fort reno park – Page 3

North of Tilden: Rock & Roll, P&P, and Lord & Taylor’s

June 27, 2009June 29, 2009Local, Other, planningArchitecture, books, development, fort reno concerts, fort reno park, friendship heights, local boy does good, mazza galerie, music, national realty, politics+prose, sweater set, tobago dc, urbanismLeave a Comment

Three minor news items in the Upper Northwest:

sweater-set — The Sweater Set get ready.

1: The first two Fort Reno concerts were a smashing success, with at least 300 people showing up to listen, eat, and frolic on the grass around the stage. Monday night’s show was a fun mix of different styles. The Sweater Set delivered on their ultra-indie promise to give a twee multi-instrument set. Funk Ark played some solid 70s funk that made the sudden arrival of a Park Police car seem a little too like a cop movie, especially when teens started fleeing the concert with black plastic bags. Lastly Pash led the night out with a harder energy, although the lead singer’s vocals were drowned out in the mix, which took away a lot of the melody.

The second night began with noon:30, who added some soul-like vocals to cool and muddy indie rock. They’re having an EP release party on July 4th. Meow vs. Meow followed up with a harder sound with a lot of strong rhythm. Lastly, the Electricutions played the crowd out, just after the sun had totally left the horizon. There’s another show this Monday and another on Thursday, but more on that later.

friendship-home-plate — Plenty of potential connectivity.

2: National Realty & Development, the owners of Lord and Taylor’s, have announced plans and received approval to build a one-story commercial building on the “home plate” parking lot behind Mazza Gallerie. The Northwest Current’s reporting mentions that the original lease between L&T’s and Mazza called for the parking lot to be used as a car park in perpetuity. Now, the unanimous and quick vote of the council is to turn it into a walkable shopping district, competing with the deluxe stores along Wisconsin Avenue. Could still have some height on top of that, but apparently the 50-year lease ends in 15 years, so development won’t have enough of a payoff for them. Completion of the five stores is expected for early 2011.

3: Politics and Prose, the cultural institution at the border of Tobago and Chevy Chase, announced its schedule for July/August. You can look at the schedule, but here are the authors presenting books on urban issues:

Wednesday, July 8th, 7PM: Alyssa Katz will discuss her book on the foreclosure and mortgage crisis, Our Lot.
Friday July 10th, 7PM: Reloville, by Peter Kilborn, examines large subsets of suburban residents whose livelihoods depend on not forming close ties to the local community and frequently moving on to a new job.
August 11th, 7PM: Jane Jacob’s struggle with Robert Moses, and the issues it was born of, are retold in Anthony Flint’s Wrestling with Moses.

Maybe I’ll see you there. It’s not too accessible, but you can take the L1,2,4 or the M4 from Van Ness and Tenleytown Metro stations, respectively.

Fort Reno concerts announced

June 18, 2009Localfort reno, fort reno concerts, fort reno park, local boy does good, music, tenleytownLeave a Comment

The entity that organizes the annual Fort Reno Concert series has finally gone online, and not a moment too soon. The first show is next week, on Monday, June 22nd, showcasing some strong talent from the DC area. First up is Pash, an indie rock band that sounds superficially like Metric, having a good band and a great female vocalist. Second is Funk Ark, a funk group that seems to mass-customize grooves for a post-partisan era. Lastly, but not leastly, the Sweater Set, about whom the only thing to say is: kazoo harmony.

The concerts are an annual event going back at least until the 1950s that let some up-and-coming local bands get some wide exposure. I’ve talked to some old timers who remember sitting out on the grass and listening to blues and folk music after ending their days at Deal and Wilson. It was a good time then, and it’s still a good time. Check it out.

The show starts at 7:15.

Fort Reno project 090424: Topography

April 24, 2009December 31, 2013Reno Park Studieschevy chase, cleveland park, design, details, fort reno, fort reno park, friendship heights, research, tenleytown, tobago dc, topography, van ness, WashingtonLeave a Comment

So I want to study the park with as much detail as possible. I’ve been spending a lot of time there just observing, which is always the cornerstone of good design, but I’ve also been trying to understand the area objectively. Logically, the place to start is with the ground, so here is a topographic map I’ve put together.

s-topomap — Topographic maps represent altitude using lines called contours. The closer contours are to each other, the steeper the slope, the further, the flatter. The contours start here at 62m and end at 130m.

After the fold, there are other, cooler maps that show height using shading.

Continue reading ➞ Fort Reno project 090424: Topography

Streets through time and place

March 8, 2009December 11, 2013planning, Reno Park Project, Theory, WritingArchitecture, context, fort reno park, hierarchy, history, northwest, planning, preservation, streets, tenleytown, Theory, time, tobago dc, urbanism3 Comments

murdocksign I noticed yesterday that DC has re-signed Murdock Mill Road, down off River Road in Tenleytown. It’s a nice little reminder of history – and of natural geography – among the rationalist streets of the city plan laid down in 1897. While those straight, predictable lines make navigating the city easy, they did erase the context and history of what was Washington County. By its perseverance, this little snippet of prior use reminds residents of the pre-urban past, adding quiet character to the neighborhood.

The road itself is no larger than an alley – its form preexists both the automobile age and the dreams of a residential garden city, so there are neither sidewalks nor setbacks. It is discontinuous, with one part behind the old Sears Building and the other appearing a few blocks to the west before becoming Butterworth Street. It’s also completely secondary: Where the narrow eastern section intersects with 42nd Street, the heavy grading on the latter route necessitates a concrete retaining wall and a stairway down from Murdock Mill Road, ten feet above. It is very dislocated; left inexplicably during the changes of urbanization, along with the Methodist Cemetery, its only active address.

The road once headed down in the direction of Massachusetts Avenue, following a creek of the same name. Before the imposition of the 1897 Permanent Highway Plan, Murdock Mill Creek began at the west of Tenleytown, and cut through a subdivision of small farms registered as part of Friendship, and finally into what is now the Dalecarlia reservoir. Now, the stream is undergrounded, emerging only from underneath 52nd Place in northern Spring Valley. Other streams have been buried; still more roads have disappeared when developers carved up the farms they existed to serve. Murdock Mill Road is only one of these many streets, some of which are still used.

Continue reading ➞ Streets through time and place

Introducing The Fort Reno Project

March 5, 2009March 7, 2009Reno Park ProjectArchitecture, development, experiments, fort drive, fort reno, fort reno park, meta, northwest, planning, tenleytown, tobago dc, urbanism, Washington1 Comment

This blog exists partially as an outlet for a particular project I have long been thinking about, teased by its difficulty. Fort Reno Park, in Tenleytown, occupies one of the most historically complex sites in the District of Columbia, yet it is also one of the least understood and developed sites. It once was a farmland, a civil war fort, then a black neighborhood, and finally turned into undifferentiated parkland after an abortive attempt to create an extensive system of parks and civic buildings in DC. In the process, most of its history has been swept away, damaging the permeability of the neighborhood and acting as more of a dead zone than an asset. I am doing this primarily as a personal project, something to use for my portfolio.

I want to explore the way that social media, blogs in particular, can be used by architects to solicit information and, in turn, illuminate process for laypersons. Rather than asking questions wildly, I will present my plans, my theory, and my designs for the site and hope to get constructive criticism through the comments. I expect that the gradual revelation of plans will help locals easily digest the ideas, expose them to healthy strategies of urban design, and ultimately make them feel involved from the start. They may not be going anywhere, but the lack of productive local involvement or even transparency has resulted in sour relations with an often parochial and misinformed locale.

I hope that this develops buzz and becomes a catalyst for neighborhood identity, the explorations of place and history informing the kernel of a new spirit of Tenleytown-Tobago-AU Park. Additionally, I want to show residents the power of architecture and the value of good urban design by giving examples in the real world and relating them to local situations. Most audaciously, I want to energize the area’s community groups to act more productively, giving and getting more from those around them. Changing the values of a population is the surest way to changing lifestyles, something critical to creating a meaningful, sustainable city.

The thought of redesigning the park is nothing new. Tenleytown neighbors have been trying for years, DC Parks has made a little change, and the NPS’s CityParks project aims to make the DC parks better. Nonetheless, I will bring a decidedly different perspective to the concepts of historical preservation, park use, context, place, park design, interpretation, social capital, and management than any of these projects have before. I appreciate any thoughts on the matter. I want to know what people want to see examined or designed, so feel free to request things. I really am open to all reasonable suggestions other than “leave it alone.”

The first post, about the history of geography will be coming tonight, but in general I will post my ideas slowly – I have a job – and this will take a considerable amount of time and dedication, lasting well into the summer. If you are interested and wish to get updates most easily, rather than checking back and getting frustrated, you may want to subscribe to my RSS feed.