Photo by NCinDC.

A few observant Cleveland Park residents tipped us off that the mural located on the east side of 2902 Porter Street NW — whose ground floor was formerly housed a 7-Eleven — had been whitewashed. It turns out that the new tenants of the ground floor, D.C. Immediate and Primary Care, painted over the mural in order to facilitate some remodeling.

“It was a decision made by the ownership,” said a man who identified himself as an owner of the urgent care facility, but refused to supply his name over the phone. “There’s going to be some signage. There was graffiti on the mural in the corner. We had plans from the beginning to remove [the mural] and make it conducive to our design. [The mural] doesn’t seem like it fits within the building.”

The mural had a bit of a cult reputation as being a good way to tell who had just moved to the neighborhood — if you thought that the people who were quite realistically painted on it were actually waiting for the bus in front of the convenience store, well, you were outed as a newbie. (Full disclosure: I did a double take the first time, too.) But the owner we spoke with was surprised that people would be upset about the mural’s removal.

“We’ve had a lot of people come and say they don’t care for the mural, and it was only done four years ago,” the man added. The exterior of the building, he claimed, is in the process of being remodeled to include “significant change,” like a green design and wood accents.

“We’re trying to do right by the community,” said the owner.