A Few Quick Items: On the Ground Floor in SW, Buzzard Point, Circulator Changes, DC CAS Tests, SW Duck Pond

- UrbanTurf writes about the Southwest Waterfront neighborhood's potential to become "the next hot neighborhood" in DC. The article includes a couple quotes from me, so go check it out!

- JDLand reports that the Florida Rock concrete plant across from Nationals Park on Potomac Avenue, SE will be razed, but it will be moved a few blocks away to another Florida Rock Properties-owned site in...you guessed it, Buzzard Point, located at S Street and the Anacostia River.

- DDOT announced that there will be some changes made to DC Circulator routes starting on April 1.  The National Mall loop will be discontinued.  Also, the SW Waterfront-Convention Center route will be changed slightly in Southwest.  The route will run along Maine Avenue instead of Water Street to accommodate construction of the new Kastles Stadium at The Wharf, which should be complete by early July.  However, it is recommended in a new Transit Development Plan for the Circulator to suspend the SW Waterfront-Convention Center route until development at The Wharf and O Street Market in Shaw are further along.  This route is one of the most subsidized out of the six Circulator routes because of low ridership. Another recommendation is to create a new route, from Dupont Circle down to the Mall area, running along Maine Avenue to the Navy Yard.  This new route would most likely be introduced within the next couple of years.  DDOT will host a meeting tomorrow at the Capital Hilton, located at 16th & K Street, NW from 6-9pm where the public can comment about the proposed changes to Circulator routes.  Comments can also be made online.

- Volunteers are needed next week to help monitor students at Jefferson Middle School as they take their DC CAS tests.  Monitors will sit in the classrooms with teachers.  The tests will take place from 9am - 11am Tuesday - Friday.  If anyone is interested to volunteer for any of those days, contact Ms. Nedra Jones at Jefferson Middle School at 729-3270, or nedra.jones@dc.gov.

- Ward 6 Council member Tommy Wells introduced legislation yesterday to change the name of the park at the corner of 6th & I Street to the "Southwest Duck Pond."  Monthly clean-ups have been done by the Neighbors of Southwest Duck Pond group at the park since last year and they have made great progress towards rehabbing the neglected park.  There will be a press event on Saturday at 12:30pm to activate the fountains for the season at the park, announce the Volunteer of the Year for 2010, as well as an announcement about the future of the park.  Council member Wells is expected to attend.

Waterfront Station Construction Photos

I took the above photo of the patio area in front of the Waterfront Station Safeway yesterday, which looks to be just about complete, except for tables and chairs that may be installed.  Landscaping is in place and doors have been added from the elevator bank inside Safeway to the patio area. The EPA tower lurks in the background, which is supposed to be re-skinned and repurposed as a residential building, along with its sister building on the other side of Waterfront Station.  I've been hearing chatter recently about this building getting underway relatively soon since the multifamily market is heating up in DC.

Here is a photo of construction back in early February. The patio area has been under construction for a few months since work on the parking garage below it was completed earlier this year. The old Safeway next door was demolished last summer, just a few months after the new store opened. Last spring while I was on a sneak peek tour of the new Safeway, Craig Muckle told me the patio area would open about a year from then, so it looks like he was on target with that date.

The SE parcel fronting M Street will one day become an office building, but for now, it will be a grassy area, similar to the ones on the NE & NW parcels closer to I Street. The SW parcel will remain a blacktop surface for now since Bank of America will be staying in their trailer until their lease ends in December 2012.  While the NE & NW parcels have not been used for regular interim uses thus far, that may change soon (at least on the District-owned NE parcel).

Station 4 and Z-Burger build-outs continue on the west side of 4th Street.  I was told a couple weeks ago by Med Lahlou that Station 4 is now aiming for a mid-April opening and the last I heard about Z-Burger was it's planning on opening in May. Brown paper has covered up most of the windows at Station 4, which seems to be further along than Z-Burger.

Prepping for Saturday's Festival

As the Southwest Waterfront Fireworks Festival fast approaches, preparations are underway along the waterfront to entertain the thousands of people that are expected on Saturday.  As mentioned previously, the festival will last from 1pm to 8:30pm with a full schedule of events, followed by the fireworks show. Over at the Gangplank Marina, E dock is being converted to a commercial dock so cruise boats like DC Harbor Cruises can take tourists along the Potomac River (above photo). 

Over at 7th Street Landing, DC Harbor Cruises has taken over District Doghouse's old kiosk, which won't be coming back this season.  Eventually, the cruise operator will move to another kiosk under construction on the other side of 7th Street Landing to serve the E dock. The new food provider that will be moving to District Doghouse's kiosk will be the BBQ operation that is currently on the grounds of St. Augustine's. Last week I tweeted about the mural of The Wharf being installed in front of the Hoffman-Madison Waterfront team's construction trailer next to 7th Street Landing.  In addition, this year's Cherry Blast will take place at the former Zanzibar on the Waterfront building from 8pm-12am. According to the Going Out Gurus:

This year, the party is down on the Southwest waterfront - at the old Zanzibar - where the entertainment includes performance art, burlesque and graffiti, plus music from quirky, hook-filled Brooklyn indie band Bear Hands, the Beach Boys-influenced synth-pop group ANR and a number of DJs. Check out murals while snacking at food trucks. And Zanzibar’s deck offers a perfect spot to watch the official Cherry Blossom Festival fireworks. The $10 admission includes one free drink, but no tickets will be sold at the door, so get yours in advance.

Volunteers from the Southwest Library Playground Project (SWLPP) will be set up at the Gangplank Marina park pavilion to do face painting and sell water, which has been donated by Deer Park.  The face painting will be free, but donations will be accepted to go towards the construction of a new playground next to the Southwest Library. Half of the proceeds from water sales at several stations throughout the festival will go towards relief efforts in Japan and the other half will go towards the SWLPP.

As Barbara Ehrlich, one of the organizers of the festival from the Washington Waterfront Association, told me this afternoon, this year's Southwest Waterfront Fireworks Festival will be the biggest event staged by the group (in collaboration with the Hoffman-Madison Waterfront team) and will serve as a dry run for next year. That is when the National Cherry Blossom Festival will celebrate the 100th anniversary of the gifting of the cherry trees along the Tidal Basin from the people of Japan to DC. 

A Few Quick Items: Clark Honored, Constitution Center Lease-Up

 - Clark Construction Group, LLC won a national construction award for their work at Arena Stage, according to a press release by the company.  The Associated General Contractors of America presented the Aon Build America Award to Clark on March 23 in the category of Building Renovation at the group's annual convention.

- The Washington Business Journal reports that the SEC will delay its move of 740 employees from offices in Virginia to Constitution Center. Part of the reason for the delay is the federal government has been operating under continuing resolutions, or CRs since the beginning of the fiscal year in October.  From the article:

“Due to uncertainties regarding our long-term funding and the current cash-flow crunch that makes it impossible to fund build out and moves, we are staying at the Ops Center for a short time while the budget situation is clarified,” said John Nester, spokesman for the agency, in a statement to the Washington Business Journal. The SEC signed a lease for 900,000 square feet — the largest federal lease in a decade — in August with David Nassif Associates at 400 Seventh St. SW, but just four months later reported 600,000 square feet of excess space under a federal policy that mandates agencies report their extra real estate.  The landlord has said the agency will end up with one quadrant of the building, or about 340,000 square feet.

- Also from the WBJ (subscribers only) and related to the SEC lease at Constitution Center, the paper interviewed Tim Jaroch from David Nassif Associates about how they have leased up the largest privately-owned office building in the District.  From the article:

Jaroch maintains that the SEC’s lease was carefully thought out and a good strategic move for the agency, which handles its own leasing and does not work with the General Services Administration as most other federal agencies do. He did not anticipate the SEC walking away from the majority of its space.

After the SEC did just that, the landlord had to find new tenants and leased the majority of the building to the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency and the Federal Housing Financing Agency. Now Constitution Center will be home to three finance-related agencies and the next step will be to build out the space for these tenants. 

“We have to build out tenant and amenity space equal to about five typical good-sized Washington office buildings in 18 months,” he said. “This is just the start.”

Change in Comments Policy

I have hinted previously that I may change the comments policy due to the excessive amount of "Anonymous" comments on the blog.  As an interim measure while I research ways to possibly upgrade the blog, I've changed the settings for making comments, so only registered users can make comments (using Google, OpenID, LiveJournal, WordPress, TypePad, or AOL). I encourage you all to continue to make comments on any posts - there have been some lively debates lately on a variety of topics.  My goal with this new policy is not to censor comments.  Open discussion posts will also be introduced soon and used from time to time (especially when I get bogged down with other tasks that keep me from doing new posts on a regular basis).  However, I think the discussion will be more productive if the comments are not anonymous.  Thanks for your cooperation.

SWNA Elections This Saturday

The Southwest Neighborhood Assembly (SWNA) will be holding its elections on Saturday from 10am - 3pm in front of the Waterfront Station Safeway.  All residents of Southwest in ZIP code 20024 who are 18 years of age or over are eligible to vote.  There's no absentee ballots, early voting, or advanced registration to vote. Positions on the ballot include President, Vice President, Treasurer, Secretary, Treasurer, and District Councils (1-4).  You can vote for up to two candidates for the District Council positions depending on where you live. District Council boundaries are as follows:

• District 1: North of M Street, West of 4th Street
• District 2: North of M Street, East of 4th Street
• District 3: South of M Street, West of Delaware Avenue
• District 4: South of M Street, East of Delaware Avenue

For a list of candidates and bios, check out the SWNA website.  All candidates serve a term of two years.

Update: Below are the results from Saturday's election.  Winnners are written in bold.

President: Kael Anderson (251), write-in candidates (9)

Vice President: Jodi McCarthy (205), Grace E. Daughtridge (102), write-in candidates (2)

Treasurer: Jo Chang (172), Ellen Winship (108)

Secretary: Laura Shin (251)

District 1 Representative: Gita Morris (42), Zev Feder (39), Mike Flick (28), write-ins (2)

District 2 Representative: Saadia Athias (21), Ben Curran (19), Monique Stuart (10), Shannon Vaughn (10)

District 3 Representative: David Campbell (87), Kenneth Prater (67), Zach Dobelbower (40), Matthew Johnson (36), write-ins (1)

District 4 Representative: Robert Smith (8), Ken LaCruise (5)

SW Ecodistrict Public Comment Forum Created

There was a meeting last month held by the National Capital Planning Commission (NCPC) to discuss the Southwest Ecodistrict Initiative, an area roughly comprised of the Southwest Federal Center west of 4th Street to 12th Street (including L'Enfant Plaza) and south to Banneker Overlook. The two main corridors that will be analyzed in this district is 10th Street (connecting the National Mall to the Southwest Waterfront) and Maryland Avenue (connecting the Capitol and the Jefferson Memorial). The DC Office of Planning will conduct a study of the Maryland Avenue corridor this summer and the NCPC is exploring the feasibility of decking part of the Southeast-Southwest Freeway from just west of 10th Street over to 9th Street. To follow up with the meeting, a lot of information has been posted on the SW Ecodistrict website, including a public comment forum. If you want to comment about the Ecodistrict plan, sign-up to use the forum - the public comment period will end on April 15th.

Rendering courtesy of the National Capital Planning Commission.

SW Waterfront Fireworks Festival Schedule

The following is the schedule of events for the Southwest Waterfront Fireworks Festival on Saturday, April 2nd, co-produced by the Washington Waterfront Association and the Hoffman-Madison Waterfront team as an official event of the 2011 National Cherry Blossom Festival.

Gangplank Marina Stage

1:00pm: US Navy Band and Ceremonial Color Guard

3:00pm: The "Old Guard" Fife and Drum Corps

6:00pm: US Army Band "Pershing's Own" Downrange

7th Street Landing Stage

1:00pm: Collector's Edition with Kristine Key

3:00pm: The Clarence Turner Blues Band

4:30pm: The Jacques "Saxman" Johnson Band

9th Street Plaza Stage

1:00pm: The VIP's

3:00pm: Nen Daiko Japanese Taiko Drummers

4:30pm: High Jinx

Special Events throughout the Southwest Waterfront

• Childrens’ Activities and Waterfront Demonstrations
• Community Displays and Information
• Costumed Characters and Strolling Musical Entertainment
• Face Painting and Balloon Artists
• Food and Beverage Vendors
• Festival Merchandise
• National Cherry Blossom Goodwill Ambassadors

The National Cherry Blossom Festival is Washington, DC’s and the Nation’s greatest springtime celebration. The 2011 Festival is March 26 through April 10 and features signature events, daily cultural performance, art exhibits, sport competitions and more. The National Cherry Blossom Festival celebrates the 99th anniversary of the gift of the cherry blossom trees and the enduring friendship between the citizens of the United States and Japan. For schedules and information call the Festival hotline at 877-44-BLOOM or visit http://www.nationalcherryblossomfestival.org/.

SW Library Playground Project Well Underway!

The following post was written by Felicia Couts - project manager of the SWLPP:

The Southwest Library Playground Project (SWLPP) is a volunteer-led initiative to build a playground for SW DC children. The playground will be located in the park next to the SW Library at 900 Wesley Place, SW. Design plans include play equipment for children ages 2-12 and preservation of the trees and foliage. The SWLPP is an initiative of the Community Benefits Coordinating Council, a 501(c)(3) organization committed to helping SW and Near SE DC residents.

Community support is vital and several local companies and individuals have made fundraising pledges. Frager’s Hardware, restaurants along the waterfront, including Captain White's Seafood, and local SW residents are all supporting SWLPP.

Councilmember Tommy Wells, ANC members, and the Department of Parks and Recreation are working with SWLPP volunteers to bring the park to life for SW DC children.

Amidon Elementary School students participated in the Draw Your Playground contest to show the SWLPP volunteers what they want in a playground. First place went to Edugwu Agada, second place to Jostin Garcia and third to Vanquisha Smith. A pizza party will be held in March for Eduguu’s class and all three will receive certificates of recognition. Winners were chosen from thirteen finalists and their drawings show the children want playground features like swings, slides, a bike rack and water fountain. All of the drawings are planned for display at the Southwest Arts Festival later this year.

The “Community Build Day” is in late September 2011. The whole community -- children and adults -- is invited to help build the playground. Although there will be professional assistance, volunteers of all skill levels will be valuable to this effort!

We still need your help! Make a secure PayPal donation or send a check at our website. Email us to inquire about volunteering.

Help us bring the children a safe, fun, playground!

Felicia Couts
Project Manager
Facebook: SW Library Playground Project
Twitter: SWLPlayground

Oh Safeway.

Also on the agenda at Monday's ANC 6D meeting was Safeway and its new "Quality Assurance Program" (i.e. greeters who check receipts as customers leave the store). This part of the meeting became somewhat of a heated debate as some ANC commissioners and audience members accused Safeway of targeting the Waterfront Station Safeway store for its new policy, not to increase customer service, but because of shoplifting and subjecting all shoppers to this new receipt check was degrading. A couple of Safeway representatives countered that all stores in the District have experienced shrink (when the actual inventory is less than what is thought to be on the shelves) and the increase occurred after the bag tax was instituted in the city. Another potential cause of shrink is the design of the store, which has a food court area in the front of the store that customers who didn't use the parking garage have to walk through in order to leave the store. The Southwest Safeway was chosen as a test case because of four main reasons:

• The SW Safeway has 35,000 customer counts per week - more than any other Safeway in the city.
• The clientele is diverse (including residents, office workers, tourists, and baseball fans) which serves as a microcosm of the District's population.
• They have faith in the store's management team to implement the test.
• There has been an increase in shrink.

The test will last up to 26 weeks and after the test period, Safeway will evaluate whether to implement the receipt check in other stores in the District. Not satisfied with Safeway's explanation, which didn't mention anything about customer service, but focused on "shrink," the ANC voted 5-0-1 to send a letter to Safeway's regional management team expressing their dismay with the new policy and requests that the store implement the receipt check at a non-urban store (Georgetown's new Social Safeway comes to mind).

Has anyone experienced issues with the new receipt checking procedure?

Update: Here is The Washington City Paper's take on my post.