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Friday Reminder: Council Hearing on Ballpark Traffic
A reminder that on Friday (Jan. 11) at 10 am there's a public oversight roundtable by the city council's Committee on Economic Development on parking and traffic plans for the stadium. Note that this is not the official hearing on the legislation introduced this week by Tommy Wells to regulate on-street parking in areas around the stadium and Capitol Hill, though I would imagine it should get touched on. But there's plenty of other issues to talk about as well--parking lots, traffic and pedestrian flow, Metro, and so many other items that fans and neighbors are waiting to hear about. It's going to be broadcast live on DC Cable 13 (and on the web simulcast), but I'm expecting this hearing to be so lively and informative that I'm actually going to shut down the laptop, take off my fuzzy slippers, and attend in person. (For less brave souls, the hearing should be available via both replays and on-demand viewing within a few days.) Watch for my summary of it all later Friday afternoon.
UPDATE: I have indeed survived the hearing, but will need some time to pull together a summary. In the meantime, the one headline worth passing along immediately is that Nationals season ticket holders should expect to get their parking information in the mail next week. A package showing lot locations and prices is at the printer as we speak, and recipients will choose their preferred location and cost and return it to the Nationals; they'll then receive their parking pass and exact parking location after that.
More to come.
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More posts: parking, Nationals Park
 

Another Day, Another Parking Lot (And Other Tidbits)
In the past few days I've mentioned the start of construction on the first of the temporary surface parking lots at Capper and the transformation of an existing lot at 1100 South Capitol into a monthly lot managed by Colonial Parking. Today I see that the dirt is being dug up at 1000 South Capitol, which had a public space permit approved a few weeks ago for the construction of a parking lot. This property is owned by Lerner Enterprises (yes, the same Lerners that own the Nationals) and they have eventual plans for an office building on the site, but it shouldn't be a surprise that they would give this land over at least temporarily to the Ballpark Parking Cause.
Additional dispatches from today's drive-around:
* Equipment has arrived on site at 1345 South Capitol, presumably for the start of excavation for this 276-unit residential project across the street from the ballpark.
* The DC Foreign Car Shop at 31 K Street and the buildings along First Street and N north of the ballpark are still standing;
* A very affable-looking "Hospitality Ambassador" from the Capitol Riverfront BID was answering questions with a smile at the Navy Yard Metro entrance;
* The amount of construction and roadwork from New Jersey Avenue west to South Capitol really is unbelievable. (I rarely drive through the neighborhood during the day on weekdays, so most of you long-suffering residents and commuters are already well aware of this.) But seeing it in full swing just reinforces my New Year's resolution to restrict my photo treks to Sundays, when the commotion is taking its Day of Rest.
UPDATE: One more tidbit: a permit has been approved to remove the underground storage tanks at the BP Amoco at South Capitol and N. I had thought that maybe it was only temporarily closed because of the construction on N Street, but this probably means it's gone for good. As for what might appear in its place--the land is part of Monument Realty's vast holdings north of the ballpark, but no development plans for the site have been announced. In the meantime, I bet it would be a handy spot for a parking lot!
 

This Month in the Hill Rag
January's Hill Rag is now online, with a number of articles on Near Southeast-related issues (most of which I've covered here in recent weeks). There's a big piece on Tommy Wells' Performance Parking Pilot Plan, though it was written before yesterday's official introduction of the legislation. Their Loose Lips-type anonymous columnist "The Nose" also talks about the parking plan, dubbing Tommy Wells "The Pimp of Parking." (Lovely.) There's also a piece spelling out the Capitol Hill Restoration Society's objections to DDOT's plans to renovate the 11th Street Bridges. And there's a wrapup of the December ANC 6D meeting, where representatives of the Nationals pledged much cooperation with the neighborhood and the ANC voted to support the ballpark's liquor license (I wrote about this meeting here).
 

Wells Introduces Performance Parking Pilot Zone Act
As expected, Tommy Wells just introduced to the city council the "Performance Parking Pilot Zone Act of 2008", which would create a three-year pilot project to "better manage curbside parking, especially around the stadium and the impacted area." Wells said the goals of the bill are to protect residential parking in neighborhoods and to support local business, and commented that "it is clear that a couple thousand well-managed curbside spaces are better than two-to-three times as many unmanaged spaces." Council chair Vincent Gray co-introduced the bill, and council members Catania, Brown, Barry, and Bowser signed on as co-sponsors. I should have a link to the text of the bill itself later today, but if you can't wait, read my entry from a few weeks ago describing the plans, since I'm too lazy this morning to re-summarize.
UPDATE: Here is Tommy Wells's press release, which is a handy overview of the new legislation, and the bill itself. Some bullet points:
* The areas to be covered by the pilot include all areas south of the Southeast-Southwest Freeway from 10th Street SE to 12th Street SW and from the freeway north to East Capitol Street between Washington Avenue, SW and 11th Street, SE.
* Fines would start at $50 for parking overtime and would just upward if needed "to dissuade ballpark patrons from parking illegally in neighborhoods";
* Sixty percent of the meter revenues would be used to repay the cost of the new multi-space meters (pictured at left) and related signage, 20 percent would be deposited in the city's Transportation Unified Fund, and the rest would be used for "non-auto transportation improvements" within the zone, such as streetscape upgrades for pedestrians, biking infrastructure improvements, and better bus and rail signage.
* A "pay-by-cell phone" zone could be created to allow for electronic payments for parking. (Cool!)
Specifics still to be spelled out:
* Designations of streets as residential, retail, or ballpark-adjacent, which will govern which type of parking restrictions a street has;
* Rates for the meters;
* Days and hours of meter operations;
* Parking time limits and Residential Permit Parking restriction hours;
* A guest-pass system to allow residents to better handle visitors.
Two community meetings have been scheduled, on Jan. 22 at 401 I Street, SW, and Jan. 23 at 301 North Carolina Ave., SE. Both are from 6:30 to 8 pm. There will also be a hearing at some point by the council's Committee on Public Works and the Environment, chaired by Jim Graham. And it will also no doubt come up for discussion at this Friday's council Committee on Economic Development oversight roundtable on "Parking and Traffic Plan for the Nationals' Stadium" (Jan. 11 at 10 am).
Here's a Tommy quote from the press release: "Some of the best thinking in the country has gone into this proposal. Parking is already at a premium in our neighborhoods, but giving free curbside parking to ballpark visitors isn't managing the problem, it's only inviting more congestion and traffic."
I imagine this is just the beginning of a flood of information on the plan. Stay tuned.
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More posts: parking, Nationals Park
 

A Day Without Parking News Is a Day Without....
Sometime within the past few weeks, the surface parking lot at 1100 South Capitol Street has come under the management of Colonial Parking. The spiffy new sign (and the Colonial web site) indicate that it is open for monthly parking only, at a rate of $80 a month. It's on the site where Ruben Companies plans eventually to build its SC1100 office project, but no start date has been announced for that.
As for whether it could possibly be one of the lots that the Nationals are planning to use for season ticket holder parking, I have no information on that, but it's certainly interesting that this lot has suddenly gotten big-time management....
And, in case you didn't see it mentioned in my photo update yesterday, work has begun on the Capper parking lots along Third Street. Some PVC pipes are piled up on the two blocks, and some trench digging is underway at Third and I.
 

New Page: Nationals Park FAQ
I was trying to take a few days off, but an idea popped into my head during an attempted nap that I just couldn't ignore. So say hello to a new page: my Nationals Park Frequently Asked Questions and Rumor Destruction Page (call it the Ballpark FAQ for short). I tried to pull together the questions that I hear and see the most often, from basics about the park's location to all the questions about Metro, parking, and entertainment options around the site. I'm going to keep it updated as events warrant--I know there's going to be a flood of information from the team and the city about how to get to the ballpark as Opening Day gets closer, which will allow many of the FAQ's "specifics haven't been announced" answers to be fleshed out with actual details. It also doesn't address much of the in-the-weeds detail of baseball at the ballpark--I'll leave that to Nationals fan sites.
This FAQ is now the default ballpark page, and replaces the old Stadium Renderings gallery, which has now been moved to a new page (after all, renderings are less important when the dang thing is just about three months away from opening!). So if your bookmarks have changed, apologies. The exterior and interior stadium photo galleries are still in their proper places.
(As for why on earth I didn't do a page like this a loooooong time ago, I plead insanity. Yeesh.)
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More posts: Metro/WMATA, parking, staddis, Nationals Park
 

Ballpark and Beyond, and Stadium-Related Tidbits
This week's Ballpark and Beyond column in the Post is my summary of ANC 6D's deliberations on the ballpark liquor license. It also references a meeting held last night between community leaders and city and team representatives (though my deadline was before the meeting, so the column couldn't actually include anything *from* the meeting).
The meeting included updates on the road improvements in the area and the Navy Yard Metro station upgrades, both of which are still on track to be basically done by opening day (the Metro station might "still need another coat of paint", it was said, but will be "serviceable").
The Nationals are still working out their parking plans, not only in terms of the lots near the ballpark but also the satellite parking at RFK, and all the additional planning that goes with it (traffic flow, signage, shuttle buses, drop off/pick up locations, etc.). It appears as of now that there might not be season-ticket-holder lots in Southwest at all, not even at Buzzards Point. There was also mention that stadium-goers will not be funneled through the South Capitol Street exit of the freeway--the team is going to try very hard to move fans through all the other close-by freeway exits, but not South Capitol Street.
Circulator buses will not be part of the transit plans for the first season. But they're planning plenty of bike racks around the ballpark perimeter, and are also still working on a bicycle "valet" parking service.
Also, there's tentative plans for two stadium job fairs, possibly on Feb. 2 and Feb. 26 (details still being worked out).
And, everybody knows that the first few games will be "a challenge."
The general tone of the meeting was more cooperative and collegial than some of these meetings have been in the past (maybe because Tommy Wells was there for the first part and everyone wanted to be on their best behavior). There's plans for more meetings and workshops between these "stakeholders" (I really hate that word) to try to hammer out the best plans for traffic, pedestrian flow, and "curbside management" (aka on-street parking) before it's all then unveiled to the community at public meetings. There was also agreement that the group should get together after the first homestand in April to talk about what works/what doesn't.
UPDATE: Speaking of public meetings, here is the official announcement about the Jan. 11 city council Committee on Economic Development oversight hearing on "Parking and Traffic Plan for the Nationals' Stadium." It contains information on how to testify at the hearing, if you're so inclined.
 

First Parking Lots About to Start, RFP Issued for Management
While the plan that Tommy Wells announced last week to address on-street parking around the ballpark and on Capitol Hill is just beginning its trek through the legislative process, the first of the new parking lots that the city and the Nationals will want stadium-goers to use will get underway soon. Building permits have been approved in the last few weeks for temporary surface lots in the Capper footprint at Second and K, Second and L, and Sixth and M, and work on the first two should be starting this month. (The third lot will get started in January, after the wreckage from the almost-completed demolition of the old Capper Seniors building is cleared away.)
At the same time, a Request for Proposals has been issued by DC Housing Enterprises for the management of these lots, offering a one-year contract with up to four one-year renewal options. The RFP, while chock full of selection criteria, required certifications and other specifications, also gives a few details about the planned operations of the lots themselves, which together will have about 670 spaces (or more, if valet parking is used). They will be offering monthly prepaid public parking on weekdays from 6 am to 7 pm, at a rate of not less than $150 per month; some daily parking may be allowed as well.
But users of the lots will have to vacate prior to any Nationals game, since the lots are "expected to be subject to an exclusive arrangement" with the team that gives all spaces over to ballgame parking from two hours before the game until three hours after. And a nice arrangement it is--the DC Housing Authority will apparently receive $10 per parking space per game, whether all spaces are used or not.
The zoning rule passed earlier this year that allowed the creation of temporary ballpark-area lots such as these says that they may also be used for a "seasonal or occasional market for produce, arts or crafts with non-permanent structures," though no plans for anything like that have been announced. The rule also states that the lots can only last until April 2013, since it is believed development around the ballpark will bring plenty of underground parking that will negate the need for these surface lots. The three Capper lots will eventually be replaced with a mix of apartment buildings, townhouses, and office buildings, though start dates for those projects have not been announced.
One block south of Capper, at the Yards, another batch of temporary surface lots are planned, which would have about 700 spaces. Beyond these and the garages with 1,225 spaces on the ballpark site itself, no other stadium parking locations have been publicly identified, though the Nationals have said they have found enough parking spaces for all season ticket holders--they just haven't said where they all are yet. And the city and the team continue to say that Metro will be the best way to get to the ballpark.
You can check out my stadium parking map to see where these new lots are--it also shows the other locations where zoning allows temporary lots, plus existing lots and underground garages where parking could be made available.
 

City Working on New On-Street Parking Plans Around the Ballpark, in Southwest, and on Capitol Hill
There has been much discussion by residents and city officials over the impending "apocalypse" of traffic and parking congestion with the opening in April of the new ballpark. Residents not only in Near Southeast (all 400 of you) but in Southwest and on Capitol Hill have been waiting for the city to announce exactly how on-street parking will be handled during games, as there is great concern as to whether residents will still be able to park on their streets and won't have to deal with hundreds or thousands of cars circling the neighborhoods looking for free parking.
It's been thought that the model used at RFK--special parking permit stickers for residents to put on their cars--would be ported over to the new ballpark area, but over the past few months council member Tommy Wells and his staff, along with DDOT, have been working on a pilot plan they hope could address not only the parking issues at the ballpark but also the parking problems seen on Capitol Hill along Pennsylvania Avenue, Barracks Row (Eighth Street), and the streets around Eastern Market. They are looking for ways to balance the needs of residents with the impact on businesses if parking is hard to come by, and are looking at a concept called "Performance Parking." Here's my five-cent summary:
"Retail" streets would have the hours of metered parking extended to seven days a week until late in the evening, and with the prices to park at the meters raised to a level that would discourage some people from arriving by car, opening up more spaces and reducing double-parking and congestion. The adjacent residential streets, now covered by Zone 6 parking rules that ostensibly only allow two hours of visitor parking during weekdays (but are dependent on the parking enforcement folks tracking the cars to know how long they've been there) would see the installation of meter kioskson one side of the street, where nonresidents could park for no more than two hours even until late in the evening and on weekends. (Residents could park on both sides of the street as long as they want.)
These rules would extend with slight tweaks to the streets around the ballpark: "Retail" streets in these areas would allow longer stretches of parking (four-plus hours), but would have rates for metered parking comparable to the amount charged in pay lots, to discourage ballpark-goers from believing that on-street parking would be any cheaper than what's available in existing lots and garages. And with the residential streets having meters that wouldn't allow parking for longer than two hours, most people going to three-hour-plus baseball games would avoid parking on those blocks.
In other words, these restrictions would tell visitors--park in a lot, or take Metro, or walk, or ride your bike, but don't expect to drive down and find a space for free on a street somewhere.
One other facet of this plan would be to use the revenue from these much higher on-street parking rates to pay the cost of the new kiosk-type meters (that cost about $7,800 a pop), the cost of the extra enforcement needed to make the plan work, and also improvements to the streets and the communities to make alternative modes of transportation more enticing (fixing sidewalks, adding bike racks, making bus shelters better, etc.).
This plan has been previewed for local businesses and the ANCs (today it was the media's turn), and it's hoped that a bill creating this special pilot project can start its path through the city council process in early January. Alas, this would not be enough lead time to get it all in place before Opening Day, so there will probably be some tumult during the early part of the season as the city tries to keep stadium visitors from taking over the residential neighborhoods.
You'll no doubt be reading much more about this idea over the coming months, and there will be public meetings and refinements and many words written about it all, I'm sure. And of course one other piece of the puzzle--the locations of the various lots where the Nationals will be directing season-ticket holders to park--has yet to be made public. Eventually Wells's office will release maps (perhaps soon) showing the streets that could be designated as retail or residential, along with other documents providing far more detail than what I've previewed here.
In the meantime, I'm going to do something I've never done in the nearly five years that I've been running this Near Southeast site--I'm going to open up the floor to comments about this idea, that then hopefully can be read by city officials and other residents to see what people's impressions are of the plans. But be forewarned, if this little low-tech experiment goes off the rails and people start getting out of control, I'll close it down and won't be inclined to give it another shot. So behave. Of course, you'll be commenting on something you probably need to learn much more about to truly be informed, but when does that ever stop anyone on the internet?
UPDATE: Here's a story from the Post on Wells's parking plan. " 'The ballpark visitors are going to be very tempted to look for cheap parking' on city streets, said Neha Bhatt, a planner in Wells's office. 'We've got to get that out of people's head that free parking exists here.' " The story also reminds me to mention that plans are to make Buzzards Point off-limits to on-street parking during ballgames (though it's likely some cash lots will be built there).
Also, there's going to be an Committee on Economic Development oversight roundtable on "Parking and Traffic Plan for the Nationals' Stadium" on Jan. 11 at 10 am. (It was originally scheduled for this Monday, the 17th, but they felt like there hadn't been enough public notice. I'll say--I hadn't even heard about it!)
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More posts: parking, staddis, Nationals Park, Traffic Issues
 

ANC Votes to Support Stadium Liquor License
I just got back from ANC 6D's monthly meeting, where the commissioners voted 6-0 (with one abstention) to support the application by Volume Services Inc. for a "CX Arena" liquor license at the new ballpark. This single license would cover all concessions at the stadium, including kiosks, restaurants and boxes, and at individual seats.
The ANC had asked representatives of the Nationals and concessionaire CenterPlate to discuss potential issues with alcohol sales at the ballpark in greater detail, but it became a more freewheeling discussion between the team officials, who are trying to assure nearby residents that the team wants to be a good neighbor, and the commissioners, who feel that the community has received very little communication up to now from the DC Sports and Entertainment Commission and other city agencies about traffic, parking, and other stadium-related issues.
Nationals senior vice president for business affairs Michael Shapiro spoke a number of times of the Nationals' "sincere desire to become a member of the community," and that they want the neighbors "to be proud" of the new ballpark. Shapiro and director of ballpark operations Matthew Blush offered to meet on a regular basis with community leaders, which appeared to be well received by the commission's vice chair Andy Litsky, who described the ANC's dealings with the Sports and Entertainment Commission on ballpark-related issues over the past two years as a "horror show."
Greg McCarthy, who is senior director of the Nationals' ballpark district dealings, spoke about parking and traffic issues, explaining that season ticket holders will be assigned to specific lots and will be given detailed instructions on the correct routes to use, to prevent the cut-through traffic and circling for on-street parking that the team says it will be actively discouraging. The commissioners made clear that parking issues remain a huge concern for residents, and that they want to hear specifics soon about how gameday parking will be handled.
Shapiro and Blush described upcoming outreach efforts such as bringing neighborhood kids to the ballpark for batting practice, getting jobs at the stadium for local residents, and having ambassadors and security outside the ballpark itself before and after games as part of making "the building work for the community." Commissioners and audience members were particularly interested in job opportunities at the ballpark, with the hope that the Nationals will go beyond "hanging out a sign" to actively recruit nearby residents.
As for the liquor license, Shapiro indicated that most of the rules in place at RFK (such as no alcohol sales after the seventh inning) would be in place at the new ballpark, and suggested that the Verizon Center would be used as a guide for how to handle alcohol-related issues for non-baseball events such as concerts. (I'm guessing that liquor sales might not be an issue at the first non-baseball event at the new stadium, which is scheduled to be the April 17 mass by Pope Benedict XVI.)
With some concerns that protesting or otherwise hindering this application might spur the sports commission or the city council to issue a liquor license outside of the city's Alcohol Beverage Control jurisdiction, the ANC gave its support. The license hearing is scheduled for Jan. 2.
In the meantime, the DCSEC, the Nationals, and community leaders have another meeting scheduled for Dec. 19.
 
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