A new report from the Brookings Institution shows that the D.C. metro area has the most “walkable places” per capita of any American city -- one for every 264,000 people, beating out even New York City for walkability. Visiting Fellow Christopher B. Leinberger says that the Washington region could serve as the model for the direction the country’s other metro areas are heading over the next generation. The Associated Press already picked up on the......

Good morning, Washington. It's Columbus Day, the least observed of all the federal holidays -- or is that Veterans' Day? Unless you work directly for the government or your job is absolutely dependent on it being open for business, odds are about even you're sitting at your desk at the usual time this morning, as a trade-off for getting to take the Friday after Thanksgiving off. It's also, of course, a controversial day, and is......

Former Editor-in-Chief Ryan Avent writes a weekly column about neighborhood and development issues. It wasn’t easy to keep up with the business flooding through the Council as the latest session neared its end. Amid the bills dealing with Greater Southeast Community Hospital, authorizing development bonds, addressing land deals in the West End and over the Center Leg Freeway, and placing moratoria on new Adams Morgan taverns, an interesting pattern nonetheless emerged. In just this past......

By new DCist contributor Analiese Bendorf Ducks and Creeks Fans of Bethesda's calorie-conscious Rock Creek Restaurant will soon be able to nosh on guilt-free grub at a second location in the District, where owners Tom Williams and Judy Hammerschmidt plan to open Rock Creek at Mazza Gallerie. Tom Sietsema reports in this week's Dish that former 1789 chef, Ris Lacoste, will lend a seasoned hand by interviewing potential chefs for the Mazza location, before turning......

With 2,500 products rotating through its grocery shelves, each Trader Joe’s has to churn out a good number of its signature cutesy price labels. In fact, the number's so good that each TJ's—including the West End location that opened early this month—must hire a a full-time, four-person art team to deal with it all. The way it works is a classic division-of-labor: two artists devote themselves to creating laminated labels, while one handles 3-D signage......

If you're looking for a change of pace and need an industry that is sure to remain in business for years to come, consider escalator repair. Taking after DeVry and ITT Tech, Metro has kicked off a $1.5 million training lab for escalator repair, writes the Post. The lab will train the next generation of escalator repairmen, who, as we all know from experience, will have no shortage of work anytime soon -- on......

The last time we discussed a citizen-led campaign to convince a certain specialty grocer to open in D.C., we discovered our readers have a lot of opinions about their grocery store options. Well recently DCist met with Lydia Charles, the organizer of another similar effort to convince her favorite grocery store to open a store in the U Street NW neighborhood. Charles has just launched WeWantTraderJoes.com, the online arm of the petition she began circulating......

As part of DCist's new commitment to hard-hitting grocery store coverage, we're sad to report that the new Trader Joe's in the District's burgeoning West End neighborhood has a little more gestating to do before it shows its Two-Buck Chuck to the world. Originally slated to open today, the long-awaited Trader Joe's now plans to open its doors in early September. For the past few weeks, workers on the new grocery store in the yet-to-open......

You have to step back from D.C. occasionally to see how significantly the look of the city is changing in a short space of time. Large scale change spans the District, from new construction in the West End north of Foggy Bottom, to the cranes remaking Columbia Heights, to the new buildings stretching east from downtown toward the rising office towers at New York and Florida Avenues. Just outside the city, the massive National Harbor......

It was another busy week in DCist. We kicked off a new feature exploring what Metro needs, starting with a good PA and proposing that it take a cue or two from the London Underground. We checked out The Sounds and Morningwood at 9:30, discussed CVS's condom-locking policy, mocked Dick Cheney's ceremonial first pitch and reviewed the West End's recent development. We reported on an update to the rock-throwing kids in Columbia Heights, cooked......

Once mainly a dumping ground for hotels in easy striking distance of both Georgetown and downtown, the District's West End neighborhood has lately experienced a building boom that may bring more residents than ever into the quiet area east of Rock Creek Parkway, north of Foggy Bottom, and west of Dupont Circle. For years, the West End had been a veritable eye of the storm -- remaining oddly quiet, while the rest of the......

Rumor Mill Grinding Up There may be changes afoot where the West End, Foggy Bottom, and Downtown meet. In the midst of this vortex, Smith Properties is redoing the office building that houses a law firm, a Bank of America, a cell phone store, and—most importantly—Galileo Restaurant. Galileo?! Duhn Duhnh Duhhhhhhhhn. The building itself at 2101 L St. NW is coming down, but what of the best Italian restaurant in the District? What of local......

News today has it that the U.S. Capitol Police seemed to have forgotten about the First Amendment on Tuesday night, when they arrested anti-war activist Cindy Sheehan and Beverly Young, the wife of a Republican representative, at the State of the Union address for wearing "expressive t-shirts." Ironically, Young's shirt was pro-military: "Support the Troops -- Defending Our Freedom." Capitol Police Terrance Gainer issued an apology and dropped the charges against the two. District Claims......

We didn't mean to, but it seems that we set off an interesting discussion about new names for the city's neighborhoods. As we mentioned this morning, real estate prices in NoMa are fast rising. For those of you unaware of a neighborhood called "NoMa" within the District, it's a large swath of land north of Massachusetts Avenue and east of North Capitol Street, fanning out from Union Station and encompassing a once industrial wasteland that......

We haven't written much about the development of the site of the old George Washington University Hospital since last January when we reported the University had announced they would conduct not one but two studies about what to do with the land. The situation is this: GWU could make quite a bit developing the site as commercial retail, office, and housing. Neighborhood residents resent the university's relentless growth and see the massive plot of land......

Leafing through the June West End Guide we came across an article about an interesting new business in Georgetown. Opened by two 23-year-old school buddies Toby Moore and Justin Lesher, eSpot is an eBay listing and sales service. For 30% of the first $500 of the sale amount and 20% of anything higher the duo will photograph your item, list it on eBay, and mail you a check when it sells. They only accept items......

Like the double-faced Janus, there are two Smith Points. One is the Georgetown restaurant loved by neighbors for its food, the other is the exclusive club environment that gets going later toward midnight, made famous by two infamous patrons, the Bush twins. And numerous people (including these women who were apparently White House interns last summer who posted their W.H. photos on Webshots) have followed in their wake. As some community interests in Georgetown continue......

The corner of New Hampshire Avenue and M Street has never been known as one of the city's most beautiful. With Don Shula's steakhouse, Lulu's Club Mardi Gras and the Exxon gas station in the center, you may wonder why the West End Ritz Carlton decided to set up shop on the edge of what could be described as a garish, undefined regurgitate semi-urban, semi-suburban architectural mess. Lulu's attempts to transform the corner of M......

It's hard to miss the giant "Hoya Saxa" mural while driving past Georgetown University on Canal Road NW. The mural has been an institution since it appeared on the wall sometime in the early 1990s, yet some, such as Barbara Zartman, vice president of the Citizens Association of Georgetown, say the mural is "grafitti" and should be removed. Well, it looks like that won't be happening anytime soon. The West End Guide reports that at......

You've seen it around town: a stencil of a smiling face labled "BORF," sometimes accompanied with a quirky statements. The work of the enigmatic Borf can be seen along U Street, in Adams Morgan, in the West End, Foggy Bottom, in Georgetown, and even at least one in Virginia. Just who is behind the graffiti? While we still haven't met him, a little internet snooping has unearthed some clues. His has sparked a post......

Walking through the campus of George Washington University last fall, we wondered aloud to a friend what the university intended to do with the site of the old George Washington University Hospital, also known as the ginormous empty lot next to the new GW hospital off Washington Circle on Pennsylvania Avenue. The site is seen to the right in a GW photo. At the time our companion mused that it would probably sit empty for......

The West End Guide reports that Trader Joe's, the gourmet Los Angeles-based grocery chain, is set to open its first location in the District by 2006. Trader Joe's is eyeing the old Columbia Hospital site in the West End, which is being converted to retail and residential use. Anticipating Trader Joe's arrival, the team from the WEG did a market basket survey to compare Trader Joe's prices with those at the Social and Watergate Safeways,......

The Wisconsin Avenue building once occupied by Britches is slated to become the new home for Ralph Lauren and luxury lofts above. The properties in question are 1245 and 1247 Wisconsin Ave., near Prospect Street. It was the flagship store for Britches, the locally owned mens clothing retailer that went out of business last year. (Just to be clear, Ralph Lauren hadn't signed a lease yet, but it was fully expected that it would, the......

We came across this image from some sort of University of Oregon research page on urban heat islands. While a political pundit may try to say that Congress or the White House is full of hot air, it may in fact be the Pentagon. Examining this undated map, here are some locations in near the center of the city that produce a lot of heat. - the Pentagon - Department of Agriculture - Department of......

DCist always enjoys taking a look through the Craigslist missed connections every once and a while to get a chuckle or two, e.g. "4 Hotties in Bethesda Chipotle @ 7:PM!", "Crying on the Yellow Line" and "MC with a weatherman." But this one caught our eye, not because anyone affiliated with DCist was at McFaddens on Saturday night, but because we think we could wager a good guess as to who may have penned the......

Is the Watergate historic? That's the question that faces the District's Preservation Review Board on Thursday. Certainly the building that redefined the art of political scandal has a place in American history, but its residents are locked in a pitched battle that mixes property rights with history. The West End Guide reminds us what's at stake. A group of residents opposed to the conversion of the complex's hotel into new condos want the building declared......

The D.C. Public Library will feature Ronald McDonald as part of its "Summer Quest: Readers Rule" summer reading program for schoolchildren. Is this an innocent tactic to get young children excited about reading, or an evil ploy by the McDonald's corporation to hook kids on their fatty foods? After seeing Super Size Me, DCist isn't slightly suspicious ...Ronald McDonald at DC Public Library Ronald McDonald will visit children participating in the D.C. Public Library's Summer......

While much has been written about the O Street home of Massachusetts Sen. John Kerry (or should DCist say Teresa Heinz Kerry?), the West End Guide has the skinny on the home of Kerry's vice presidential nominee, Sen. John Edwards of North Carolina. His home, built around 1830, is just a block away on P Street. It is currently assessed at $3.7 million. The Edwards bought the Georgetown home after selling a seven-bedroom 30th Street......

The Bush twins caused Stetson's headaches a few years back when they were caught drinking underage. Under pressure, the bar's staff under went a regime change and the character of the Texas bar on U Street changed, some say for the worse. Could Smith Point, Georgetown's low-key-turned-Jenna sightseeing cellar bar, be next to go under a Bush twin-related management revamp? Georgetown's advisory neighborhood commission is protesting Smith Point's liquor license renewal, according to the......

From DCist contributor Catherine Andrews: DCist couldn't help but notice lately all the buzz surrounding the new Georgetown lounge bar, Blue Gin. The Post's Fritz Hahn seems to have gone especially ga-ga for the place, writing a glowing review, suggesting it no less than three times in a recent Going Out Gurus chat, and choosing its main bartender as the Entertainment Guide's Bartender of the Month for August. DCist's curiosity was officially piqued, so we......