The Sherman Avenue streetscape project is finally getting rolling this week, in what DDOT director Gabe Klein says will transform a "barren raceway prioritizing just cars" into a "beautiful, tree-lined residential street with wide sidewalks, shorter crosswalks and bike lanes in both directions." Good news, to be sure, especially considering that project was supposed to [...]

Here's the thing about Capital Bikeshare: The more stations there are, the more valuable the whole system becomes to its users, since they can access bikes in more places and get closer to where they need to go. The system is beautifully scalable; new stations can go wherever they're wanted. The problem, of course, is [...]

The Department of Real Estate Services tells me that Councilmember Marion Barry has dropped his disapproval resolution on the District Department of Transportation's move to 55 M Street SE, which momentarily put the whole thing in limbo. That means the move can go forward as planned, without having to wait through another 35-day review period until [...]

After two days of sharp back-and-forths, the blog finally seems to be quieting on the topic of plastic bag fees. Well, people: I hope you've saved some energy. The sniping about a five cent fee seems wholly misplaced when parking is now going up to $2 dollars an hour in premium parking areas—the "busiest commercial [...]

Last week, commenters lashed out when I blogged about an upcoming meeting regarding road/sidewalk construction on 17th Street NW. One questioned the need for the project saying "Roads seem fine. Trees are present. Sidewalks allow me to walk on them without any problem. What gives? Maybe use this money for parts of the city that [...]

Go check out your stimulus dollars at work people! Tonight, the District Department of Transportation (DDOT) will hold a meeting to discuss the upcoming 17th Street Construction Project, one of the many transportation projects financed by the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act.
Here's more on the project:
The $4.5M 17th Street Resurfacing Project is one of the [...]

Mayor Adrian Fenty by 15th Street's contra-flow bike lane yesterday—no police escort in sight!
Yesterday, I did a little reporting on D.C.'s brand new, contra-flow bike lane, which is protected by a lane for parked cars (look closely above.) It's a pilot project on 15th Street NW, and the District Department of Transportation plans to carefully [...]

If you haven't gotten a chance to see D.C.'s first contra-flow bike lane, well it should look a little something like this:

The lane has been installed on 15th Street between U St. and Massachusetts Ave. in Northwest. The southward bike lane is separated from traffic by an 8-foot parking lane.

Coming to a D.C. street near you: Washington's streetcars are on their way from the Czech Republic.
Everyone's jumping on the bandwagon now. D.C.'s getting streetcar lines, as are Arlington and Fairfax, and now a group of Alexandria residents is hoping the idea will catch on there too.
Last night, an Alexandrian group promoting smart growth launched a [...]

Streetcars! They're coming.
In fact, they're coming soon. Well, "soon" is a relative term—Maybe 2012, maybe earlier. But considering streetcars were barely a topic of conversation until the city was suddenly laying down rails in late August, we've been hearing an awful lot about them recently.
And in the past week, the city has been speedily holding [...]