Over the past week, a panel of real estate, marketing, and library experts have been interviewing dozens of local figures, pouring over market statistics, and touring the surrounding neighborhoods to figure out what to do with Washington's central library. The experts, coordinated by the Urban Land Institute at a cost of $125,000, evaluated three scenarios: The library remaining in Mies van der Rohe's landmark building as the sole tenant, another tenant coming in to share the space, and the city selling the building and moving somewhere else entirely.

This morning, they came back with their recommendation: Add two floors on top of the four that already exist, and lease it to somebody else, which would generate between $4.1 and $5.5 million annually in rent. The co-tenant would have their own entrance on the northeast corner. That, in turn, could help finance renovations on the rest of the building, estimated to cost between $200 and $250 million (which also drags down the potential return to the city should it choose to sell the building outright; the panel estimated it would only fetch between $58 million and $71 million in the current market).

Read the rest at Housing Complex.

The proposed Fort Totten Wal-Mart

Lydia DePillis takes note of the schmancy-looking surprise Walmarts opening up in the District:

From a local perspective, one of my biggest qualms about Walmart is what the mega-retailer could do neighborhoods: Can a big-box store integrate well with its surroundings, creating walkable places where other kinds of small businesses can thrive? The District's experience with other chain-centric developments, like Home Depot in Brentwood, has been rather terrible. And we're still building suburban-style strip malls on D.C.'s increasingly precious land, both with Walmarts and without them—the Shops at Dakota Crossing, the Point at Arboretum, the Georgia Avenue Walmart, and the Walmart at Capitol Gateway will all be one or two story single-use buildings, and most with large areas of surface parking.

But it's hard to have much of a problem with JBG's Walmart development on New Jersey Avenue, which has all the right elements as far as urban development is concerned: Decent architecture, apartments on the upper floors, smaller stores fronting the street. And fortunately, Walmart's fourth and fifth stores—both at 120,000 square feet—are more in that vein.

Read the rest at Housing Complex.

Lydia DePillis

All public spaces are not created equal, as we know. And Freedom Plaza, a vast expanse of concrete inlaid with representations of the White House and the Capitol Complex, is about as livable as a barren tundra. Tents have overflowed the small grassy patches, and are resting on hard concrete. Communal services, like food, medical supplies, and media, are clustered in a corner; the central walkway between them is narrow and divided by a staircase, which makes it difficult to navigate. The evening gathering, called General Assembly, can only occur in the middle of the plateau. Although this has changed recently, for much of the time they've been there, the facilitator spoke using a mic in front of a bunch of chairs arranged in rows—not the most democratic way to hold a meeting.

Most devastatingly, there's nothing of much value around the plaza. There's the fortified wall of the Reagan building, the usually dark National Theatre, a blank office building, and the monumental staircase of D.C.'s city hall—not the people these protesters are targeting. There's no reason for passersby to gothrough the plaza unless they're curious about something inside it. All in all, a lonely place to hold an occupation.

Not that Lydia is against occupying! She points to McPherson Square as being the best place for long-term camping. Read the rest at Housing Complex.

Photo by Lydia DePillis

Such antipathy makes no sense. Concentrating marijuana production (and even sales, although that's not what these applications are for) in Ward 5 would be a boon to the area, not a blight—they're employment centers, after all, that will pour capital back into the communities they inhabit. Cannabis greenhouses would celebrate and compliment the presence of the neighboring National Arboretum. They're heavily regulated enough that any leakage of product to people who shouldn't have it would get them shut down in a jiffy.

Furthermore, there's no evidence that marijuana operations increase crime—in fact, experience points the other way. The Denver police department foundthat pot dispensaries aren't robbed any more than banks or liquor stores. And last year, when Los Angeles abruptly closed 70 percent of the 638 dispensaries operating in the city, the RAND Corporation reported an increase in crime over the ten days following the crackdown. "Despite its plausibility, we know of no systemic evaluation of the claim that dispensaries themselves attract or cause crime," the authors wrote.

Sure, logically, the signs point to pot dispensaries being a good thing in neighborhoods. But decades of pot-is-a-gateway-drug training are hard to undo. And for longstanding black residents who saw drugs destroy communities, it's not a surprise that they're less willing to draw a distinction between pot and other drugs.

Besides, the pillars of Ward 5, like those in every other ward, often don't want anything new, be it a pizza joint or a pot disepensary. Like NIMBYs everywhere, they fear traffic, noise, new people walking around. And in the case of a dispensary, they have this extra armament to fight against the proposal by demonizing drugs.

While I agree with Lydia, I'm not surprised at all that people reflexively don't want weed, legally or illegally, being sold in their backyards.

Photo from flickr user erissiva under a Creative Commons attribution license.

The problem with neighborhood branding is that many neighborhoods are similar: They have trees. They have history. They are close-knit communities.

For that reason, the four design concepts the Office of Planning has offered for a Brookland brand could probably apply to any number of neighborhoods in D.C. (The "small town, big city" trope has in fact already been used by several).

Check out her post to see the other logo options the planning office is considering.

If bus shootings make you distraught
Consider a ludicrous thought:
This condo is far
But comes with a car
Stop renting! It's time that you bought

DCist is reporting that the Real World DC cast may be arriving right friggin now. Has anybody been this excited by the arrival of more d-bags into D.C.? DCist writes:

"A tipster just texted that the D.C. Real World cast appears to be arriving as we speak — she reports seeing a blonde girl with a suitcase walking through Dupont Circle, looking clueless and being trailed by a camera crew."

Of course, we've been doing our own serious blogging on the subject over at Housing Complex. The Anti-Real World DC blog has pictures (see above) capturing the apparent awkward move in.

"Hi. I'm Ethan. I will be playing the drunken frat boy in cargo shorts."

"Hi. I'm Zoe. I will be playing the drunken ditz who hooks up with you in the second episode."

There's more after the jump!

Anti Real World blogger writes of the mayhem/excitement:

"Walking by the house on my way to my birthday lunch and saw Generic Blonde Girl castmember walking to house. Straight male friend thought she had too much make-up on.

Sidenote, cameramen were literally shoving people out of the way..."

One Real World-themed twitter feed notes the following:

*"Remember: Know the law: Stay off RW property. Stay off Safeway property. Sidewalks are public – not even cops can have u move"

*"The Real World Cast is moving in. Fer REAL"

*"They're filming outside by the grill now."

*View really bad picture of possible cast outside Real World Home.

*photo by Anti-Real World DC. They have more pictures. You should check out their site if you give a shit.

Get the latest on the Real World in DC

Watch for architectural/vocab dispatches from Beaujon, "jump squad" efforts from Cherkis and Montgomery, doings at the landlord-tenant court from Housing Complex's regularly scheduled columnist Samuelson, Wemple doing whatever Wemple's doing, Scheinman on pricey condos, DeBonis on the new and improved (?) DCRA, Carman on crummy and otherwise restaurant designs, and I'll be on the critter beat with the animal shelters, as well as other random stuff, including a shaky real-estate angle from GoRemy, the infamous Arlington rapper. 

It's all real estate, all day. Got a tip? Got a crappy landlord? Got something to say about D.C. house porn? Hit the twitter (@housingcomplex) and the comments.

* Headline of Politico's VP debate preview makes me giggle. Plus: We watch for the crashes:

With all their potential for pitfalls and insta-classic moments, the pair has made the build up to the showdown, to take place here Thursday night at Washington University, feel more like a NASCAR race than a serious political forum: the audience may be tuning in as much in anticipation of cringe-inducing pile-ups as they are to watch the typical parry-and-thrust of debate.

* The Onion, on the other hand, makes me cringe.

* Financial bailout: U.S. Senate tries, tries again, this time with "higher tax breaks, FDIC limits," reports the Washington Post: "The Senate last night easily approved a massive plan to shore up the U.S. financial system, but the measure faces a tougher test tomorrow in the House, where leaders will try to reverse the stunning defeat the legislation suffered earlier this week."

* Some inside stuff: Atlanta Magazine's Steve Fennessy, a veteran of City Paper owner Creative Loafing, lends some valuable insight into the inner workings of CL and CEO Ben Eason, who Fennessy calls "a tireless networker with a love of jargon." The piece details a history of the Eason empire and its plans for the future. I'll say this: Despite the bankruptcy crunch, Creative Loafing employees and alums have been producing some great work about Creative Loafing lately.

* Catch up on Wonkette's gchat interview with "Washington's Only Wasillan." Spoiler: She's a sarcastic liberal! She's also boring enough to have to block during daytime hours to prevent that incessant gmail "ding" from disrupting your office banter. Pay $25 tonight to hang out with her at an Obama fundraiser at James Hoban’s, 1 Dupont Circle NW.

* And in this newspaper (still here!):

- Delaney, Greenwood, Janssen, and Wemple gang up on the Washington Nationals: Take my ticket, please!

- In Loose Lips: the Nats' finances are fucked, too.

- Tricia Olszewski on Bill Maher's Religulous and teenage love adventure Nick and Norah's Infinite Playlist.

- The debut of our new real estate column, Ruth Samuelson's Housing Complex.

Photo by Jeff Kubina