As the General Services Administration conducted an online auction to sell off Georgetown's West Heating Plant, there were two parallel contests taking place: one among the developers seeking to buy the plant, and the other among the rest of us, seeking to figure out who the anonymous bidders were.
The first contest wrapped up when the [...]

Here's a sign of the times if there ever was one: Herb Miller, a 50-year Georgetown resident and the man responsible for developing much of the neighborhood, has packed up and moved to Logan Circle. His reason: "The city's moved east."
"There was a local grocery store and cleaners and hardware stores," says Miller of his [...]

That's pretty much the news out of Ward 3 Councilmember Mary Cheh's hearing this morning on the fate of the elusive D.C. streetcar. District Department of Transportation Director Terry Bellamy said that the controversy over the proposed car barn on the campus of Spingarn High School, and the related historic landmark nomination for the campus, [...]

Two months ago, Georgetown and the neighborhood that's been fighting its campus plan asked the Zoning Commission for a 60-day extension to hash things out. They haven't quite resolved their differences yet, but figure they'll be able to do so in just one more week.
A letter from Georgetown, Advisory Neighborhood Commission 2E, the Burleith Citizens [...]

Coffee culture, as understood in bean-crazed locales like Seattle and Portland, has yet to take root in the District. A Starbucks or Caribou can usually be found churning out syrupy concoctions, but the classic independent shop—where espresso is an art and the food comes second—is still very hard to come by.
There are lots of reasons [...]

The minds of Georgetowners. (Rendering by PGN Architects)

On the quaint, narrow corner of Grace Street and Cecil Place in Georgetown, there's a fenced-off gravel lot that seems out of character with the surrounding townhouses. It's owned by G.M. Steinbraker & Sons, a third-generation contracting firm that operates out of a workshop down the street, and [...]

This week, the Georgetown Business Improvement District crowed over the opening of 29 new national and independent businesses in the neighborhood in 2011. Maybe so! But how about those that closed? Georgetown Metropolitan has a more objective handle on the situation, and he found that the city's "shopping playground" actually lost 21 shops and restaurants [...]

For a time, 3331 N Street NW was D.C.'s third most expensive house, at a square $10 million. Until yesterday, that is, when after more than four months on the market it took a 20 percent price cut, down to $7.9 million. Only three million more than its 2012 assessed value! Just another illustration that [...]

Every couple of months, I go to some event where Georgetowners agonize about how nobody likes their neighborhood anymore—commercial corridors around the city are attracting the exciting new retail and restaurants, throwing them into an identity crisis. That was supposed to be resolved by a new branding campaign, but the fretting continues.
Last month, it was [...]

After overdosing on ward redistricting, I haven't been able to muster the interest to venture into the process of redrawing their constituent parts—Advisory Neighborhood Commissions and individual single member districts. It's been a hot topic in the newly expanded Ward 6, naturally, and to a certain extent elsewhere. ANC redistricting is the smallest-bore form of [...]