U Street is Loud, Move to Brightwood

Breaking News: The U Street Corridor is loud!* We had no idea.

Any neighborhood that can spontaneously break out and have the largest party in the city after the Presidential Election in 2008 is bound to be a hot spot for bars and clubs. Oh wait…the corridor already had these bars and clubs before people decided to move in. And now they complain about the noise. Love it.

We here in Brightwood have that nice mix of a blessing and a curse. Wise and I moved here in October of 2008 from Columbia Heights and couldn’t have been happier with the cute brick houses and proximity to Rock Creek Park…and that was it. Besides Brightwood Bistro, Safeway, Subway, Pizza Hut and the Carry Out we have no real local clubs or bars.

What I’m trying to say is don’t move into the local “hot spot” and then complain about the noise, crowds and activity**. Don’t want to relocate to the suburbs? Move uptown. Brightwood to be exact, even Petworth is still relatively silent, oh wait they have some cool developments going on so never mind.

*Comments not so funny on DCist.

**Hilariously realistic comments on Washington Post Article.

Brightwood Day

V, Wise, and I strolled over to Brightwood Day. For anyone that didn’t see the three enormous banners on the intersection of Piney Branch and Georgia Avenue, Brightwood Day is a neighborhood festival that was held July 18, 2009.

As far as neighborhood festivals go, it definitely leaned on the family & church side. Everyone there was either over 45 years old or under 12. V wouldn’t let me go in the moon bounce, I was too lazy to stay for the tug-of-war (I developed a strong case of the ‘itis, more on that later), and given that I was wearing MAC makeup, I wasn’t going anywhere near the face painting. There was a large stage set up in the middle of Tuckerman Street where various performances took place. While we were there, a comedian did an act and a rather good neo-soul singer took the stage. The grassy area was lined with booths that featured everything from the Brightwood Community Association info, the Brightwood Heritage Trail, volunteer opportunities, over-priced jewelry, and anti-war literature. The anti-war literature looked kind of sketchy and given that I have a good government job that I would really rather keep, I gave that booth a wide berth. But V and I found out some really good activities and resources that we’ll experiment with and highlight over the next few posts.

Given that with the exception of Safeway, Brightwood Bistro, and the carryout, finding food in Brightwood is practically impossible (as far as we’ve discovered; if anyone out there has any suggestions, I would love love love to hear them), so I didn’t expect much in the way of festival food. There was a stand selling popcorn, water bottles, and cold drinks but there was a stand selling real food. The stand was from Haydee’s Restaurant and for $5, you got a Styrofoam container full of fried food. And I mean fried. There wasn’t a vegetable to be had, not even fried okra. I could feel my cholesterol rising with each chicken finger but it was pretty good. After wandering around a bit and shaving off years of our lives with the fried food, we were ready to call it quits. Especially since we kept getting vacation bible school flyers shoved in our faces. All in all it was a pretty good day.

Oh Me, Oh My!

LC and I (escorted by Wise) attended Brightwood Day and will have additional post rolling in here soon! It might take awhile considering all of the vendors we visited! I do have to say that Brightwood is just as diverse as I expected it to be and we have some hidden gems that will hopefully be unearthed in the up coming months! Stay Tuned!

Brightwood Day!

Brightwood Day is coming up on us fast! LC and I are going to be in attendance and we'll be sure to report on all the goodies we see!

BRIGHTWOOD DAY 2009--a fun-filled, family-friendly neighborhood celebration!

WHEN: SATURDAY, JULY 18TH

WHERE:
Outdoors at the "Neighborhood Pavilion" - corner of Piney Branch & Tuckerman NW, right off Georgia Ave.

I really hope they have smoked corn! :D

Imagine a separate Yellow Line By Dave Murphy

Naturally, the terrible crash on the Red Line has generated a great deal of press attention and discussion. Had this been a nasty pile-up on the Beltway, we would probably would have stopped talking about it by now, and it certainly never would have been international news. The fact that service disruptions continue on the Red Line is another reminder of this horrible accident. After all, these disruptions have a far greater impact on Metro than a bad traffic accident has on area highways.

If there is an accident on US-29 in Montgomery County, I can drive on Georgia or New Hampshire Avenues. But the stations that were shut down the past couple days isolated eastern Montgomery County from the rest of the Metro system. Originally, I tinkered with a map showing a separated Yellow Line for the sake of greater capacity and more geographic coverage for the Metro System. This week's accident has shown that adding redundancy to the system can be just as valuable as adding capacity.

Separating the Yellow and Green Lines would add capacity to existing track, much like separating the Blue and Orange Lines. In the case of the Yellow Line, it would allow for increased capacity on its Potomac River Bridge. If separated, the entire Green Line and the Yellow Line north of Pentagon would have the same capacity as the Red Line.

View Seperate Yellow Line in a larger map

This alignment is not 100% original either. Bringing Metro to North Capitol Street and Georgia Avenue is in no way a new idea. In these cases, however, people seem to want it for the geographic coverage, and not the additional capacity or system redundancy. Coverage is good, it brings transit to a new area. Capacity and redundancy, however, improve the entire system.

Perhaps I added a few too many stations, but they are just suggestions. While this would add service to the North Capitol Street and Georgia Avenue corridors, it would add redundancy to both the Green and Red Lines via Silver Spring, Georgia Av/Petworth, Union Station, and L'Enfant Plaza.

If this line existed already, the station closures on the Red Line might only have meant an additional transfer for Montgomery County commuters instead of the shuttle services to which Metro resorted after the crash.

Source

Architecture firm job captain scores in Brightwood

By Angie Barrett

Jennifer Lynn Paloski and Kenneth Raymond Stinson bought a three-bedroom, one-bath home at 730 Fern Place N.W. in Brightwood from Frank W. Rambo for $380,000 on June 5.

Rambo paid $295,000 for the property in May 2004. The 1,123-square-foot home was built in 1928.

Paloski is a job captain at Washington D.C.-based design firm David M. Schwarz Architects Inc.

She previously interned with Thomas Bode & Associates.

She has a B. Arch. degree from the University of Notre Dame.

There were 51 sales in Brightwood in 2008, with a median sales price of $406,500.

Filed under: Architecture
Address: Single Family730 Fern Place NW
Buyer(s): Jennifer Lynn Paloski and Kenneth Raymond Stinson
Seller(s): Frank W Rambo
Sale date: 2009-06-05

source

Yesterday Mayor Fenty joined Councilmember Muriel Bowser (Ward 4) and residents of the Brightwood neighborhood for a groundbreaking ceremony to mark the beginning of renovations of the abandoned housing project at 6425 14th Street, NW. The District partnered with Blue Skye Development to transform the vacant property into a new apartment building, eliminating a blight on the Brightwood neighborhood.

“The era of decaying conditions and neglectful ownership of this property has come to an end,” said Mayor Fenty “Today’s groundbreaking marks an important step toward welcoming more residents to this community through affordable housing and continuing our revitalization efforts up and down 14th Street.” Though this project has been referred to as the Brightwood Apartment Building, it is not the same project as this one. We were confused too!

Source