Fairly or not, historic preservation often gets pitted against other priorities: Energy efficiency, for example, and economic development. Lately, though, it's the ability to put out fires.

The problem is, federal environmental regulations passed in 2010 require certain bells and whistles—no, not literally—on the sides of fire engines, which makes them just barely able to fit through the doors of some of the District's antique firehouses. On several historically protected buildings, the Historic Preservation Review Board has allowed the doors to be widened, reasoning that the buildings wouldn't be unduly harmed.

But the board couldn't quite stomach the change for two firehouses: One at 4811 MacArthur Drive in the Palisades, and another in Cleveland Park. As the technophobic Northwest Current reports this week, those were both deemed so historically significant that making the doors taller and wider would be incompatible with the preservation of a landmark.

That puts the Fire Department in a pickle, since they now have to appeal their cases to the Mayor's Agent, who could take anywhere from a few months to a year to decide. Meanwhile, the Cleveland Park firehouse is closed, which means the Palisades one has to cover a huge area. That's making lots of neighborhood residents nervous—what if a few minutes is the difference between a the fire being doused and a gas tank exploding?

Not to be melodramatic, or anything. But it's a consideration.

Ultimately, I suspect the Fire Department will get what it wants. The Historic Preservation Office hinted as much in its staff report on the Palisades building, noting that while the board must make its determinations based on preservation law and precedent, the Mayor's Agent is empowered to consider factors like economic hardship and public safety, and so could easily pardon the widening of a door.

All of that amounts simply to more delay, enough to make you wonder: Should the Fire Department just simply have sold the buildings for redevelopment as retail space or condos, saved themselves the expense of a historically-sensitive retrofit, and built new state-of-the-art firehouses somewhere else? That would probably turn out to be more expensive in the end, given the cost of property in those neighborhoods.

Which means running the historic preservation gauntlet is simply the cost of doing business.

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UPDATE, Friday, 10:08 a.m. - It's worth noting the Board's full summary decision, which encourages compromise:

The HPRB passed a motion to advise the Mayor's Agent that the expansion of the vehicle-door openings, as proposed, is incompatible with the character of the landmark property and is thus inconsistent with the purposes of the preservation law, but strongly encourages the applicant to explore the alternatives discussed in the staff report so as to make available to the Mayor's Agent alternatives that may necessitate less alteration and be more compatible. Approved 7-0.

This Cafritz fire story isn't going away. I wrote about it right before I left, skipped town for a week, and now there's more recent news (plus this video from NBC's site, with some intense footage).

On Saturday, the Washington Post wrote about a preliminary report detailing some of the problems facing the fire department during the blaze, which took one of Washington's most renowned private art collections.

Besides the low water pressure, the property's elevation also slowed the water's flow. Mineral build-up in the pipes cut the supply as well, according to the Post's story.

Firemen also had trouble gathering water from other mains because Chain Bridge Road, where Cafritz's home is located, is "one of the longest stretches of roadway in the District that is uninterrupted by cross streets," according to the report.

Susan Rice, a Kentian?

In the grand hierarchy of elite D.C. neighborhoods, The Palisades is certainly among the top tier. It's close to downtown, but quiet and green. Its property values frequently climb beyond the $1 million mark. If you're looking for a decent club scene, this area will disappoint—but apparently, there's a "kickass wine shop" nearby for nightlife emergencies.

Yes, it doesn't get much better than The Palisades, unless of course you know about nearby Kent since the two areas often get lumped in together under The Palisades moniker. Kent appears to be the area's pricier, and thus more esteemed, neighborhood. The question is: how many people know the distinction?

Last week, I wrote a short post about Kent. I'd never heard about it until unexpectedly coming across the name in Washingtonian magazine. Soon, I determined I was not the only one in the dark. Several of my go-to neighborhood experts here at the Washington City Paper were also unfamiliar with Kent.

I put out a call for information. One individual sent me a personal message saying that the DC  Real Property Assessment Database includes Kent. The database lists 964 properties, and a number of V.I.P.s. These include Vanity Fair National Editor Todd Purdum, who is married to Dee Dee Myers, also a Vanity Fair contributor and former press secretary for Bill Clinton. Just scrolling through the Kent database, I noticed one more familiar name: Newly appointed United Nations Ambassador Susan Rice, listed as living on Millwood Lane.

"Kent has upper bracket homes," says (hilariously coincidentally named) Kent Madsen of Long & Foster Foxhall. "A lot of houses in Kent are your center hall colonials—where Palisades could be anything: bungalows, townhouses, newer bigger homes that people have built."

Madsen says Kent lies roughly between Loughboro Road, MacArthur Boulevard, and Arizona Avenue. One commenter on my earlier blog post agreed with me that "Kent" wasn't an oft-used designation: "Since most people outside the neighborhood refer to the general area as Palisades, it’s safe to say that most people, especially those moving in now, probably don’t know it’s called Kent."

Madsen disagreed: "Do a lot of people know about it? I mean, I think they do," he said.

Photo by New America Foundation licensed under Flickr Creative Commons.