Landscape architect Kathryn Gustafson of Gustafson Guthrie Nichol Ltd is to discuss her firm's projects, including the recent winning competition design for Washington Canal Park, Thursday, May 26 at 8 pm, at the National Building Museum. The lecture is worth 1.5 continuing-education units. Admission is $17, $10 for students; registration is required. Also at the NBM, there will be a black-tie gala presenting the 2005 honor award to Forest City Enterprises, developer of Capper/Carrollsburg and the Southeast Federal Center, at a black-tie gala on June 1 at 6:30 pm. Tickets are a steal at $500. Call 202-272-2448 or visit http://www.nbm.org for information.

A reminder that the next South Capitol Street Corridor and Baseball Master Plan public meeting will be held May 24, 2005 from 6:00 - 8:30 pm at the King-Greenleaf Recreational Center, 201 N Street SW. The DC Office of Planning has posted the presentation materials and flipchart notes from the April 23 workshop.

The cover story of DC's alt-weekly City Paper is "The Cost of Leaving", about the slow shutting down of the Capper/Carrollsburg public housing units, and how the former residents are being relocated. (UPDATED link for article)

I've finally posted updated photos on various pages (stupid real life impinging on my hobbies!). Check out my Department of Transportation, Capitol Hill Tower, and Washington Canal Park pages for the latest shots. And if you want to check out what Near Southeast looked like overhead in about 2001, you can always play with Google Satellite!

On May 16, a building permit request was filed with DCRA for 400 M Street, SE. This would appear to be for the planned major addition to the Carroll Apartments low-income seniors housing (scroll halfway down my Seniors Housing page for renderings and details). This is the second of the two seniors housing buildings slated to replace the huge Capper Seniors building at 7th and M; the other is in the early digging-the-hole stage, at 5th and Virginia. (All can be seen on my Seniors Housing page.) For those of you who don't maintain your own Requested Building Permit Toteboard, right now there are initial permits pending approval for 400 M, 20 M, and 1015 Half Street.

As a heads up, I'm not going to follow here on the site every twist and turn of the Nationals baseball stadium funding saga. The bickering over costs and land acquisition and whatnot leaves me totally cold. You can always keep an eye out for stories by David Nakamura at the Post (like today's piece) and Eric Fisher at the WashTimes, but here at JDLand I'll just be concentrating on news of the design and construction. (UPDATE: bumped up.)

The Near Southeast location of Five Guys is now open for business. This local hamburger joint is a great addition to the neighborhood, so drop in for a bite to eat soon, and tell 'em JD sent you :-). It's located on the 1st floor of 1100 New Jersey Avenue (New Jersey and M streets, SE), on the 2nd Street side of the building, facing the future Washington Canal Park. Operating hours are 11 am - 10 pm Mon-Fri and 11 am - 5 pm Sat-Sun. Here's the menu, and also the Contact/Directions page.

From a DC Office of Planning press release: The Anacostia Waterfront Corporation, the DC Office of Planning, and the DC Department of Transportation will be holding a community planning workshop for the South Capitol Street Corridor and the area around the planned baseball stadium on Saturday, April 23, 2005 from 8:00 am to 1:00 pm at Van Ness Elementary School Auditorium, located at 1150 5th Street, SE.  This workshop will build on previous planning efforts to gather additional community input for the South Capitol Street Master Plan with a special emphasis on how the planned new baseball stadium will be integrated into the South Capitol Street Corridor to achieve the best results for the surrounding community and the city as a whole. See the press release for the agenda and more information.

Today's Post Business section leads with "Stadium Land Rush, Developers Deal For Prime Properties Around Ballpark Site," detailing the attempts by big companies to grab land in Near Southeast. Not much in the way of new news (especially for loyal JDLand readers!) except for the tidbit about Monument Realty trying to purchase most of the land on the north side of N Street between Half and North Capitol (across from the stadium site) for an "office, retail, and residential development." It mentions the Florida Rock project as still being a "go", with plans to begin construction near the opening of the stadium in 2008. And of course it mentions DOT, the Southeast Federal Center, and the Donohoe acquisition on New Jersey Avenue. (The story also mentions a purchase by Doug Jemal of land on Buzzard's Point for an Inner Harbor-like development, which I haven't covered because it's in Southwest, and I have to draw the line somewhere!)

Today's Washington Times reports ("Firm Snaps Up Lots in SE") about the purchase of 16 lots along the 1100 block of New Jersey Avenue by the Donohoe Corporation, which confirmed the company has plans to develop the site but isn't prepared to announce any details. This would be the block that includes the New Jersey Avenue exit of the Navy Yard Metro station (across from the gleaming New "Federal Gateway" Building at New Jersey and M). I've heard tell that a hotel will be built there, but I don't know for sure. I don't believe that the properties include the church at New Jersey and L (the addresses are 1115-1131 New Jersey), but we'll have to see. UPDATE: new photos of the block on my New Jersey Avenue page....

As expected, the DC Sports and Entertainment Commission has chosen HOK Sport (along with Devrouax & Purnell Architects/Planners of DC) as the architects for the new Nationals baseball stadium. They promise a design that will "change the paradigm of ballparks" and will be "iconic and truly distinctive to Washington, D.C." There are no designs or drawings as yet. For more details, read articles in the Post ("Architects Promise Visionary Ballpark") and WashTimes ("Ballpark Will be 'Iconic'"). Also, on March 29, the DC CFO released a revised cost analysis for the entire stadium project, pegging it at $581 million (read Post story for more info).

The Voice of the Hill newspaper has a featurette on my Near Southeast web site in its April issue, "'Near Southeast' Revitalization, Archived and Digitized." You can see the entire issue as a PDF, but I hope they don't mind my snagging the single page for display here. I think the writer did a good job unearthing my point of view and motivations....

Today's DC Extra in the Post has a big story on the plans to revitalize South Capitol Street, "On the Brink of a Major League Makeover." No breaking news in it, except that "initial street improvements -- such as replacing the concrete Jersey barrier median with crosswalks at N, O and P streets, upgrading lights, and widening sidewalks -- will begin this spring or summer, using some of the $30 million in federal funds already allocated to the project." 

The National Capital Planning Commission's South Capitol Street Task Force is holding a public meeting on Wednesday, March 30 at 5:30 pm and 6:30 pm at 401 9th St. NW, Suite 500 to discuss its vision for transforming South Capitol Street. To attend, RSVP to 202-482-7296 or southcapitol@ncpc.gov .

Note the addition of an RSS feed to this site. It's a homebrew, so I hope it doesn't crash your newsreader, but now you can catch the latest Near Southeast news with the latest technology...

How to finance the new Nationals baseball stadium is the story of the day:

More posts: Nationals Park