I am I the only one that reads food dessert, instead of food desert no matter how many times I see it.

by RJ on May 12, 2011 8:57 am • link • report

@ tourists.

I remember during Obama's inauguration, the economy had collapsed but here were all these people who were dumping their money into our local economy. Thank you tourists please keep spending your money here.

by Matt R on May 12, 2011 8:57 am • link • report

Even with coal generated electricity, the per mile emissions from an electric car are 1/6th of a gasoline powered car. Cover your parking lot with a solar array and we're probably at zero total emissions (putting aside the manufacturing).

The fraction certainly improves as soon as we stop grandfathering jurassic aged coal plants past modern emissions standards. You get more daily airborne radiation from a run-of-the-mill coal plant than you've ever seen from a US based nuclear plant.

by eb on May 12, 2011 9:36 am • link • report

If the Senate's really concerned about energy conservation, they'll sell off some of the huge lots in front of their buildings, and encourage their workers to take public transportation.

Also, they could stop air-conditioning their parking garages, or stop blocking measures that would reduce emissions from the capitol's own private power plant (or shut the plant down entirely), which currently spews smog and coal dust into the city's air.

by andrew on May 12, 2011 9:37 am • link • report

Re. CaBi, the picture at 5th and F is a bit misleading. That's one of the few stations that I would consider successful. There's room every morning to dock your bike and plenty of bikes ready to take home after work. It works really well for rush hour commuting.

by OX4 on May 12, 2011 9:39 am • link • report

Isn't the power plant just heat now

Aaa operates very few trucks. 95% are independent contractors

by Charlie on May 12, 2011 9:43 am • link • report

Just about any move that promotes the shift from petroleum to electricity, no matter how hypocritical, is ok in my book.

by Campy on May 12, 2011 10:03 am • link • report

I can't believe that flyer from the Ramon encampment. I've met the developer of the Post Office Bistro, who was nice enough to knock on my door, a block down the street on T, to introduce the project. I fully support it, and I'm pissed I just found out today that it was on the ANC agenda. My fault for not keeping up better. I would have been there, and I'm thinking about a letter of support and a few signatures form my block to back it up.

It's one thing to use the ANC system to protest a license. Whether I agree with that system or not, I can at least respect people participating in the process. It's another thing to distribute that kind of vitriol to whip up the neighbors prior to a meeting. We've almost had Ramon out of office in the last two elections. It's stunts like this that motivate me to work harder next election.

by CJ on May 12, 2011 10:04 am • link • report

@OX4, I would agree re: 5th and F. A few other positives about that station are
- the fact that it holds 30 bikes allows for more people to reasonably expect to find a space.
- the traffic pattern, while mostly commuter, also picks up some Verizon Ctr/Penn Quarter nightlife, which extends the bike availability for homeward bound commuters in the evenings.
- there are four other stations within a four-block walk: two of which are heavily commercial/retail-driven - 8th/H and 7th/F; and two of which are heavily residential-- 4th/Mass and 5th/K. This allows for easy (and van-free) rebalancing when necessary, and easy-to-find "backup" stations.

by Jacques on May 12, 2011 10:04 am • link • report

How does the change from an abandoned building (a small one at that) into, what appears to be a good small cafe, mean Adams Morgan is the next stop.

by Burger on May 12, 2011 10:09 am • link • report

Here's a link to a response from the Post Office Owner. http://dc.eater.com/archives/2011/05/11/watch-out-t-street-nw.php

Among other issues, I'm surprised that Policy is getting a bad name in the neighborhood. It's a great venue and a nice evening. there's not much night clubby about it, and if the Post Office were to turn out similar, my only complaint would be that the food is overpriced.

by CJ on May 12, 2011 10:15 am • link • report

Will this admittedly symbolic move reduce tailpipe emissions or just shift them to coal-powered smokestacks?

Coal-powered smokestacks are much more efficient than car engines, so that's a good thing.

by Jasper on May 12, 2011 10:28 am • link • report

So with the restaurant/nightclub. That neighborhood is not particularly quiet right now is? I mean the black cat is across the street along with some popular restaurants. Besides that I spend a fair amount of time around their and I never hear noise from the bands or music coming from inside the black cat so maybe the flyer distributer ought to talk to the people there to see what they do.

by Canaan on May 12, 2011 10:42 am • link • report

The article about tourist spending starts with "tourists" but switches very quickly to using "visitors." Are the figures only for what we usually think of as tourists, or do they include business travelers as well?

I'd imagine it would be hard to separate business from leisure spending, but I'm very curious if this has been done and how the benefits to the city break out. My intuitive sense is that the bulk of the visitor spending that benefits DC--the hotel tax on expensive downtown hotels, food and liquor tax at expensive steakhouses, and a steady business for the taxi industry--comes from business travelers. Tourists are more likely to stay in cheap suburban motels, where they eat dinner, so DC is left with sales tax on souvenirs and food tax on lunch, unless they buy hot dogs from street vendors. But maybe for total dollars, the leisure tourists make it up on volume.

by thm on May 12, 2011 10:50 am • link • report

I don't know I would imagine gift store sales are sigificant based solely on the amount of FBI and neon DC t-shirts I see. That said, I like tourists and people watching down on the mall and seeing people react to the sites that a lot of us see every day or so.

by Canaan on May 12, 2011 11:03 am • link • report

Electric cars can be charged off peak, when we're producing more electricity than we're making. If done right, it will be a long time before electric cars result in any additional coal burning. And coal makes up less than half of our electrical grid. And electric cars will eventually be designed to store electricity which can be pulled off during peak times, providing wind power storage.

by David C on May 12, 2011 11:04 am • link • report

So let's summarize. Washingtonians hate federal politicians because they don't have voting rights. Washingtonians hate students, because they turn neighborhoods into ghettos. Washingtonians do not want streetcars because property values might increase. Washingtonians do not like tourists because business travelers spend more.

Wow.

by Jasper on May 12, 2011 11:06 am • link • report

@eb - "The fraction certainly improves as soon as we stop grandfathering jurassic aged coal plants past modern emissions standards."

Agree with most of your points. As a practical matter, though, we're not building enough of any type of plant to replace the capacity of taking all the jurassic aged coal plants offline in any sort of short order. And post-Japan, as much as I love nuke power, I think that uraniam-based nukes are stalled. We really need to get thorium-based nukes up and running. But we're still looking at decades-out.

by Andrew in DC on May 12, 2011 11:16 am • link • report

@David C's comments: we never produce more electricity than we need. When we are in danger of doing it, we turn off generation. What you mean is that we can charge cars at night when wind is blowing the hardest, yet load is at its lowest. That is good, because turning off some generators at night is bad for their operational efficiency. I.e. you don't want to shut down a nuke because you have too much wind blowing. You'd prefer that the wind blow and we store the extra power (in a car or other storage resource).

by rdhd on May 12, 2011 11:36 am • link • report

rbhd, that isn't correct. Turning off generators is very difficult and expensive, and to a large extent it isn't done. Look at this graph comparing demand to production over the course of a day. Demand fluctuates a lot but production only a little. Everything above the red line and below the green is "more electricity than we need" and all has to be load shed. Electric cars can charge using that shed load.

by David C on May 12, 2011 12:05 pm • link • report

David C: While there are very slight variations in how much electricity is produced and consumed at any given moment, these variations are tiny and corrected asap (though slight variation will always be there).

Your graph is comparing a day ahead forecast with actual demand in real-time. In real-time, the system operator has to manage the balance (try to keep it at 60Hz). When balance deviates too much or is expected to, it is corrected first automatically (through inertia and AGC) then manually (through redispatch).

As to your statement about shutting down generators: it does happen and it is a bad idea (as you say).

by rdhd on May 12, 2011 12:46 pm • link • report

"If the Senate's really concerned about energy conservation, they'll sell off some of the huge lots in front of their buildings, and encourage their workers to take public transportation.
Also, they could stop air-conditioning their parking garages, or stop blocking measures that would reduce emissions from the capitol's own private power plant (or shut the plant down entirely), which currently spews smog and coal dust into the city's air."

EXCELLENT remarks here.
Not only the Senate- but the House also has gigantic fallow land that is devoted to car parking for fat lazy midwesterners & Northern Virginians who have never walked except to their cars, and demand parking rights despite being in the center of a huge urban complex with mega expensive international investment driving central city land values thru the roof.
If the USA House & Senate were serious about debt and that kind of shit- they would sell off these lands and make a ton of money- and the land would be better used than as a parking welfare subsidy for fat lazy people and northern Virginians of both political parties.

by w on May 12, 2011 12:56 pm • link • report

@w
Your point would have been taken just as easily (and in my opinion much more easily) without your offensive and ugly stereotyping of people based on geography and physical stature.

And for the record, there is such a high demand for those spaces that being able to drive to the Hill is something of a status symbol in its own right. The drivers tend not to be slothful, but rather highly successful, and they come in from all areas of the metro area--including the District itself. I can't begin to guess at the BMIs of the drivers, and I suspect that you can't really, either.

by Catherine on May 12, 2011 1:34 pm • link • report

Re Oakland MI sprawl:
Oakland County has one of the highest foreclosure rates in Michigan (Source: Detroit Free Press). A quick search today shows 827 properties in foreclosure today, down from a high of 3,657 in 2008. I'm sure these people are now living the "American Dream". Then again, if these people are now displaced then Mr. Patterson won't have to campaign for their vote.
When the real estate bubble popped, the exurbs were the hardest hit. Instead of focusing on the needs of his voters, this politician decides to create a strawman arguement against "limousine liberals" and anyone else who disagrees with his vision of the "American Dream", facts be damned.

by Smoke_Jaguar4 on May 12, 2011 1:48 pm • link • report

@w The house has a slightly better excuse: They're holding onto that land because they want (ie. desperately need) to build another office building.

The Senate could also use another building, given that they currently rent quite a bit of space around Postal Square and Union Station for various administrative functions.

However, it hasn't been politically expedient to construct another legislative building since the days of Reagan (which is also part of the reason why so much other crap was crammed into the CVC when it was built, as it was congress's first opportunity in decades to build out more space on the hill for administrative functions).

by andrew on May 12, 2011 2:07 pm • link • report

@andrew
Yes- you are making sense here- but not for all of the land- there is a huge abundance of land-especially on the House side- where numerous buildings have been torn down over the years [ it boggles the mind WHY they would tear down these buildings when office space is at such a premium]
also- my idea here- the Congress would be acting in it's own and in the public's interest if they built some kind of dorm/hotel/mized use building so that new Congressional people could live near their jobs.As for fat midewesterners and Northern virginians- it is certainly my experience that many of these people have a problem with their weight- as well as with supporting excellent uses of federal money- like high speed rail- which was rejected by Ohio and Minnesota [ and Florida]. NoVa is full of people who live in the sprawl and are hostile to the city- so I feel absolutely NO REASON to apologize or to moderate my blast furnace comments. If I heard more positive things in support of DC and our rights by people from Virginia I would,perhaps feel more inclined to be moderate. As a Native of DC I have to deal with people from both Ohio and Virginia on a daily basis- and I do not like most of them- although there are always good people no matter where you go in the world- even in god-forsaken dumps like Saudi Arabia there are nice people.

by w on May 12, 2011 2:47 pm • link • report

@w:

As a Minnesotan, I've been keeping tabs on the HSR planning there. Minnesota did not refuse HSR money...you're thinking of Wisconsin.

Regarding the food desert bit, I looked at USDA's locator and found a couple interesting tidbits. First off, they're apparently not counting military Commissaries, as both Andrews AFB and the North Post of Ft. Belvoir (both having fairly large Commissaries) are included on the locator. Also, one of the tracts along Oxon Hill Rd has a Giant within it.

by Froggie on May 12, 2011 3:01 pm • link • report

OK @froggie- point taken.
Thanks for the clarity.
it is still a shame and a big mistake not to be investing in rail no matter which state it may be.

by w on May 12, 2011 3:29 pm • link • report

I think the horse already left the stable on 14th bars when Zoning changed the Arts Overlay to allow 50% on each block face last year. The eastside block between S and T reached that limit pretty fast with the two new ones last month.

Surely there are more bars around 14th & U than in Adams Morgan now. I frequent the ones across from me between S and T and am proud to take company to them as, so far, they are very nice bars (plus I'm friends with several owners). But to go out to eat I take company to P Street, 17th Street, or Adams Morgan where there are more legitimate restaurants.

Ultimately the developers will come in, of course, and tear down the bars and shops to build mid-rises with multi-hundred car garages and CVS's and McDonalds's on the ground floor.

What a city where planning is a dirty word calls progress.

by Tom Coumaris on May 12, 2011 4:05 pm • link • report

@ Froggie: you hail from the cities, or up north?

As a longtime DC res. who hails from the gopher state.. I can actually agree witht the fat lazy midwesterner who only walks to their cars comment. My family is amazed when I WALK the 3 blocks to the restaurant we are going to. The horror.

by greent on May 12, 2011 4:37 pm • link • report

Another ex-pat Minnesotan here. My friends back home were horrified when I told them that one of my life goals was to live without a car... easy here, impossible there. That said, I make it a point to invite my family and friends to visit me here and show them a good time around the city (thus bringing the above-mentioned tourist dollars). I suppose you could call it my version of "urban evangelism."

by David T on May 12, 2011 6:03 pm • link • report

@ w: NoVa is full of people who live in the sprawl and are hostile to the city- so I feel absolutely NO REASON to apologize or to moderate my blast furnace comments. If I heard more positive things in support of DC and our rights by people from Virginia I would,perhaps feel more inclined to be moderate.

And people in NoVa would do so because ... you're asking them nicely?

by Jasper on May 12, 2011 8:27 pm • link • report