Southwest...The Cherry Blossom Capital of Washington, DC

The National Cherry Blossom Festival begins one month from today and at this week's SWNA meeting, Southwest was designated the "Cherry Blossom Capital of Washington, DC." About 90% of the cherry blossoms in DC are located in Southwest, including the Tidal Basin and East Potomac Park, according to Lida Churchville, who has been working on the SW Call Box project for the past two years. Members from the Earth Conservation Corps were responsible for painting the call boxes, and as Southwest...TLQTC mentioned last week, they have been painted blue and pink, with the blue representing our neighborhood's proximity to water and the pink representing the color of the cherry blossoms that bloom each spring. The Call Box committee has also partnered with the National Cherry Blossom Festival to provide cherry blossom-inspired artwork on 14 out of the 32 call boxes in SW. Those designs will be unveiled during the cherry blossom festival on April 11. Check out the NCBF website for a list of other events during the two-week long festival. Churchville gave us a bit of a history lesson about the cherry trees as well at the SWNA meeting. The 100th anniversary of the gifting of the cherry trees by the people of Japan will be in 2012, but it turns out that the city of Washington was supposed to receive the trees back in 1909. However, once the trees reached Washington state from their trans-Pacific voyage, it was determined that the trees were infested and had to be burned, so Washington, DC didn't receive its cherry trees until the year 1912. So, SWNA has three years to plan for the big 100th anniversary celebration!

Lane Closures on I-395

DDOT issued a traffic advisory that lanes will be closed on I-395 (SE-SW Freeway) during off-peak hours starting next week until the end of April, related to the reconstruction of the 9th Street Bridge. Read the traffic advisory for more details.

Engine 13 Presentations Held Tonight

Earlier this evening, DMPED held a forum where the three development teams vying for Squares 494 and 495 had the opportunity to present their project proposals to the community. DMPED will post the slide show presentations from the three teams on their website tomorrow, and then I'll have a more in-depth post about the proposals. Meanwhile, I thought I'd whet your appetite with a rendering of one of the proposals for the new Engine 13, courtesy of E Street Development. The above rendering is a view of a new two-story firehouse, with an office building on top, at the corner of 4th & E Street (the vacant parcel alongside the SE-SW Freeway).

Update #1: The presentations have been uploaded to the DMPED website. You can see the presentations for E Street Development, 494 Partners, and Trammell/CSG/MVH. I'll give more details on each proposal by this weekend.

Update #2: Following is a description of each of the proposals, along with some renderings. For reference purposes, parcel A is the site of the current Engine 13, which is located at the corner of 6th & E Street. Parcel B is the parking lot at the corner of 4th & E Street. All three proposals plan to move Engine 13 to Parcel B into a 22,000 SF space and all include some office space and ground-level retail. The similarities end there...

Proposal 1 (E Street Development)

E Street Development is a combination of Potomac Investment Properties, CityPartners, and Adams Investment Group. Their architect is Beyer, Blinder, Belle. E Street Development has partnered with the D.C. Central Kitchen and Kid Power Inc. to provide community-oriented space in their development. Both parcels will be designated LEED Silver and will have green roofs. In this proposal, parcel A would become a 307,000 SF nine-story office building with ground floor retail space along E Street. The D.C. Central Kitchen wants to create a retail outlet on the first floor of the building, in the form of a restaurant where their trained cooking staff can prepare affordable nutritious meals. Retailers that the development team will target include a coffee shop and daycare center. Parcel B will be a 191,000 SF, 10-story office building, with a new Engine 13 firehouse on the ground floor. The firehouse will be facing 4th Street, while the office building's lobby will be oriented towards E Street. There will be 3,000 SF of community space on the second floor of the building, where Kid Power Inc. will have space to implement their programs. Locally, Kid Power Inc. works with 50 kids at Amidon-Bowen Elementary and Jefferson Middle School, but currently don't have enough space to do after school programs. (The above rendering is parcel A, viewed from the corner of 6th & E Street, from the DMPED website)

Proposal 2 (494 Partners)

494 Partners is made up of a partnership between JLH Partners, Chapman Development, and CDC Companies. Their architect is Compu.tecture, and as in proposal 1, both parcels will have green roofs. This proposal would put a 208-key extended-stay hotel on parcel A. The hotel would be 9-stories tall, shaped like an L, and the main lobby would face E Street. In the hollow area of the "L", there would be an 11,000 SF all-weather atrium, which would be open to the public 365 days a year. The atrium would be oriented towards historic St. Dominic Church and contain green space. There would be 6,000 SF of ground-level retail space, targeting a restaurant, coffee shop, and drug store. During the presentation, the development team mentioned that they have spoken with the proprietors of La Tomate (a restaurant along Connecticut Avenue, NW in Dupont Circle) about opening a second restaurant at their site. Parcel B will have a 103,000 SF eight-story office building with a firehouse on the first two floors, and 3,450 SF of retail space on floors 1-2. Compu.tecture designed the upper floors of the office building to curve along 4th Street. The firehouse entrance would be on 4th Street and the office building lobby would be on E Street. (The first rendering is parcel A, viewed from the corner of 6th & E Street; the second rendering is parcel B, viewed from the corner of 4th & E Street, from the DMPED website)

Proposal 3 (Trammell/CSG/MVH)

The third team is made up of Trammell Crow, CSG Urban Partners, and Michele Hagans. Their architect is Gensler, the same designer who did Trammell Crow's Patriots Plaza development catty corner to parcel B, which is currently under construction. This proposal has the most office space planned out of the three development teams, while both buildings would have either green or white roofs and would be LEED Silver. Parcel A would have a 306,000 SF 11-story office building with nearly 14,000 SF of ground level retail along E Street, 6th Street, and School Street. About 2,200 SF of community space would be provided on School Street, however, a community partner has not been identified yet. The main lobby would be on E Street. Parcel B would be a 190,000 SF 11-story office building with Engine 13 on the first two floors. The firehouse entrance would be on 4th Street and the main lobby for the office building would be at the corner of 4th & E Street. Currently, there are four levels of below-grade parking planned, but since Trammell Crow has Patriots Plaza nearby, they may share parking to try and reduce construction costs. (The first rendering is parcel A, viewed from the corner of 6th & E Street; the second rendering is parcel B, viewed from the corner of 4th & E Street, from the DMPED website)

After the presentations, there was a question/answer session, where members of the community were able to ask the development teams questions about their proposals. Not many community members attended the forum, so most of the questions came from ANC 6D commissioners. I asked the development teams whether the large amount of vacant office space in SW would require them to secure a major tenant before starting construction on the office portions of their proposals. All three teams committed to start construction on parcel B first with or without a lead tenant, since opening a new firehouse is a priority. It wasn't clear from their answers whether there would be any delays in building on parcel A. Even if you weren't able to make it to the forum, DMPED wants your input, so questions and commentary about the proposals can be submitted to dcbiz@dc.gov until Tuesday, March 3rd. The questions and the developer teams' responses will be posted on DMPED's website by the end of next week. In addition, please vote on which proposal you like best by participating in our poll (see the left sidebar). While the Deputy Mayor's office will make the final decision on which team will win the bid, I will forward the results of the poll to the project director at DMPED. The poll will be open until Friday, March 6th.

Reporters Building to Get Pizzeria

A Pizza Autentica restaurant will take the place of Irene's Deli on the ground floor of the Reporters Building, which was built in 1964 (see photo). The Reporters Building is located at 300 7th Street, across from the new Constitution Center, and is leased to the Department of Agriculture. The WBJ reported earlier this month that another Pizza Autentica will open downtown at 1331 L Street, NW. According to the article, the L Street, NW location will serve Italian gelato, espresso, and pizza. The Pizza Autentica chain was formed by Hakan Ilhan, who founded the Cafe Cantina franchise in DC. I'm looking forward to having a pizzeria in the neighborhood, but my guess is it'll probably only be open Monday-Friday for the lunch crowd.

L'Enfant Plaza Expansion Planned

In the Spring 2009 issue of OnSite Magazine (subscribers only) from the Washington Business Journal, there's an article about eyesore buildings around the city, including the FBI headquarters and the new convention center. Inevitably, L'Enfant Plaza was profiled, a 1960's-era concrete mixed-use complex that sits on top of the L'Enfant Plaza Metro station. Currently, L'Enfant Plaza consists of three office buildings, the L'Enfant Plaza Hotel and an underground retail promenade. JBG, one of the largest developers in the region, owns two of the office buildings totaling 631,000 SF, the 370-key hotel, and the retail promenade totaling 179,000 SF. (Above is a photo of the central courtyard and the north & west buildings taken in December 2008 - JBG owns the north building). JBG has plans to expand L'Enfant Plaza with two office buildings, an extended-stay hotel on the north end of the property, and a 202-unit apartment building on the south end of the site. In the article, JBG publicist Julie Chase mentioned the following about the goal of the expansion:

“The goal is to make [L’Enfant Plaza] far more pedestrian-friendly and bridge the up-and-coming vitality of the Southwest waterfront,” Chase says.

The article also states that Chase predicts that L'Enfant Plaza will emerge as a "second ring" to the clubs and restaurants along the Southwest Waterfront and will act as a buffer between the National Mall and the Maine Avenue corridor. The folks over at JBG were kind enough to send Southwest...TLQTC some renderings of the new office and hotel components (see below). SmithGroup has designed the new buildings and has also designed Constitution Center.

Here's a rendering of the southern facade of one of the new office buildings, which will be located in the central courtyard and will have ground-floor retail.

Here is a view of the two new office buildings as seen from across 10th Street, which will total about 500,000 SF. The retail component will contain about 25,000 SF.

On the northeast corner of the complex, a new 234-key extended-stay hotel will be built along D Street.

Ms. Chase at JBG said in the OnSite Magazine article that construction would begin next year and will deliver in phases in 2011 & 2015.

Douglass Bridge to Close

DDOT has released a traffic advisory that the Frederick Douglass Memorial Bridge (AKA South Capitol Street Bridge) will be closed on Sunday morning in order to test the swing span from 5am to 10am.

Updated Waterfront Station Photos

I've been meaning to post these photos I took at Waterfront Station a couple Sundays ago, but I haven't had a chance to do it until now. See my post from December to see progress photos from October and December.

The first photo is of the West Tower, which has reached its full height of eight stories. This tower is supposed to be complete by March 2010.

The East Tower, where the new Safeway will be located, is a little behind and has reached only the 7th floor. The projected completion of the east tower is May 2010.


The 4th Street right-of-way is much more defined now with two towers flanking either side of the soon-to-be reopened road, which should happen sometime before the West Tower is completed.



Here is a close-up of where the entrance will be to the new Safeway in the East Tower.

SW Call Box Update at Next SWNA Meeting

From March's The Southwester, there will be a SWNA meeting this coming Monday at 7:30pm at St. Augustine's, located at 6th Street & Maine Avenue. Special guest will be D.C. Council Chair Vincent Gray. Agenda items include an update on the SW Call Box project and announcements about upcoming SWNA elections. If you've noticed, the call boxes around Southwest are painted blue and pink, with the blue representing our proximity to the river & channel, while the pink symbolizes the cherry blossoms that bloom each spring around the Tidal Basin and East Potomac Park. The artwork that has yet to be installed in the call boxes will depict scenes related to cherry blossoms. However, according to an article in Black College View, one of the 32 call boxes will be dedicated to Thurgood Marshall, the first African American Supreme Court justice and former SW resident.

(The above photo is of a painted call box located on M Street across from the View at Waterfront).

March Issue of The Southwester is Available

Here's a link to March's issue of The Southwester, which is still in existence, three months after it was announced at the November SWNA meeting that the local paper may have to cease printing, due to a lack of advertiser revenue and the pending retirement of the Editor-in-Chief.

Bellevue Small Area Plan Meeting Tonight

Here's a link to And Now, Anacostia's post about a meeting tonight for Bellevue's Small Area Plan from 6:30pm - 8:30pm at the PR Harris Education Center on 4600 Livingston Road, SE.