Posts about I Wish This Were

Giving inspiration to its former name, the old Parkington Shopping Center in Ballston once held claim to being the first shopping mall in the country to be built around a multilevel garage. The complex was redeveloped into the Ballston Common Mall in 1986. At that time, Arlington County built an adjacent replacement public garage but inexplicably sited it at an angle to Glebe Road.

In 2006, the Kettler Capitals Iceplex (a twin-rink practice facility for the Washington Capitals and community skating) opened on the roof of the garage, with access from a dedicated elevator adjacent to Glebe Road.

Because of the unusual angular siting of the garage, the smartly designed glass elevator shaft opens onto an unappealing grassy triangle with mud patches where the groundcover has died. Neither an urban pocket park nor an attractively landscaped buffer, this section of the Ballston Common block lays fallow in a rapidly developing neighborhood.

Comprising approximately a quarter-acre on its triangular parcel, the lot sits on the least active front of the Ballston Common Mall complex. While other façades of the mall hold patio restaurant seating, retail entrances, and display cases, this lot is fronted only by a brick-and-concrete garage.

Presently, this face is blessed with less pedestrian traffic than its other fronts, though that is bound to change as the redevelopment game washes anew over the surrounding blocks.

Owned variously by Arlington County and Macy's, Inc. as tax-free open space, the small bit of land is ripe for something better. But what?

Likely too small for an active grassy space, perhaps it could be hardscaped into a Belgian-blocked plaza with a series of eight or ten tall specimen trees, benches, and a kiosk offering another lunch option, as well as giving a small food business a low-rent opportunity.

If you have any other ideas for this space, leave your thoughts in the comments. Do you use this space as it is now and think it could be better served simply by re-sodding the grass? Or do any changes need to wait until the other properties along Glebe Road have been redeveloped to be successful?

I Wish This Were... is a series in which Greater Greater Washington contributors imagine a better use for vacant properties and poorly-conceived public spaces in the DC area.

Some suggest that the businesses on this strip can't survive without the service lane and its 25 parking spaces. But every other commercial strip on Connecticut Avenue is able to thrive without a service lane. These businesses are just steps away from a Metro entrance, and are served by a rear alley that would allow people to drop off and pick up heavy items. The nearby Sam's parking lot almost always has space available. Making this area appealing and walkable would attract people in larger numbers, benefiting all of the businesses in the area.

This service lane was a big mistake, but it can be fixed. Imagine what a beautiful and vibrant public space this could be, with room for walking, sidewalk cafés, shade trees, flowers, and benches.

Sign the petition now to ask our elected representatives to restore this vital piece of the Connecticut Avenue boulevard to its original state.

What are the options?

This stretch of Connecticut Avenue was originally designed with broad, pleasant sidewalks on both sides.

Option 1: The status quo (cars first, people second)

In the early 1960s, Washington DC was being hollowed out as people fled for the suburbs. City planners were committed creating an automotive utopia. Cleveland Park's citizens had to fight off a proposal to run a freeway down Reno Road, which would have razed a wide swath of the neighborhood; other neighborhoods didn't escape that fate. Throughout the city, graceful mansions were replaced with parking lots. The streetcars that once ran up and down Connecticut were shut down permanently in 1962.

The service lane was created at the behest of local merchants. This was before Metro, during the heyday of the suburban strip mall; and convenience for drivers was everything.

So the wide sidewalk was dug up and replaced with a service lane, a second row of curbside parking, and a median separating the lane from the avenue. The vestigial sidewalk that remained is so narrow it hardly deserves the name.

This may have seemed like a good idea at a time at a time when public transit was poor or nonexistent, but it's completely inappropriate for what's become a vibrant urban neighborhood served by a metro stop.

• It's unsafe. Pedestrians often step off (or are forced off) the sidewalk, sometimes into the path of oncoming traffic. This is a particular problem for older or mobility-impaired persons. The anomalous traffic pattern created by the service lane is confusing. There's an extra set of stoplights where cars leave the service lane that's disorienting for drivers who are unfamiliar with the area.

• It's unappealing and hostile to pedestrians. The strip is drab and ugly; it feels crowded and unwelcoming. The only shade trees are on the median on the other side of the service lane, so there's no shade or shelter. The whole block feels like a parking lot, not like a place designed for humans.

• It's a waste of space. The median, the parking spots, and the access lane combine to occupy well over three times the space actually used for parking 26 cars at most. This is some of the most valuable real estate in DC, and it's terribly underutilized.

• There's no room for pedestrian amenities. A recent streetscape project conducted by Cleveland Park citizens along with DDOT has provided for beautifying the larger commercial area, with park benches, bike racks, and other amenities. There's no room for any of this along the service lane, nor is there room for any of the 12 excellent restaurants and eateries along the strip to provide sidewalk seating.

Option 2: Angled parking

A frequently proposed option is to replace the row of parallel parking alongside Connecticut Avenue, along with the median, with back-in angled parking. This approach would result in roughly the same number of parking spaces and a much wider sidewalk for pedestrians - seemingly a win-win.

Unfortunately, this proposal would be very expensive to implement (more than $3 million according to DDOT). Why? Because there's a lot of infrastructure embedded in the median that would have to be relocated at great expense: Metro vents, streetlights, a fire hydrant, and so on. And there are a number of mature trees that would have to be cut down.

DDOT has been unenthusiastic about the angled parking approach in the past, and for good reason. It's not really appropriate for a busy thoroughfare just outside downtown of a big city. And it's not exactly been a resounding success where it's been tried elsewhere; the city recently replaced back-in angled parking in Adams Morgan with more traditional parallel curbside parking.

Option 3: Shared road

Another possibility was proposed on the Cleveland Park listserv:

In a shared road, our sharply defined curbs on either side of our service lane would be replaced by a very graduated decline from the sidewalk level to the road level. There is not a hard boundary between what is walking space and what is vehicular space. ...

One would imagine that this creates dangers for pedestrians, but in practice cars naturally slow down to accommodate the pedestrians. There need not be any loss of parking spaces if this concept is applied to our service lane, the designated areas for parking could remain.

Shared roads make sense in cases where you need to provide occasional vehicle access to otherwise pedestrian-only areas; many college campuses have spaces that are configured this way. Some European towns have deliberately blurred the boundaries between pedestrian areas and roads in their historic centers, primarily as a traffic calming device.

In this context, though, this idea doesn't make a lot of sense. According to DDOT, it would be expensive. It doesn't solve any of the problem's we're trying to address. And imagine walking down that block with a family, trying to corral little kids while cars are trying to parallel park on the sidewalk they're "sharing" with us. For that matter, do you want to be the driver looking for a spot to park on the sidewalk while zoo-bound kids swarm around you? Sounds like a nightmare for everyone involved.

If the whole cars-and-trucks-on-sidewalks thing is a good idea, maybe we should let cars and delivery vehicles park and drive on the Uptown's sidewalk, or in front of Medium Rare and Cacao? Or on the sidewalks in Woodley Park or Dupont Circle, or on Columbia Road or Pennsylvania Avenue?

The service lane is already unusual and confusing. This scheme would take the weirdness to a whole new level, at the cost of millions of dollars, without improving anything.

Option 4: Cut-ins

Another proposal is to replace the off-peak parking along Connecticut Avenue with all-day parking by cutting spaces into the median. This would respond to the demand for parking in front of these shops during rush hour.

Unfortunately, it would be expensive for the same reasons as option 3—all the median's infrastructure would have to be relocated.

Alternatively, we could work around the existing trees, vents, etc. But this would yield at most a dozen or so spots along the entire block, resulting in a significant reduction in the number of spaces available.

Option 5: Just restore the sidewalk

Sometimes the simplest solution is best.

We all know what a wide sidewalk looks like—we don't need consultants or drawn-out studies when we can just cross the street and see how this sidewalk was intended to be. This option isn't expensive, either; the sidewalk could probably be restored for less than has already been allocated to study the issue.

All of us in Cleveland Park want our local shops to thrive. Restoring the sidewalk would eliminate just one parking spot per business on this strip, and would more than make up for it by being more attractive to people. For a commercial strip that's right on top of a metro station, delivering more pedestrians to merchants is a smarter strategy than delivering more drivers. We can only accommodate so many cars, with or without this service lane; whereas the number of pedestrians we could accommodate is practically unlimited.

The commercial strips in Woodley Park, Dupont Circle, Kalorama Triangle, and other comparable neighborhoods thrive without surface parking lots. There's no reason why ours can't as well. In the end, the question is whether we want this to be the kind of neighborhood where people drive up, do their business, and leave—the Rockville Pike strip-mall model that results in alienating, unfriendly spaces—or the kind of urban neighborhood where people come and spend time because it's fun and beautiful and accommodating to humans.

Cheap and abundant "Shop-N-Go" parking will never be this business district's comparative advantage, nor should it be. Let's leave that to the suburbs, and focus on making this a lively, walkable, and human-centered place where people actually want to be.

If you agree, please sign the petition now to ask our elected representatives to restore this vital piece of the Connecticut Avenue boulevard to its original state.

Whatever happens to the underground space, it seems unlikely all stairwells will be needed. I would like to see these 8'x16' footprints used to house kiosks.

Dupont gets enough foot traffic to support small businesses, and if managed well, these spaces could enhance the commercial landscape. The city's new food trucks have proven that good things often do come in small packages. These spaces are the right size for selling coffee, gelato, frozen custard, hot pretzels, or the now-ubiquitous cupcakes. A flower shop might work as well. (In another era, I'd suggest newspapers.)

A skilled architect could come up with a good simple design. My own version is depicted here. For the entrances used as stairwells, a similar structure could be used as a cover.

I've already gone on record stating that Shake Shack should consider a park location. The old comfort station west of Dupont Circle remains my favorite spot for a burger joint, though with Shake Shack now open just two blocks south, it seems unlikely we'll get to recreate the magic they brought to Madison Square Park in New York.

This little triangle deserves to have a more public use for this charming little building.

The Dupont Circle neighborhood is bordered by Rock Creek park, yet somehow barely manages to connect to it at all.

The main entrance to the park is via a pathetic set of stairs by 23rd & P. It leads to a section lovingly nicknamed P Street Beach. The clearing will be used by a few sunbathers in warm weather, but is sadly underutilized. Francis Junior High abuts the park, and offers a basketball court, three tennis courts and an outdoor pool.

There is an old outlet to Rock Creek in the park; I wonder if it's an old buried feeder creek that could be daylighted.

What could be done to make the park more inviting, to make the park feel more connected to the neighborhood? How do we help people enjoy their proximity to Rock Creek? Volleyball courts? Picnic tables? A dog park? Can a bike/ped bridge be built to connect to the trail on the other side of the creek? I vote for all of the above.

I Wish This Were... is a series where contributors imagine a better use for vacant properties and poorly-conceived public spaces in the DC area.

Pedestrians can connect from the three avenues (Massachusetts, Connecticut and New Hampshire) but not the two streets (19th and P). At the Connecticut and New Hampshire crossings, pedestrians have to wade through two levels of traffic signals, waiting for the second on a narrow concrete median, not wide enough for bikes, and without room for more than a single wheelchair.

In 2006 the Project for Public Spaces put Dupont Circle in its Hall of Shame, saying "the road around the Circle is two lanes too wide, and the connections from the interior park to the edges could be dramatically improved."

To make the park more accessible, Massachusetts Ave's inner roadway should be removed, with Massachusetts Ave traffic merging in a simpler two-lane circle.

This blog has already suggested we put a lid on Connecticut Avenue. The block of the underpass north of Dupont Circle and south of Q St should be decked over to give us a new park.

The new park would connect the two distant halves of Connecticut Ave, expand the circle's green space, and might even provide a better home for the farmers market.

The biggest missed opportunity is under our noses. Where planters fill the Connecticut Ave medians, we once had trolleys that dipped below the surface, and came to rest in two semi-circular (and unconnected) platforms. That underground space should be given a use that opens it to the public.

The space became vacant when the streetcars stopped running in 1962. In 1995 the western half was turned into a food court called Dupont Down Under, which soon failed, and tied up the space with lawsuits.

Last year a group called The Arts Coalition for Dupont Underground (ACDU) presented the only submission for the city's call for proposals. The underground space is so vast, their art space would use up only part of the tunnels, so their proposal included a restaurant and a winery.

It is a shame the city can't take the initiative to clean the space up, so it can at least be used for temporary events while ACDU gathers funding.

Nearby, another vacant government space is showing how commercial and artistic organizations can team up to revitalize a dormant space: a building at 14th & Florida is being used by BYT and Art Whino to host Vitaminwater® Uuncapped Live. Dupont's tunnels could foster similar events. Residents have proposed many other alternatives, but without investors this is wishful thinking. Ideas have included a dance club, a gym, a storage facility, and a pool hall. And even a sex club has been given serious consideration.

A clean, empty space will give rise to many creative temporary uses.

I Wish This Were... is a series where contributors imagine a better use for vacant properties and poorly-conceived public spaces in the DC area.

Local developer Brian Brown almost came to agreement with two restauranteurs to turn this lovely late 19th-century firehouse, at the northwest corner of North Capitol St and Quincy Pl NW, into a 2-story bar and restaurant. Both deals fell through due to lack of financing. Let us hope that a committed investor comes forward.

This site of a former Esso service station at the northwest corner of Florida Ave and North Capitol St NW, behind "Truxton Park," has been vacant for many years as developers have been unwilling to pay to decontaminate the site. A 3 or 4-story affordable apartment building with a neighborhood grocery or shop on the ground floor would be ideally suited for this prime real estate at the junction of two heavily-used Metrobus lines.

The DC government owns this lot at Florida Avenue and Q Street NW and condemned the boarded-up building (which appears to have had retail space) in August 2009. OECD reports that 'affordable housing' is planned here. Homes here should be architecturally similar to the rowhouses to the right (west), perhaps with retail or office space mixed in. The rooftop of a 2-story building here would afford a view of the Capitol and Washington Monument.

The District or a developer should transform this "L'Enfant wedge" at Florida Avenue & R Street NW into a welcoming space similar to the one with the LeDroit Park gate at Florida & T Street NW.

As I recently suggested, imagine this mini-highway decked over to become a tree-lined plaza framing the view of the Capitol dome.

Bloomingdale already boasts some fine examples of smart urban design: