Is Jumbo Slice a nuisance? It certainly feels that way by [ahem] p.m. the next day, once you’ve finally woken from that night out at Asylum that you capped off with that regrettable $4.50 quarter-pie. And when you must walk the walk of shame home instead of cabbing the walk of shame home — because you spent your last single bills ensuring that your blood-grease content matched your BAC — you bet, Jumbo Slice feels like a right pain in the high heel.
But Jim Graham, Councilmember from Ward 1 and no friend to pizza molto grassa, says the nuisance goes further than that — much further. According to ABC7, Graham says the piece of pie is disrupting peace of mind, contributing to “street fights, stabbings, muggings and even a shootout involving two plainclothes police officers.” Quote Graham:
Even though [Jumbo Slice is] a legal business and everything, they have become a nuisance. Behaving the way they do in terms of music, in terms of letting people hang out and also in terms of tolerating a certain level of violence.
This editor appreciates the ease with which Graham dismisses free enterprise — “a legal business and everything,” only the concern of those who would prize pizza over justice. Yet might Graham be overstating the case by proposing a crackdown on single-serving pizza? The slice slueths at ABC7 have the deep dish for you:
A hidden ABC 7 camera captured an example of what Graham is talking about a couple weeks ago. Two girls began arguing in front of one of the Jumbo Slice businesses, the altercation turned physical when punches were thrown and people wrestled to the ground. The melee went on for 10 minutes before police arrived.
Shocking. There’s no telling how many Jumbo Slices they downed that evening. Maybe those girls shot some Jumbo Slice on U Street before they even arrived at Adams Morgan. And who can even count the Jumbo Slices they threw back at home before they even left for the bars? With all that slice running through their veins, it’s a marvel no one was more seriously hurt.
In other cities with congested bar districts, officials have seen some success in alleviating violence by diverting traffic from those streets altogether late on weekend nights. For 18th Street NW, that might mean no thru traffic or on-street parking after a certain hour, which would give drunks a wide berth in the middle of the lane to walk and carouse — as opposed to constantly bumping into one another on narrow sidewalks while totally hammered. Bet you those other cities don’t face the dread scourge of overlarge pizza, though.
