The commissioner for ANC 2F06, Michael Benardo, recently circulated an email with an online petition pushing for the creation of a dog park at the Shaw Recreation Field at 11th Street and Rhode Island Avenue NW. Now, anyone who lives in a ten block radius of Logan Circle knows that the neighborhood is in desperate need of a legal dog park. Just try walking through the circle itself at dusk sometime – odds are pretty good you’ll be witness to an off-leash dog getting away from its owner and darting into traffic.

But I do take issue with some of Benardo’s reasoning behind why putting a dog park in Shaw Recreation Field is a good idea. Here’s what the petition says:

>> The field is centrally located to Logan Circle, U Street and Shaw neighborhoods;

>> Residences and businesses are more than fifty feet from the field;

>> The field has historically been under-utilized as an athletic field;

>> A number of other fields exist nearby where athletic games and competitions can be held;

>> Precedent exists for redesignating parkland use, as when the tennis courts at Shaw Field were converted to a skate park;

>> Locating a dog park in Shaw Field will deter the criminal activity and public drunkenness commonly seen on the field;

>> A dog park at Shaw Field will not compromise environmental considerations, interfere with community gardens, or cause run-off contamination to streams or waterways;

>> The field is flat and will allow for easy compliance with the Americans with Disabilities Act.

Many of these points are fine, but the idea that the field is underutilized as an athletic field is just wrong. Nearly any afternoon, evening or weekend day when the weather is nice, there are men in this field playing soccer. I’ve walked past it nearly every day for the last two and a half years, and I’ve never once seen any “criminal activity” going on. Mostly it’s just big groups of guys, using the field as it’s intended. There is, on occasion, some evidence left behind that people were drinking beer at the basketball courts, but I’m not exactly sure how moving the soccer players off the field and bringing dogs and their owners in will deter that from continuing. And are there other fields nearby where athletic activity can be held? I can’t think of any.

Photo by IntangibleArts