There was no way I could pass up the unbelievable weather on Saturday, so I wandered down to the stadium site to take a bunch of new pictures. Initial construction has gotten underway at 1st and O, and is now rounding the corner at 1st and P and heading west. This is just a one-story concrete structure at this point, and you can see from the other pillars driven into the ground that it's the horseshoe outline of the southern side of the park.

Eagle-eyed boots on the ground report seeing the appearance today of No Parking signs along M Street between New Jersey and 1st Street--in front of On Luck, Zohery Bus Tours, and the Metro entrance--marked as lasting from Aug. 12 to Aug. 30. Dovetailing with what I've heard elsewhere, this may well mean that demolition on that corner is about to start. (I would guess that it will happen the same time along the rest of that block of 1st Street, back to L Street.) This is to clear the way for the 100 M Street office building and the 1100 First Street residential tower, which will be built concurrently. Some folks have also mentioned the fence that has gone up today around the Sunoco station at 50 M--there's still been no word on the sale of that property, so I don't know if demolition is imminent there or not. UPDATE: I went and took a look myself, and there are also No Parking signs along the eastern side of 1st Street between L and M, marked as starting August 8 through December 8. Also, the Sunoco fences also have signs on them indicating that it is a Sunoco construction zone. Perhaps Sunoco is demolishing the station themselves--but to make way for what, we all want to know? Is it the rumored hotel? Will the hotel folks be buying the land, or is Sunoco keeping the land and handling the development themselves? We shall see....

The Anacostia Waterfront Corporation has posted a PDF of a presentation from Wednesday's board meeting, with bullet-point updates about their initiatives, including the Southwest Waterfront, Poplar Point, Hill East, and of course, the "South Capitol Street Waterfront". Nothing really new in it regarding the Ballpark District, though I was little surprised to see a map they had (page 29 of the PDF) of the area that they have some sort of weird layout of the southeastern corner of the stadium site, with a big plaza that easily crosses over to the riverfront, and even shows P Street running halfway through the stadium site. Unless there's been some huge reconfiguration of the stadium design that I haven't yet heard about, methinks they're being a tad blue sky and are trying a bit too hard to turn the stadium into a "waterfront" ballpark. They've also got a watercolor on page 27 that doesn't even depict the stadium in its correct layout. There's a map at the top of my Ballpark District page, released by the AWC in Dec. 2005, that is I believe a more realistic rendering of how the stadium interacts with the waterfront; and page 15 of the DCSEC renderings presented to the Zoning Commission shows the design of the southern side of the stadium (but don't get me started on that blue-grey "future development" monstrosity shown on that slide--I'm guessing the ZC wouldn't be interested in approving THAT). Hopefully the long-awaited (and very long overdue) Ballpark District Master Plan will be released before too much longer, where we can see concrete designs of what they're anticipating.

This is nothing more than PURE RUMOR at this point, I have no confirmation, but I'm floating it out there to see if anyone can back it up or shoot it down. A source informs me that one of the nightclubs on the block bounded by Half, 1st, K, and L that was purchased in 2005 by developer Ron Cohen, has been given until Sept. 12 to close. Hope to be able to tell you more soon. If you have any scuttlebutt (on this or any other Near Southeast news, for that matter), drop me a line. UPDATE: I haven't been able to get any further confirmation on the above, but I'll note that the Holiday/Aspen cab company, located on this same block (at the corner of 1st and K), has closed up shop within the past week.

A number of correspondents have written in to alert me to work being done on a multi-unit building at 10th and L (or is it 10th and Potomac?). The interior's been gutted, and they appear to be renovating the entire building. I have no information on this--the building hasn't sold recently, nor (ahem) is there any building permit filed with the city. So I know nothing, but I appreciate the alerts.

The hot-off-the-presses Aug. 10 Voice of the Hill (PDF) has a front-page report about the efforts to save the 106-year-old Anacostia Community Boathouse, under threat because of the pending changes to the 11th Street Bridges. The boathouse is one of the two red-brick buildings that are on the Anacostia River shore, right in between the two bridge spans (the second building, which is not in danger of being demolished, was recently the recipient of a $300,000 grant from DDOT to help its renovation). The 11th Street Bridges Environmental Impact Study, currently underway, has ID'ed four different build options for the bridges (to better link them to the Anacostia Freeway), and three of those options impact the boathouse. Public comment on the EIS is being accepted until Aug. 28. UPDATE: Oops, should have included this link to the Anacostia Community Boathouse Association "Save the Boathouse" page.

Donohoe Real Estate Services has posted a new and more detailed rendering of their planned 146,000 sq ft office building at 1111 New Jersey Avenue. It shows St. Matthew's Baptist Church at New Jersey and L still standing, and also shows the project not using the air rights above the entrance to the Navy Yard Metro station at New Jersey and M. I don't know whether this is their final design or not, but it was far enough advanced in comparison to the earlier one that I bit the bullet and created a new tab on my Square 743N page for this project, now joining the project pages for its neighbors-to-be at 100 M Street and 1100 First Street. The Donohoe web site says only "Delivery 2008" for a timeframe, so construction could start anywhere between late 2006 and mid-2007.

From an e-mail distribution: "SWNA and ANC6D cordially invite you to a CANDIDATES FORUM ARENA STAGE In the Kreeger Theater Monday, August 14, 2006 Starting at 7 pm. Candidates for Mayor and Ward 6 City Council will be asked questions dealing with Southwest. The questions will especially concern Waterside Mall, the upcoming AWC Waterfront Project, and the Baseball Stadium. Questions will be asked by a panel and the audience will be able to write their questions for the candidates."

More posts: ANC News, Nationals Park