Reno Park Update 091226: Just Activity

just localites

Just because I love making this page load slowly – and because I can’t help but post anything I crank out of my computer, this is a map of pure pedestrian activity, I’ve shown here.  It’s a rather aesthetic image, I think. Below the fold is the same image against all pedestrian spaces, to make it clear where people actually are.

Reno Park Update 091028: Driver’s Perception

driver-buildings

In the last two updates, I showed that the disconnect between physical and social boundaries complicates any analysis of the spatial architecture of the Tenleytown-Tobago area. Of course, it’s worth looking at the vehicular perception of space.  

Reno Park Update 091022: Property as Figure

pedestrian-fg-buildings3

In the last post, I showed this map of the neighborhood, which expressed the gradients of permeability the T-T area. But this might not perfectly show how different the city looks without property laws. Look after the break.

Reno Park Update 091021: Pedestrian’s Perception

I wrote in the last update that any analysis of the spatial relationships of a suburban-style city needs to consider the legal rules and social sentiments that coexist with physical boundaries. Of course the laws vary based on your “mode” of travel, with pedestrians getting a bit of leeway in terms of “travel.”

But let’s do pedestrians. How do they interact with space?

Reno Park Update 091017: Nolli Fails

davenport-street-murch

This is what the average street looks like in Tobago. 30 foot setback, grass, buildings.

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This is a part of the Nolli Plan. It’s a famous figure-ground drawing of Rome by a man of the same name that makes a visual comparison between structures and open space. There had been many drawings of Rome before, but Nolli’s particular drawing innovates on the others by showing the ground floor interior spaces or courtyards as part of the white space. It revealed columns and arcades, relating architecture to the urban form.

Reno Park Update 090804B: Transit Fade

Ok, so for the second set of transportation analysis, I’ve compared transit accessibility to lot areas. Even without buildings, it’s possible to get a sense of the transit-accessible public space here. Areas that are lighter have more transit options. Again, Tenleytown is a hub of activity, where the blocks around the circle and the Metro stop are major transfer points that get a lot of street traffic.

property-transit

So, Chevy Chase isn’t really the most transit-accessible place in the world. Even if I had used a 1/4 mile radius for buses, there would have been a dark spot there. Also, note that the commercial strip between Fessenden and Ellicott streets is in the 1/2 mile radius overlap between Tenleytown and Friendship Heights, which may contribute to its success, in spite of being somewhat isolated by the hill to the south. Read on for a breakdown of plans.

Reno Park Update 090804A: Transit Radii

I’m still working on the buildings and pedestrian maps, but I took a break to chart out the public transportation resources. I’ve included all public transportation resources, but not AU shuttles or the W45/47. Those aren’t accessible to 90% of potential park users, so I’m not interested. So, to start, here’s a route map. Clearly, it gets kind of insane around Tenleytown.

Note: These drawings are in an Adobe CMYK color space, so may look wacky on some computers.

routesmap

So that’s a good beginning. These are obvious facts. Under the fold is an analysis of the walksheds for each stop, station, and line.

Reno Park 090725: Property

As promised, a map of all of the property lots in the area of Reno/Tenleytown area. Fascinating ain’t it?

property

Even without squinting, you can see diagonal lines that don’t seem to match up with any roads or lots. I’m fairly certain these cuts line up with older borders and roads, putting a whole new volume of evidence of the past fossilized in the modern legal form of the city. The erasure and remainder of various structures as a history appears too. Why did some lines stick around? Perhaps one owner sold out before the other, and a divided lot just went up for sale as two later. More comparisons under the fold.

Reno Park update 090712: Roads

baseroadmap

After some hard importing/copying work and on-the ground observation, I’ve finally assembled this map of all legally marked streets and alleys in DC. Next up, sidewalks, then buildings and property, and finally land use. I’ll start doing mashup comparisons of these maps for the walkshed and green space requirements. Plus, I think I came up with an particularly useful modern variation on the Nolli Plan, which should make any archi-map geek excited. Comparisons to topography under the fold.

roadsmapheight

Generally, it’s interesting to see how the grid and the avenues flattened the topography. If I do a historical map, then the comparison would be fascinating, but historical topography is not relevant to my goals. Also note the amount of parking on the avenues, and how alleys nicely eliminate driveways in front of houses. Finally, Tenleytown is at the pass over the ridge line that begins at AU and ends near Chevy Chase. The hills and valleys in the area almost necessitated that the Georgetown-Frederick Pike go through this area at this spot.

DC’s Shovel-Ready Projects

This monday, Mayor Fenty signed and submitted the section 1511 certification to request funds for the first round of highway under the stimulus bill or the ARRA, as the hepcats in the GAO call it. Despite it being for “highway funding” the $57,650,000 will go to eight items that are actually quite urban. Almost every project includes some benefit for pedestrians or the city, and at least two are primarily for them: the Great Streets Initiative project on Pennsylvania Avenue and sidewalk enhancements across the city. Take a look at the projects in the map below, or follow after the break to see a list of projects as well as well as a few proposed ones that didn’t make it. 


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