Everyone remembers the church parking debate that cluttered neighborhood email lists, local news media and blog comments back in 2006. In a report last night, WJLA appears to have brought the saga back to life.

As a refresher, back when Mayor Anthony Williams was in office, residents in the Logan Circle and Shaw neighborhoods began demanding that the tradition of not enforcing double parking laws on residential streets during church hours come to an end. Parishioners who largely live in suburban Maryland but still attend services at a dozen or so historic black churches in the neighborhood had long been illegally parking with impunity, and residents were fed up with not being able to park in their own neighborhoods on Sundays. Churchgoers argued that they had always attended these churches and their impact one day a week was minimal. Williams pledged to come to some sort of agreement between the two sides, but never really did, although he did repaint part of Vermont StreetAvenue NW to add additional diagonal parking spaces.

More recently, Mayor Adrian Fenty declared in February that all parking laws in the neighborhood would be enforced seven days a week — meaning double parking and parking in illegal spots on Sundays would no longer fly. But since then, according to the WJLA report, some churches have started placing traffic cones and “no parking” signs along streets near them in an attempt to reserve spots for their ministers and members. Metropolitan Baptist Church, at 1225 R Street NW, and Lincoln Congregational Temple, at 1701 11th Street NW, are singled out as the biggest offenders in the story.

As church parking has long been one of our readership’s favorite topics to debate, we’ll be aggressively updating this story.

Photo of the Metropolitan Baptist Church by Wake Up the Giant