Battle Developing Over Old Soldiers' Home Land
The Post fired a shot this Sunday in the growing fight over a land-use plan for the campus of the Armed Forces Retirement Home, and some residents of area neighborhoods are preparing their own response.
Established in 1851, the Old Soldiers' Home, which once served as Lincoln's summer Presidential residence, was originally surrounded by 500 acres of open land amid the neighborhoods of Park View and Petworth, with Brookland off to the east. The land is dotted with trees and ponds, a golf course, random military paraphernalia, and the Retirement Home, where generations of soldiers returning from war have lived. The home still operates under the aegis of the Department of Defense (but without taxpayer funding), treating veterans for a host of medical problems, both age- and combat-related. The Retirement Home's growing medical costs are a key driver of plans for development (click here to see a recent Post news story on the project and neighborhood opposition).
According to the Post, the new development plans call for "condominiums, shops, a hotel, embassies, and medical and office buildings" spread around the southern and eastern edges of the property, with the central and northern portions reserved for green space and the Retirement Home. Some residents are incensed by the plan, which they believe is too dense and too lacking in open space. They have been gearing up to fight the project, and Council-member Jim Graham (D-Ward 1) has involved himself in the battle. Portions of the campus have been previously developed, notably in the construction of the vast hospital complex to the south and the National Shrine of the Immaculate Conception to the east. Most recently 46 acres of land were sold to nearby Catholic University at a cost of $22 million, a transaction which revealed to the Home's operators how valuable their land had become.
On Sunday, the Post aired an opinion on the matter, publishing a column by the Home's Chief Operating Officer, Timothy Cox, that took opponents of the plan to task for fighting the development plan. The piece disputed many of the residents' points, saying their fears are overblown, that ample untouched space exists in the immediate area which could be turned into parkland, and that the money raised in the land development will be used to support ailing veterans. Most amusingly, Cox acidly pointed out that inflows of new residents have been a fairly large factor in increasing the density of the neighborhoods and reducing open space.
Opposed neighborhood residents are not taking the piece lying down. DCist has received word that a press conference is in the works for this Sunday, during which the proposals of the Home will be disputed. It seems highly likely that the intensity of these disagreements will only increase.
Personally, I find it somewhat difficult to understand opposition to the plan, though I will be paying close attention to arguments made on both sides. The open space is currently integrated into the city quite poorly, and there is no shortage of open, undeveloped land around the southern hospital complex and the Soldiers' Home that could easily be turned into public park area. While density has increased to the west of the land, the whole central area under discussion seems strikingly under-used and out of place in an urban environment. As a Brookland resident living within eyeshot of the area under discussion, I welcome the plan.
My mind remains open, however, and DCist will continue to follow the debate as it develops.
Picture of Lincoln Cottage taken from nationaltrust.org.