info (PDF).

Arlington: The public forum to discuss legalizing accessory dwellings like basement apartments is tonight. I'm sure the opponents will show up. Speak up to allow property owners to rent out their basements if they want to and allow more people to live more affordably in Arlington.

DC Zoning: Tonight, Low and Moderate Density; Tuesday evening, Arts and Culture; Wednedsay, Retail Strategy in the afternoon and Parking and Loading including bike parking in the evening; Thursday evening, Historic Structures.

These meetings aren't 50 people in an auditorium with each person speaking for 2 minutes and bored government officials not really listening. These are all small groups of 10-20 people who engage in real discussion about how to change zoning, and the recommendations do reflect what was discussed. The Parking and Loading draft is out, and I can't post it yet, but it really is based on what we discussed. One Smart Growth advocate can and did singlehandledly get provisions in there to require parking to go behind new buildings instead of on the side; one NIMBY-ish neighborhood advocate can and did get higher minimums when higher density abuts lower density. We need more advocates for livable communities to make sure those who want to prevent change of any kind don't get their wishes enacted into law.

ANC meetings: Tuesday, Georgetown and Mount Pleasant; Wednesday, Shaw/Mount Vernon Square, Logan Circle and Adams Morgan; and Thursday, Columbia Heights. I only have Wards 1, 2, and 6 so far; check the DC ANC site to find yours.

As always, check the calendar in the right sidebar for upcoming ways to make your voice heard. DC is not that big a city, and the numbers of people who participate in these meetings are not so great. And the other cities and towns are even smaller, of course. You can make a difference!

Traffic

New Haven next to boulevardize a freeway

by David Alpert   •   March 28, 2008 9:40 am

In 1957, New Haven tore down a neighborhood near its waterfront to build a freeway. It created a barrier between downtown and Union Station, cut off streets, created dark shadows under huge ramps, and fostered more car-oriented and pedestrian-unfriendly development in the hospitals and huge parking garages that were built there.

The freeway never went anywhere, with other neighborhoods successfully fighting the destruction that the freeway wreaked on Oak Street. Now, Tri-State Transportation Campaign reports that New Haven is proposing to tear down the freeway, develop new mixed-use buildings in the space, and reconnect the street grid.

Why is Washington DC's Mayor instead intent not only on keeping those freeways that should be boulevardized, like the Whitehurst, but also rebuilding long-gone roads through our parks?

Transit

Alexandria gets a "trolley"

by David Alpert   •   March 27, 2008 11:54 am

The first time I went to Old Town Alexandria, I thought, "there needs to be a trolley along King Street from the Metro to the waterfront." Well, now there is. Sorta. It's really a bus dressed up as a trolley, which DC Metrocentric sneers at but I think has merit: a dinging trolley probably would be more appealing to visitors who shop at the high-end boutiques and chain stores on King.

A real trolley would be even better, but it's a step. More prominent signage (or, rather, any prominent signage at all) would help a lot. This trolley/bus will run every 15 minutes, more than the bus it replaces, but 10 minutes would be better, as would real-time info displays. 15 minutes is a little long to wait standing on the street corner in the cold while deciding whether to walk to the Metro station or regret not just driving instead.

Update: more good discussion on DCist.

Development

Where to put the noise?

by David Alpert   •   March 27, 2008 10:20 am

Mixed-use development is the best kind for so many reasons, like enabling people to live near where they work, and maintaining "eyes on the street" all day. However, it does create a few problems, like noise. There's a big market for restaurants, bars, nightclubs and live music, but it can also be disruptive to residents.

At yesterday's Retail Strategy meeting, Barbara Kahlow of the West End Citizens' Association spoke of noise concerns as a primary issue for the community. Residents along 17th Street in Dupont have been at odds with the local restaurants over noise for many years. The property owner of the corner store at 14th and T told the Dupont Circle Conservancy that they can't find a tenant because the ANC is preventing any new liquor licenses in that area. Sometimes the residents have a point, other times they might be demanding too much.

The usual solution is to put restaurants and bars in less residential, less developed areas, like the new Ballpark district, which was mostly warehouses and parking lots until recently, and whose few residents would welcome stores and restaurants to improve the neighborhood. But eventually, the numbers of residents increase and so do the bars, and the amount of noise, and complaints rise. This is happening in the Gallery Place and Mount Vernon Triangle area, where the neighborhood's own success is now an obstacle to further growth.

Neighborhood blog The Triangle reports on the controversy over what kind of retail to put at 5th and I. One proposal includes a small jazz club. One commenter on Penn Quarter Living wrote, "I don't think clubs of any type directly next to housing works," while FourthandEye, author of the Triangle post, disagrees. "Do people really want this area to be 15 blocks of highrises, Quiznos and dry cleaners? ... This is downtown city living!"

If we build mixed-use, then every club is going to be near housing. We can avoid having too many clubs in one place, to spread the noise around; on the other hand, districts like Adams Morgan and U Street draw more people because of the wealth of choices and proximity of one to the other. Soon there won't be a place for a bar that's not next to a residential neighborhood, meaning every one will generate complaints. Yet we need them. It's not a debate that will go away.