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COVER STORYOct. 20, 2006

Just how far has Mayor Williams traveled?

By Mike DeBonis

(Illustrations by Kyle T. Webster)

One day in late September 2005, Mayor Anthony A. Williams checked himself into George Washington University Hospital, feeling a little under the weather. He’d come back from a 10-day tour of Europe just days earlier, so he’d probably picked up a bug from one of those notorious airplane ventilation systems. The whole episode was pretty unremarkable, except for one small consequence: His hospital visit meant that he had to cancel a trip, this one to Michigan.

Not a whole lot of trips got canceled during the Williams administration. As Williams’ tenure winds to a close, there’s little debate that the mayor has taken D.C.’s interests to the ends of the earth. But what if he wanted to promote the District on an extraterrestrial basis, something along the lines of “one giant leap for statehood”? Could his cumulative travels have taken him to the moon?

This accounting covers only Williams’ second term (Jan. 2, 2003 to present). It doesn’t include personal travel (his yearly Thanksgiving trips to his in-laws’ in St. Louis, for example) or the dozens of domestic trips that haven’t been recorded in the local press. The Washington Post reported that in 2003 alone, he had taken 30 trips to 28 locales. We were able to account for only 14 of them.

Still, we’ve counted 59 trips constituting 295,770 miles of travel, ranging from a two-week, three-continent, 20,000-plus-mile expedition last summer to a quick trip down 95 to Newport News, Va., in March 2005. Strung together, that’s enough to take Williams to the lunar surface at its mean distance of 238,856 miles, with a solid 60,000-mile head start getting back.

295,770 Total Miles

(Moon Distance: 238,856 miles)

Puddle Jumps: 28,790 miles in 25 trips

Atlantic City, N.J.; Beckley, W.Va.; Cambridge, Mass.; Charlotte, N.C.; Chicago (twice); Cleveland; Detroit (three times); East Plains, Ga.; Houston; Indianapolis; Lubbock, Texas; Nashville, Tenn.; Newport News, Va.; New York (three times); Paducah, Ky.; Pittsburgh; Roswell, N.M.; San Antonio; St. Cloud, Minn.; St. Louis

Exotic Foreign Expeditions: 111,085 miles in 7 trips

Beijing and Shanghai, China; and Bangkok, Thailand (October 2004); Beijing (June 2005); Chongqing, China (October 2005); Accra, Cape Coast, and Kumasi, Ghana; Dakar, Senegal (May 2006); Seoul, South Korea (June 2006); London; Istanbul and Ankara, Turkey; Paris; and Johannesburg, South Africa (June 2006); Johannesburg, Cape Town, Durban, and Tshwane, South Africa (October 2006)

European Getaways: 87,809 miles in 11 trips

Brussels, Belgium, and Paris (November 2003); Barcelona, Spain (February 2004); Rome (May 2004); Thessaloniki, Greece; Frankfurt and Berlin, Germany; and Vienna, Austria (September 2005); Paris (three times); London (three times); Belfast, Northern Ireland (September 2006)

Glamorous Domestic Junkets: 68,086 miles in 16 trips

Colorado Springs, Colo.; Hilton Head, S.C.; Honolulu (twice); Las Vegas (three times); Long Beach, Calif.; Los Angeles; Miami, Fla.; Nome, Alaska; Orlando, Fla.; Salt Lake City, Utah; San Diego; San Juan, Puerto Rico; Saratoga Springs, N.Y.

Most Memorable Travel Moment

On his recent trip to South Africa, Mayor Williams was accompanied by his predecessor, civil rights activist Marion S. Barry Jr. The two were together on an excursion to Robben Island, the famous prison where Nelson Mandela was held captive for 27 years. Williams says the sight of Barry’s emotional reaction to the scene “is etched forever in my memory.” CP