Chain Reaction
I like skyscrapers. And DC has no skyscrapers. It does, however, have what’s basically an enormous multi-block vacant lot in the middle of downtown where the old Convention Center used to be. And it’s right between my office and my apartment so I pass it every day, dreaming of the extremely tall buildings that could be put on the site. Instead, we’re going to get City Center DC a mixed-use collection of DC-sized buildings:
At any rate, I was interested to read about the retail plans for the project since if any good stores were to open there it would be a convenient spot for me to shop. I learned that “Thirty percent of retail space will be devoted to merchants with six or fewer stores in the United States.”
I get the sense that this kind of set-aside is a common element of plans for big projects like this that need government approval. But insofar as the objective is promote diverse retail options, it seems a little backwards to me. There are some national chains that right now don’t have any outlets in DC. For a Mac user such as myself, for example, the lack of an Apple Store is noteworthy. Similarly, there’s no K-Mart, Nordstrom, JC Penny, Ikea, or many other national chains. There’d be a big difference in terms of its impact on people’s lives of getting a DC outlet of a store like that than there would be in the opening of the District’s ninety-billionth Starbucks or Cosi. Under the circumstances, it seems to me that if you want a set-aside of some kind, what you want to do is have a set-aside for firms that don’t already have more than such-and-such a number of stores in the District. That’s how you prevent a dull retail monoculture. Just raising the barriers to chains in general just tends to push them outside the District line. That makes life for DC residents less convenient than it might be, and costs the city a certain amount of revenue. Ideally, we should be trying to turn the city into, among other things, a hub of commerce that draws people in from the surrounding area, not a place that pushes people out to peripheral malls.
72 Responses to “Chain Reaction”
Register
RSSLogin
Topic Cloud
ArchivesBlog RollAbout Matt YglesiasContact Me
Donate
November 20th, 2008 at 6:29 pm
The Apple Store thing again? There are three Apple Stores within walking distance of a Metro stop, deal with it. And Pentagon City is hardly peripheral – it’s four train stops away from Gallery Place, and has your Nordstrom, Penney’s and Apple Store.
Crossing the Potomac will not cause DC residents to melt.
November 20th, 2008 at 6:31 pm
Isn’t there a city ordinance or something that prohibits buildings in DC that would be taller than the Washington Monument?
November 20th, 2008 at 6:44 pm
Rmwarwnick, no that is not the law. The law on building height is based on the size of the street the building is on. The practical implication is no building can be as tall as the Cairo apartment building on Q st. Why? Because when they built the Cairo in the late 1800s the fire equipment couldn’t reach the top and congress didn’t want to pay money for new fire equipment.
November 20th, 2008 at 6:46 pm
Perhaps you should abandon your Apple fixation then and actually start working with something beyond a kiddie computer.
November 20th, 2008 at 6:47 pm
God, I miss Cosi. There was one in the Macy’s in Valley Fair mall in San Jose for about 30 minutes a couple years ago.
Isn’t there a Hecht’s straight up from Metro Center? Or I guess Macy’s now. Am I dating myself? Hecht’s, Xando, the 4Ps…sheesh. Next I’ll try going to Hechinger’s…
November 20th, 2008 at 7:03 pm
I believe that the rule was that no building could be higher in space than the top of the Capitol building. Frankly, I like it. It’s what makes DC DC. If you want skyscrapers, go to New York.
There’s a Cosi (or there used to be) across the street from the Ballston Metro station.
There’s an Apple store across the street from the Clarendon metro station.
November 20th, 2008 at 7:11 pm
I agree with Matt, the chain restriction on CityCenter is a bit TOO restrictive. But honestly, Matt, Pentagon City is not very far.
#6 Barbara: You are incorrect on the height limit. You are repeating one of the oldest urban legends out there. See #3 Nathaniel, who IS correct. Though I don’t know about Congress not willing to pay for the new fire equipment. I thought it’s just that people were outraged at how tall The Cairo was.
November 20th, 2008 at 7:14 pm
This post is stupid.
The sad part is, it’s been surpassed by about four other posts this week.
Could you stop phoning it in, Matt?
November 20th, 2008 at 7:17 pm
Similarly, there’s no K-Mart, Nordstrom, JC Penny, Ikea, or many other national chains. There’d be a big difference in terms of its impact on people’s lives of getting a DC outlet of a store like that than there would be in the opening of the District’s ninety-billionth Starbucks or Cosi.
Most economies of scale in retail are local, so if you can only open one store in a given metro area, it’s not going to be profitable for many of these businesses. The distribution and marketing costs just don’t pay off unless they are being leveraged across multiple locations in the same area.
November 20th, 2008 at 7:19 pm
30% isn’t an awful lot of space to devote to small chains or independent stores, if you ask me. And surely the point of the rule is to promote local businesses . You can argue whether or not that’s a great idea, but banning retailers with outlets in the District would be diametrically opposed to the purpose of the restriction.
November 20th, 2008 at 7:20 pm
Is there a part of “Thirty percent of retail space will be devoted to merchants with six or fewer stores in the United States.” that we’re not groking? It says 30% not 100%, if K-mart or Apple or any other store that has more than six stores in the US, they are perfectly free to compete for the 100% available remaining 70%.
November 20th, 2008 at 7:38 pm
I think there’s something to be said for trying to keep this retail spot from being like any other in the country. Perhaps it’s possible to do this while catering to the unrealized needs of DC residents. Maybe separate percent requirements?
November 20th, 2008 at 7:42 pm
I’m thrilled to hear about the “less than six stores” rule, as that’ll make it (potentially, at least) interesting. Hey! Maybe even some locally-owned businesses! Otherwise, I’m confident it would have ended up being Foot Locker, Starbucks, Gap, another Starbucks, Radio Shack, etc., etc.
Variety is good. We have plenty enough chain stores in the area.
November 20th, 2008 at 7:44 pm
Oh, sorry, I didn’t notice it’s only 30%. So, basically, it will be Starbucks/Radio Shack/Foot Locker. Oh well.
November 20th, 2008 at 7:47 pm
The rent for that retail space will be too expensive for interesting, quirky, local merchants. You will get the stuff you can get everywhere else because it pays the rent. If you want interesting, local retail, you need to have a mix of real estate that includes some low rents.
November 20th, 2008 at 7:51 pm
And if they are restricting 30 percent of the space to retailers with less than 6 other outlets that means that Home Depot, Staples, Starbucks, Sears or Kmart, Target, Safeway, Macy’s, Walgreens/CVS/RiteAid, MacDonald’s/BurgerKing/Wendy’s… can be in the other 70 percent. I wonder how our host would feel if Zabar’s opened there? Or if instead of Safeway, Fairway?
November 20th, 2008 at 7:56 pm
I think a lot of this will depend not on whether some provision of the development contract/regs specify how many stores must be “local,” but on how high the rents are. I suspect/fear that some substantial portion of that designated 30% will end up consisting of (a) a dry cleaner, (b) some variation on “Mandie’s Cutesy Gift Shoppe” (which will close within 6 months), and (c) another dry cleaner. (And, in the bizarro world economics of dry cleaning, the competition between the two dry cleaners will do absolutely nothing to lower the cost or improve the quality of dry cleaning in the area.) Much as I hate to spend time in the new urban mall districts dominated by chains large and small (e.g., Gallery Place, Clarendon, even Times Square), the chains are often better at what they do than the independent alternatives that can actually afford to occupy space in these mall districts.
November 20th, 2008 at 8:01 pm
A few ideas for those local/independent businesses:
Massage parlor
Liquor store
Gun store
Payday loan store
Sex shop
Smoke shop
November 20th, 2008 at 8:37 pm
Mixner,
curious. where do you live?
November 20th, 2008 at 8:46 pm
Is it even physically possible to build skyscrapers in D.C.? Isn’t the bedrock too far down for that kind of construction?
November 20th, 2008 at 8:51 pm
Wasilla. But I summer in Crawford, Texas.
November 20th, 2008 at 8:55 pm
“six or fewer stores in the US” makes me think that they are going to put in super high end fashion stores. You know, the type that only has locations in London, Milan, Paris, Tokyo, NYC & LA… and maybe one in Vegas.
November 20th, 2008 at 9:08 pm
Right now, the old convention center makes for a really convenient parking lot. Last I saw it, there were plenty of spaces. I wonder if the Chinatown restaurants noticed an increase in business after the tarmac was laid?
November 20th, 2008 at 9:33 pm
If not for your post a few days ago, I would assume the 30% would be taken up entirely with restaurants. They are one of the few things where locals can truly compete with national chains and can usually do a much better job.
As for building heights, I can understand if DC residents don’t want to have huge skyscrapers. But the way the city currently looks – it’s like everything is the same exact height with no variation. Without the silly ordinance as it is, some buildings would be taller and others would be shorter and it wouldn’t look like some Prussian city planner laid everything out.
November 20th, 2008 at 9:51 pm
Well said. I live in Georgetown right now, and while it’s something of an adolescent fantasy (hot girls and lots of bars!) it’s really an incredibly impractical (read: expensive) place to live. To whit: there is no fast food except subway, no metro stop (due to racism?) and the closest grocery store is in Glover Park. Though it’s scenic and that new Clooney and Malkovich movie takes place here, it’s not an example of urban planning you can believe in.
November 20th, 2008 at 9:51 pm
Ikea is a terrible example. They only build to be off of major highways for convenient access.
In any case, I don’t agree here. I know you’ve laid out all the economic reasons why DC would benefit from taller buildings, but frankly I don’t think it would be the same town — at all — if it was as tall and/or as fast paced as you sometimes seem to indicate you’d like.
As previous comments have pointed out, 70% of the retail has the potential to fall into the chain category, although I tend to agree that it’s pretty easy in DC to get to Pentagon City if necessary.
November 20th, 2008 at 10:44 pm
Kmart? Please trust me when I say you do not want a Kmart. Target, yes. Kmart? Last week I was in a Kmart for the first time in years. Nasty. I can’t remember the last time I was anywhere that smelled so very badly.
November 20th, 2008 at 10:51 pm
Buy Cheaper
WOW goldWe do instant delivery through customer service 24 /7.
We will always strive on our goal to make sure that our customers get the best gaming experience from
dealing with us.
Please feel free to use our Live chat service power leveling
cheap whenever you need our instant attention in the exchange
of items or services.
November 20th, 2008 at 11:02 pm
In what way would having the same chains as everywhere else in the country not be a monoculture?
There’s an argument that this promotes small and locally owned business, and is likelier to keep profits within the community. I’m not a huge fan of zoning, or a huge enemy of chains– but I can at least sympathize what their ends here if not their methods.
November 20th, 2008 at 11:14 pm
Wow,
I didn’t know that they were going to tear down the convention center. Huzzah!!
It is/was an absolute blight on the district. The last 2 times I’ve been to meetings at the convention center I was and remained utterly appalled at the sterile wasteland that it created. It decimated the small DC Chinatown and also created a big dead-zone. Kind of like that in the Gulf of Mexico.
So, I really don’t care what mix of retail and residential replaces the great white whale. Just as long as something that promote urban life does so.
November 21st, 2008 at 12:03 am
I like skyscrapers. And DC has no skyscrapers
Neither does Paris, and most people who’ve ever been there thinks it’s rather a nice place.
we should be trying to turn the city into, among other things, a hub of commerce that draws people in from the surrounding area
Why? It would just cause traffic and wasteful use of cars, even with congestion pricing. Isn’t it better if people shop locally?
And who knew that Mixner has a sense of humor!
November 21st, 2008 at 12:28 am
Nobody ever said trolls can’t laugh.
November 21st, 2008 at 12:40 am
And who knew that Mixner has a sense of humor!
…which is why I suspect that this is a parody Mixner. He usually makes Bartleby the Scrivener look like a party animal.
November 21st, 2008 at 1:01 am
hey Mix–Massage parlor?
Liquor store?
Gun store?
Payday loan store?
Sex shop?
Smoke shop?
you’re about 45 years too late, but they THRIVED along 9th st. back in the day. Oh, and don’t forget the pawn shops & burleyQ houses! And if you needed a switchblade, the 9th st. area was the place to go. I kind of miss it, especially looking at what the Convention Center has done to the area.
As for skyscrapers, that’s just insane. Matt, if you want to live in Houston, MOVE TO HOUSTON!
November 21st, 2008 at 1:01 am
Neither does Paris, and most people who’ve ever been there thinks it’s rather a nice place.
Well, it sticks them in La Défense (or, as a one-off, Montparnasse), just as Amsterdam has many of its bigger office type buildings in Schiphol-Rijk or the Zuidas. Of course, a lot of retail in Paris and Amsterdam is devoted to merchants with just the one store.
November 21st, 2008 at 1:14 am
FYI: nothing on earth defines a person as more of a flake than Apple worship. Nothing. Not believing in the Tooth Fairy. Not believing in supply-side economics. Nothing.
If you like Apple, fine. But bitching about urban renewal because they’re not putting an Apple Shrine within groveling distance of yourself is as pathetic a statement about yourself as you could make.
November 21st, 2008 at 1:50 am
And fwiw — because M**** is downstairs having spent, from what I can tell, an entire day doing nothing but shit himself empty — I’ve always assumed that he’s in the western Sprawl Belt, since he never shows up until morning Pacific (Matt’s early threads are usually M**** free.) Some shitty exburb of Arizona, perhaps? Vegas? ? He gets touchy when people talk certain sprawly western shitholes, which is usually a tell. And he’s as sour as a crate of limes, so I call parody here.
November 21st, 2008 at 2:02 am
National chains employ African-Americans in large numbers, while local entrepreneurs are typically immigrants who only employ their relatives and countrymen, or maybe Hispanics in more menial jobs.
November 21st, 2008 at 2:58 am
Who employs neo-racial-determinists, Popeye? Just wondering.
November 21st, 2008 at 6:17 am
Matt,
Please move back to NYC — we DC natives love our low skyline city.
Stop being a whiner.
November 21st, 2008 at 9:22 am
My biggest objection with that plan is the concrete pocket park immediately adjacent to busy New York Av. Absent a plan to have, say, public-space vendors or temporary restaurants setup during lunch (check out Charlottesville, VA for an example) those are always worthless.
Leave the astroturf be till someone comes up with a better idea. If they’re wedded to the other details of the plan, a far better idea would be to relocate the space occupied by the interior building to the external pocket parks and put in a big squarish park right in the center of everything. Normally this would be a problem, but given the building height restrictions it should still get plenty of sun.
November 21st, 2008 at 9:51 am
Other Matt: FYI, the lack of a Georgetown Metro stop is because it is so close to the river that the tunnel would have had to be dug prohibitively deep. The racism thing is a myth.
For a good read about the Metro, check out “The Great Society Subway” by Zachary Schrag.
November 21st, 2008 at 10:26 am
Again with the planning dilettantism.
You have shown a schematic for a mixed use development with no parking. KMart Ikea, Home Depot etc. are not going to open a store at a location where you can’t drive to.
Think about what they sell at these places. No one is going to take a sofa or lumber on the Metro.
November 21st, 2008 at 10:31 am
There’s an Apple store not three blocks from the Bethesda Metro stop, and it’s practically next door to Quartermaine’s, the best coffee in the DC area. You should get around a bit more.
Yeah, I’d go for a Fairway on the old Convention Center site. But don’t forget Eastern Market and the DC Central Market; they’re still there.
November 21st, 2008 at 11:20 am
MY wrote: I like skyscrapers.
I say: Then you may be a moron. I agree wholeheartedly with the folks who suggest you move to a city already blighted by skyscrapers. Jeez.
November 21st, 2008 at 11:23 am
I always thought the old convention center site was the perfect place for DC’s own Tiananmen or Red Square. Now that the socialist/Marxist utopia approaches, maybe Chairman Obama can take a hand in revising the plans.
Re: The height-limit debate. I agree that DC is nice in skyscraper-free form (that’s what Rosslyn should be for), but I think the current limit is a bit too restrictive and could be relaxed, at least in some areas. Maybe this would also solve the problem of downtown consisting of a bunch of boxy, nondescript buildings that look like some giant levelled them off with a chainsaw.
November 21st, 2008 at 12:14 pm
Jim: “You have shown a schematic for a mixed use development with no parking. KMart Ikea, Home Depot etc. are not going to open a store at a location where you can’t drive to.”
Um, what? There are at least 4 underground garage entrances shown on that map. You can tell, because there are little drawings of cars driving into and out of them.
November 21st, 2008 at 12:57 pm
E claims that “the lack of a Georgetown Metro stop is because it is so close to the river that the tunnel would have had to be dug prohibitively deep. The racism thing is a myth.”
Please, then, kindly explain why the Red Line — which goes under the gorge at Rock Creek, resulting in an extremely deep tunnel — was not “prohibitively deep.” While you’re at it, please explain why a Georgetown Metro tunnel would necessarily be close to the water; it could run under P Street, for instance, and be only as deep as the red line tunnel at Dupont.
November 21st, 2008 at 1:05 pm
the lack of a Georgetown Metro stop is because it is so close to the river that the tunnel would have had to be dug prohibitively deep. The racism thing is a myth.
My mapoint software shows the distance from Rosslyn station to the river to be .275 mile – that same distance on the Georgetown side would put a Metro entrance at Wisconin and Prospect – one block up from M – and also benefitting from much more of a hill on the Georgetown side of the river than on the Rosslyn side – so could you please elaborate further?
While I agree with the myth of the racism thing, my understanding is that when the original planning was done for Metro back in the late 50s and 60s, the most important factor was commuting patterns and necessity – Metro was designed primarily as a commuting system to bring people in and out of DC during the day (and you should have seen what traffic was like downtown before 1976 when Metro opened)- not necessarily to be an overall transportation system – and Georgetown, not being an employment center, just didn’t rank high enough in the overall commuting model to justify putting in a station.
November 21st, 2008 at 1:07 pm
Or better yet, consider that the Wheaton station — in the burbs — is 196 feet deep and that the Forest Glen station just one stop away has the longest escalator in the Western Hemisphere. BOth are on the red line — which principally exists to shuttle white suburbanites to their DC jobs and back (helpfully facilitating their non-contribution to DC’s tax base). Again, how deep is “prohibitively deep.” The only thing that was probitive about georgetown was the resistance of its disproportionately wealthy, white, and powerful residents.
November 21st, 2008 at 1:37 pm
Ethel-to-Tilly is, I think correct in noting that the metro system was (and still is) designed to bring commuters from the outlying ares in efficiently (witness that it is a poor way to get across town, except when you’re already downtown) and that commuting/congestion patterns had much to do with the planning of the syystem in the 60s and 70s. But this doesn’t necessarily exonerate those responsible from charges of designing a system — perhaps deliberately — with racially disparate results. The very fact tht the stress was on getting suburbanites to their DC jobs without their having to poke their heads out from under ground until they are safely in the vicinity of the downtown government and other office buildings itself telling. As is the Metro map before the advent of the green line. That services suburbs, too, but those parts of suburban Maryland that are served by it (as well as the overwhelming bulk of the portions of DC serviced by it) are predominantly non-white. And it took quite a while for the green line to come into being — and still longer for it to dip into Anacostia.
Regarding the Shrag book referenced by E, interestingly, the author acknowledges that Georgetown residents in fact vigorously opposed a station in Georgetown, but he then goes on to dismiss that resistance as “irrelevant” based on purported engineering difficulties, which I find facially dubious. And Shrag’s only sources were the relevant officials, who would hardly have an interest in admitting that they knuckled under the pressure of the Georgetown elite. In addition, Shrag offers another dubious excuse that a Georgetown stop was deemed not worthwhile because of commuting patterns and there not being enough apartment blocks and the like — but that of course describes Capitol Hill as well, and that’s weel-served. The tenor of Shrag’s book strikes me as puffery and boosterism, and he displays no healthy skepticism regarding the pro-WMATA spin that he received.
November 21st, 2008 at 2:14 pm
Sebastian, you have in backwards, Forest Glen is the deep one, Wheaton is the one with the escalator. It was a pain when I lived at Forest Glen and half the elevators where being repaired for the entire year I lived there. It would ahve been nice if there was an escalator.
November 21st, 2008 at 2:16 pm
Are people really giving Mixner credit for humor in post no. 16? It is totally consistent with his world-picture, in which average skin pigmentation and crime decrease smoothly, and virtue and income increase smoothly, with increasing distance from the center of any city anywhere.
November 21st, 2008 at 2:23 pm
that a Georgetown stop was deemed not worthwhile because of commuting patterns and there not being enough apartment blocks and the like — but that of course describes Capitol Hill as well, and that’s weel-served.
You’re missing the point of the commuting argument – there are no employment centers in Georgetown (at least there weren’t in the 50s and 60s) – nor a public need to get there in the way Capitol Hill is. And Capitol Hill, besides being a destination, is also very conveniently located along any lines coming in, i.e, bulding stations on Capitol Hill didn’t involve much extra thought or planning in the way changing the entire layoout of the Rosslyn Potomac River tunnel and the I-Street alignment would have meant to accomodate a Georgetown station.
I think you’re really getting way too carried away with the “racist” argument that you’re ignoring all the other considerations involved.
November 21st, 2008 at 2:25 pm
Are people really giving Mixner credit for humor in post no. 16?
Yes.
It is totally consistent with his world-picture, in which average skin pigmentation and crime decrease smoothly, and virtue and income increase smoothly, with increasing distance from the center of any city anywhere.
That is not my “world-picture.”
But I’ll play: In roac’s world-picture, all criminals are oppressed saints, people only live in suburbs because they’ve been forced to do so by evil forces wielding the mighty weapon of zoning laws, and communism is the highest state of human social organization.
November 21st, 2008 at 2:39 pm
In my world-picture, people like to live close to their jobs, so they bid up the price of real estate that is close to their jobs, and people with less money get forced farther and farther out. The phrase is “drive till you qualify.”
My own close-in suburb was a major center for Hispanic immigration ten years ago. The school planners who were coping with this influx looked up a couple of years ago and said, Hey, where did all those ESL kids go? The answer is that the post-WWII garden apartments where their families were living are being torn down and replaced by $500,000 townhouses, so they have had to move out to Prince William County. Which is no doubt good for me financially, though it seems like a sad state of affairs.)
November 21st, 2008 at 2:41 pm
Documentation for last paragraph of previous post is here. Sorry.
November 21st, 2008 at 3:08 pm
I love Matt’s implicit assumption that people are going to get their furniture from Ikea no matter what, and so it’s just a question of whether you let them go to an Ikea within the city limits or if you make them travel.
November 21st, 2008 at 3:13 pm
roac,
In my world-picture, people like to live close to their jobs, so they bid up the price of real estate that is close to their jobs, and people with less money get forced farther and farther out. The phrase is “drive till you qualify.”
Well, gee, yes, there’s a market in housing, and so housing in more desirable locations tends to be priced higher than housing in less desirable locations. Also, people are willing to trade a longer commute for better or cheaper housing.
Are you saying you think these facts constitute some kind of problem? If so, why, and what solution do you propose?
November 21st, 2008 at 3:19 pm
Ehtel-to-Tilly: That’s a very good point about Capitol Hill being an employment center (not to mention an employment center of not inconsiderable influence). And it’s certainly true that Georgetown has never been an “employment center” at least somewhat narrowly construed to mean a place with a high concentration of office jobs (those who hold the service-sector jobs that make Georgetown-as-retail-and-entertainment-center possible might quibble with that definition, however).
Your point re-emphasizes that the DC Metro system’s focus is on facilitating (largely suburban) commuting into narrowly defined “employment centers.” My main objection to that whole idea is that reducing suburban-commuter congestion is fine, as far as it goes, but if one is going to invest in a public transit system, it might be nice if it also provided an efficient way to get around town, which benfits residents and non-residents alike, rather than being one that disproportionately benefits suburban commuters. (I find DC Metro to be the sorriest public transit system that one can find in a capital in the developed world.)
As for “getting way too carried away with the ‘racist’ argument,” I would respectfully ask you to read more carefully (while continuing to indulge my at times awful typing). I made two points. Point the first was that the general design of the DC Metro system — prior to the addition and expansion of lines, esp. the green line — had a racially disparate impact. I allowed that that could have been deliberate or not. I’ll further elaborate that even if not deliberately ‘racist,’ the general plan of the Metro system offered little to the largely nonwhite population of DC. For instance, it completely shut out Anacostia and points beyond in Maryland that are predominantly black. Prior to the green line (and the contemporaneous gentrification of a number of neighborhoods, e.g. Adams Morgan, Columbia Heights, Mt. Pleasant) you could superimpose a map of mostly white areas of DC over the metro map and find that the two matched up very well (with the exception of Georgetown and the MacArthur Bouevard extreme to the west). Simply put, the predominantly white pockets of a predominantly nonwhite urban area were very well served, and the predominantly non-white areas were poorly served or not served at all. That is simply a fact. I left as an open question whence this racailly disparate system came, but I think it very hard to argue that the impact was anything but racially disparate.
Beyond that, I made the point that Georgetown’s residents did in fact vigorously oppose (and, I understand, continue to vigorously oppose) any extension of the Metro into Georgetown. Although I noted that the population of Georgetown is disproportionately white, I did not attribute that opposition to racism (I also noted that they are disproportinately wealthy and influential). But the opposition of Georgetown residents also is a fact, and I offered along with that fact the surmise that their opposition probably has something to do with Metro not having ever expanded into Georgetown. I will re-emphasize here that the supposed cost/engineering obstacle appears to be hooey, because for WAMTA, there is apparently no tunnel that is prohibitively deep when it comes to servicing the suburbs (see, e.g., the 196-foot tunnel on the red line).
In any event, the Georgetown set got their comeuppance, for, without mass transit, the neighborhood — which has become a retail and night-club hub — now has some of the worst traffic problems in the District, and is intolerable on weekends.
November 21st, 2008 at 3:50 pm
Are you saying you think these facts constitute some kind of problem?
Not a problem for me. In fact, a financial windfall, having bought 20 years ago a house on what was perceived as the “wrong part of town,” but has now quadrupled in value through gentrification. (Not that that was anything but dumb luck. It was what we could afford when my wife was home with the kids.)
This discussion, however, started out to be about your assumption that the only retail businesses that could survive in downtown Washington were massage parlors, check-cashing stores, and whatever else you said. I am pointing to evidence suggesting that the long-term trend in at least some American cities suggests that the crime-ridden slums are going to move to the suburbs. See, e.g., Paris, France.
November 21st, 2008 at 4:02 pm
roac,
Not a problem for me.
I didn’t mean a problem for you personally. I meant a social problem. Something the government should address through public policy. Do you think it is a problem of this kind or not? If you do, what policy do you propose to address it?
This discussion, however, started out to be about your assumption that the only retail businesses that could survive in downtown Washington were massage parlors, check-cashing stores, and whatever else you said.
It was a joke, roac. I’m sorry you didn’t realize that.
November 21st, 2008 at 5:07 pm
Sebastian – I’m not sure if you were here in DC during the 60s and 70s before Metro was built – but the city was choking on the cars that suburbanites were driving into town each day. The difference in traffic between now and then is night and day. Alleviating that problem was the primary raison d’etre – nothing else – partially because the Metro had to funded by so many jurisdications which didn’t share your concern about the Metro being an all things transportation system to the non-whites of DC, and partially because it wasn’t their cars driving into downtown each day that were causing the traffic problem.
It’s one thing to bring up all those concerns now – and as originally a NYC native I totally agree that Metro would be a whole lot better if it had tried to be something more than it is and to better serve more of the population in a better way. But the fact of the matter is that wasn’t the primary concern of the planners way back when – part of that is that it was a different time and place – DC was run by Congress and not responsive to the *needs* of its citizens – and part of it is that Metro was primarily designed to bring massive amounts of commuters nto the downtown office core to alleviate massive traffic congestion. Places like Georgetown and Anacostia unfortunately didn’t fit at the time the primary criteria by which service was allocated. Things such as the Georgetown residents objections to Metro happened, but have acquired an urban legend status as having more impact than in reality. Georgetown was never considered at best more than a secondary priority. Providing full-scale subway service to all of the residents in a fair manner was never considered a priority either. You’re providing after the fact rationales and reasoning to judge things that weren’t considered important at the time. It really was planned in a much different time and place and attitude than exists in the DC of today.
November 22nd, 2008 at 12:54 pm
E2T: Fair enough. I don’t think we actually disagree much at all; indeed I disagree with nothing in your thoughtful response. And I certainly wasn’t around DC in the 60s and 70s; the idea that it was more choked with suburban commuters than it is now is mind-boggling. I find it intolerable now (I daily risk bodily harm from mostly suburban commuters every day as I commute by bicycle — having formerly alternated with a motorcycle until a careless driver put an end to that, and almost to me for that matter). My big problem with the DC Metro is precisely what you identify as its defining feature, but I don’t discount the value of reducing suburban car commuting. The choice to focus on only that — and not on having a multipurpose Metro that facilitates getting people other places than their downtown office jobs and from other places than the N. Virginia/S. Maryland bedroom communities has had many baleful consequences. If you make it easy for folks to get in and out of downtown, and only that, you among other things do nothing to foster a vibrant multi-use city. What you say is all very true, and reflects a plantation view of the District, which has had predictable consequences for urban life here.
It’s also shameful just on the somewhat superficial level of national pride. The metro system of the capital of the (at least erstwhile) richest and most powerful country on earth should be showpiece. Instead, it’s a hideous commuter conveyer belt.* Geez, take a gander at the metro system of Moscow, which shames us by comparison.
*Also I just don’t get that it did not occur to WAMTA until the 21st Century that if you put mechanical escalators outdoors, exposed to the elements, your escalators arfe going to break down a lot. Seriously, the first enclosures for the damn escalators didn’t show up until a few years ago. Sheesh.
Anyway, thanks for the exchange. I certainly profited from it.
January 14th, 2009 at 9:14 am
laptop battery
laptop batteries
February 8th, 2009 at 9:13 pm
laptop battery
March 1st, 2009 at 5:08 am
viagra
I want to say – thank you for this!
March 2nd, 2009 at 4:35 am
levitraIncredible site!
March 11th, 2009 at 4:21 am
Excellent site. It was pleasant to me.
March 14th, 2009 at 5:06 am
Very interesting site. Hope it will always be alive!
xanax
April 3rd, 2009 at 4:01 am
Excellent site. It was pleasant to me.
cheap brand pfizer viagra
April 19th, 2009 at 8:47 am
fC9jFV uvauhrxutnoa, [url=http://yjnbnzuhbvpy.com/]yjnbnzuhbvpy[/url], [link=http://voavwgucacew.com/]voavwgucacew[/link], http://scvdgsatlxoc.com/