The Montgomery County Planning Board removed Gwen Wright three months before she was expected to retire.

As we mentioned earlier this week, sometimes we don’t envy Washington’s urban planners. Their challenges often encompass issues as varied and complicated as economic development, land use planning, sustainability, design and social justice. Add to that the design politics associated with the symbolism invested in the nation’s capital, and planning for D.C. becomes a unique urban problem to tackle. Not that it stops us from trying. Yesterday, the National Capital Planning Commission and the Commission…

Whether we make the mental connections or not, everything about our city is interrelated: • The health of the Anacostia and Potomac watersheds is directly affected by runoff from roads; • Our roads are designed and routed to ease our daily commute to get to and from jobs created by regional economic growth policy; • Growth is dependent on a reliable and expanding base of skilled workers; • Workers attracted by lively mixes of shops,…

>> You might want to pick up your porn before heading to the beach this summer. Ocean City has passed a moratorium on sex shops of all kinds. We can only see this as a boon to Washington’s own hard-working purveyors of such merchandise. Not that anyone at DCist has any idea where such stores might be. [WTOP] >> One D.C. blogger has already had it up to here with clueless tourists on the Metro….

The D.C. Water and Sewer Authority is getting ready to raise rates, a move which could cost the average resident $100 more per year. The hike wouldn’t take hold until next year, but officials say they plan an additional 8.5% increase in 2009 followed by 9.5% increases in both 2010 and 2011. WASA plans a public hearing on the move, but, of course, neither the D.C. Council nor customers have any say on the issue….

Happy Mardi Gras, Washington. Great news for all those planning to expose themselves to garner beads! (We’re unsure if any local bars enforce such strict bead acquisition standards, but you can let us know in comments.) It’s already above freezing and temps are heading up to 50 today. That’s right, the big five-oh. We predict the risk of falling on your ass will be reduced by 76% by the evening commute. Of course, now we’ve…

For all their symbolic power and grand civic functions, D.C. buildings built in the last half century have hardly created much buzz in terms of architecture, due in part to Washington’s reputation for staid and conservative design tastes. On the occasion that a renowned contemporary designer finds a willing local patron, their scheme rarely makes it through National Capital Planning Commission review without serious revision or delay, as with Norman Foster’s glass canopy finally under…

The Vietnam Veterans Memorial Fund announced yesterday that their proposed Visitor Center received the final go-ahead from the National Capitol Planning Commission, which oversees the approval and design of monuments and memorials in D.C. The privately funded, $100 million complex will supplement Maya Lin’s 1982 Memorial Wall, with exhibits and programs to tell the story of the Vietnam War and commemorate the soldiers who fought it. The Visitor Center will be built just west of…

Good morning, D.C. Seeing as we’re in the midst of the annual summer spike in crime, you might be feeling a little vulnerable right now. Well, good news! It turns out that we can at least stop worrying quite so much about terrorist attacks — according to DHS, anyway. In order to justify the recent cuts to anti-terror funding for the District, the agency has begun explaining that we simply aren’t that likely to be…

Arguments over where to put new monuments on the National Mall have grown increasingly frequent and divisive as the front lawn has filled up. In 2003, Congress banned new construction on the Mall’s cross-axis, beyond what had already been approved. In 2004, the National Museum of the American Indian and the World War II Memorial opened, and recently, a trapezoidal spot just northeast of the Washington Monument was chosen as the location for the National…