I'm fairly certain that Ft. Lincoln is pretty green the way it is now.

by stitchbones on Oct 29, 2010 9:19 am • link • report

Using NextBus to predict the D6 is a lost cause. It just doesn't work for that line. Yesterday, for instance, I was waiting at 15th and K for an eastbound bus that was supposedly about eight minutes away. Checking again about two minutes later, it now said the next D6 was 66 MINUTES AWAY! This is almost a daily occurrence. Either that, or the bus shows up 10 minutes early.

And of course, the posted D6 schedule is pretty much pure fiction.

WMATA knows about this problem, as I've sent them about 10 e-mails about it.

by anon on Oct 29, 2010 9:26 am • link • report

Just a thought, but if you provide quality mass transport equitably throughout a city and region, would the entire region become gentrified?

by neb on Oct 29, 2010 9:44 am • link • report

I read the post, but that still doesn't fully *why* they can't make NextBus and the D6 work. I live on the Cap Hill end of the route and its just as bad. Before my car died the unpredictability of the D6 kept me in my car more.

by Kate on Oct 29, 2010 9:45 am • link • report

I think the reason not every metro stop has produced gentrification has to do with architecture and planning. The metro stops that have seen gentrification seem to already have a decent amount of urbanism, and a superior quality of architecture that gentrifiers aspire to. Ask people who have "gentrified" places like U street in town or Silver Spring in the burbs why they came and many will point to the proximity of services and/or the beauty of the older buildings. It's not enough to build a train stop, one has to accompany it with a master plan that makes walking a pleasure. So many metro stops in Maryland and Virginia are surrounded by parking and sprawl. It's hard to imagine what one could appreciate once they get off their trains in those stops.

If anything, I think the surrounding cloistered developments would have an advantage over these PGesque metro stops because the "reading" might be they are safer in a community with a bottle neck, than the asphalt wastelands one needs to traverse should ones home be with-in the quarter mile radius. Architecture and planning matters and the smarter developers get it.

by Thayer-D on Oct 29, 2010 9:58 am • link • report

I think the D6 is perhaps the worst WMATA bus route. (It might not be hyperbole to say that it may be one of the worst bus routes in the country!) When I lived on the NE side of Capitol Hill, the D6 was so completely and utterly unreliable that I would usually walk to Eastern Market Metro or go an extra 5 blocks to catch the X2, even though the D6 stopped around the corner from my house. (I would go out of my way for the X2! That's how bad the D6 is!) I now live near Satdium-Armory Metro Metro, which is also the eastern terminus of the D6. Theoretically, the D6 is the most direct route from there to Union Station. (Or to the east end of Downtown along 7th Street.) In reality, when traveling to Union Station, it makes much more sense for me to take the Blue/Orange Lines to Metro Center and transfer to the Red Line. It's a long subway ride, but the D6 is such a gamble that it makes more sense to go that far our of my way. (I know the 96 Bus is another option fro me to get to Union Station. It is much more reliable than the D6, but the ridiculous route it takes because of street closures around the Capitol make it a less than appealig option.) Those of our political leaders who claim that DC is a "world class city" have no idea what they are talking about. The residents of a real world class city would not know what to make of something like the D6!

by rg on Oct 29, 2010 10:12 am • link • report

Well said, Thayer.

You can't just build transit and assume the development will come - the development has to be planned, the land must be appropriately zoned, the transit has to be successful in the first place (somewhat of a chicken and egg problem), etc.

Transit-oriented development is a good thing, of course, but the term implies a one-way causation. Build transit, then orient development around it. And in many cases, that may be true. However, the real goal is to get a transit line with transit-supportive land uses and densities around all of the stations.

by Alex B. on Oct 29, 2010 10:13 am • link • report

Transit-oriented development requires some imagination. PG County, going back decades, has never had that regardless of who was in charge. Moreover, it has to be done right. Atlanta had a major fail at it's Lindberg station, where two lines converge and near the upscale Buckhead area--space that was poorly designed and has never filled. The prime tenant, Bell South was swallowed in a merger and has continued to shrink. It helps if transit oriented development is connected to other amenities so that it benefits the surrounding community--Bethesda is a good example, along with the Clarendon-Ballston corridor. Rosslyn is the antithesis. Significantly, the successes have built on existing retail and residential infrastructure. Doing it from scrat=ch is more complicated and that may be one reason why Atlanta failed.

by Rich on Oct 29, 2010 10:20 am • link • report

Services, services, services.

It's amazing how much something as simple as a good grocery store attracts people to an area. You can only have that density come in when you have services that people can walk to. Otherwise there's no advantage to living near transit.

by MLD on Oct 29, 2010 10:40 am • link • report

FRINJ? No way. that's hardly a neighborhood center. Thats the edge of LeDroit Park, Bloomingdale, Shaw, and Truxton Circle(which is technically part of Shaw). Why do we need to invent new names for places that are already named? Especially when that place is a couple of gas stations, liquor stores, and an inhospitable intersection?

by dano on Oct 29, 2010 10:41 am • link • report

There is good and bad concerning the lack of development around Prince Georges county. While increasing the momentum of development that successful TOD sites in VA and Montgomery County have, Prince Georges County has a "clean slate" to get it right. There is the unintended luxury of sitting back and seeing the failures and successes of TOD projects in the region and being able to pick the best fit for Prince Georges County. personally, I think there is a little momentum and I think Prince Georges county will get it right. EYA Arts District and University Town Center are good starts. Now there's talk of developing New Carrollton. I think when the Purple line is in operation, you'll see economic development spread throughout northwestern Prince Georges county through College Park and along University BLVD including Hyattsville with the redevelopment of Belcrest Plaza. RT 1 in College Park has already received a shot in the arm and when East Campus is in full swing, it will spur developments connecting that part of Rt. 1 to the Arts District south through the redevelopment of Mount Ranier and points south.

by John E. on Oct 29, 2010 10:48 am • link • report

Re: New entrance/exit for Foggy Bottom-GWU Metro Station: How about building a new one at 24th and I streets, just west of the GW Medical School gate and the University Mall? It would relieve crowding at the current 23rd Street entrance and it may be less expensive than the 22nd Street proposal. It would better serve customers to the west such as the Foggy Bottom neighborhood and folks headed to the Kennedy Center.

by GWalum on Oct 29, 2010 10:51 am • link • report

@GWalum

You can't really build a new entrance over there because that's not where the station is. The current entrance is at the west end of the platform, therefore any new entrance would have to be at the east end of the platform - in the area of 22nd and I.

by Alex B. on Oct 29, 2010 10:58 am • link • report

Re: Foggy Bottom Entrance
Can someone explain why there aren't there numerous metro entrances at more stations using good old fashioned stairs? There exists escalators and elevators for the handicapped and infirm so, so its not a question of making the Metro accessible. Any ideas?

by jason on Oct 29, 2010 11:03 am • link • report

Re: Another Nextbus problem.

I've been trying to get another Nextbus problem fixed, but I can't get any response at all from WMATA. Phone calls and email complaint forms produce nothing. Does anyone have a suggestion about how to get a responsible person's attention to fix what seems to be a very simple issue with this system?

(The specifics are: I ride the 3A in Arlington, and at some point, Nextbus starting thinking it travels only westbound, never back eastbound. The web interface simply doesn't provide an "eastbound/to Rosslyn" option anymore. The estimates for this route used to work pretty well, and the bus surely does still travel back east after it goes west.)

by Paul on Oct 29, 2010 11:33 am • link • report

Another entrance could extend out from the west end of the mezzanine of the station, near the turnstiles and booth inside the station, westerly towards 24th Street. The station already extends under a portion of the University Mall, between GW Hospital and the medical school building (Ross Hall).

by GWalum on Oct 29, 2010 11:58 am • link • report

@GWalum

If you expand there, you need to address a few issues:

1. What about mezzanine capacity? The west side has very little room for expansion, and the existing mezzanine is already congested - that's why a new entrance is needed.

2. Where would the actual street-level entrance go? Part of the reason 22nd and I is attractive is because both the SE and SW streetcorners are slated to be redeveloped in GW's master plan. There is no real room at 24th and I.

WMATA did consider a new west entrance connecting to the existing mezzanine (see Build Option 2 in WMATA's analysis here: http://www.wmata.com/pdfs/planning/Station%20Access/070301%20Foggy%20Bottom%20Final.pdf - page 25 of the PDF) and they rejected it in favor of the eastern entrance for all those reasons.

by Alex B. on Oct 29, 2010 12:12 pm • link • report

fwiw, I actually think the D6 is more reliable now than it was when I lived on Foxhall Rd back in 2001. That said, I just moved to an apartment on Macarthur and it definitely still leaves something to be desired in the reliability department. The excuse that I've heard is that the D6 is a long route and is subject to traffic delays, but if that is consistently the case (and has been for YEARS), isn't it past time to come up with a strategy to deal with it?

The only solution I've been able to think of to solve the worst problem (a bus becomes so delayed that it "bunches" with the bus that should be 20-30 behind it) is to take one of those buses out of service at Sibley and send it down Macarthur/Canal/M and pick up the route on K St since the local stops in Georgetown and Dupont will be served by one bus anyway and the ridership is low enough on that stretch that one bus shouldn't get so full that a second bus is needed to slowly follow it and continue running 20-30 min behind schedule. I don't know if it's doable in practice, and would love to know if anyone has a better one!

by dc_chica on Oct 29, 2010 12:16 pm • link • report

I agree that the 22nd Street option works better and makes sense, I just raised the 24th Street scheme as a "plan B."

by GWalum on Oct 29, 2010 12:42 pm • link • report

Re: why Prince Georges hasn't gentrified using TOD

I'd like to echo John E.'s sentiment: I am quite bullish on the County getting TOD right, particularly in the northwest corridor (Mt. Rainier outward toward Laurel). I think there is enough density of transit stops and civic-minded people that "get it," that quality TOD really is destined to happen. Sometimes we get people in power here that don't fully grasp or trust in the potential that the County has with transit...but they can only retard progess, not prevent it.

by bryon on Oct 29, 2010 1:25 pm • link • report

FRINJ = meh. sorta clever, but is it a big enough zone that it even really needs a change?

by jkc on Oct 29, 2010 1:47 pm • link • report