Neighborhood Restaurant Initiative -- City of Boston -- and restaurant-driven revitalization

Boston is the locale of the first city-wide Main Street program, and they seem to be far-ahead of the other cities that have followed in their footpath, such as their initiative in launching the Boston Main Streets Foundation to do joint fundraising (since funders aren't into being contacted by 17 separate Main Street organizations...).

In reading the Boston Globe last week, an article about a forthcoming restaurant in the Dorchester neighborhood, "Home-cooked: With Ashmont Grill, a South End chef nourishes his own Dorchester neighborhood," mentioned an initiative of the City of Boston to help foster neighborhood restaurant development, the Neighborhood Restaurant Initiative.

"I'm trying to be conscious about not presenting too fancy of an image. But I also want it to be nice for people." - Chris Douglass, on new restaurant Ashmont Grill. The Ashmont Grill, in the Dorchester Main Street area, received a $100,000 loan from the City of Boston's Neighborhood Restaurant Initiative. (Globe Staff Photo / Evan Richman)

According to the web page:

Eligible Projects: The City of Boston will target up to five business districts that are underserved relative to the number/variety of sit-down, family restaurants owned and operated by local entrepreneurs. Existing restaurants (expansion project) and locally owned franchises are also eligible. Projects will receive assistance in the form of:

- Technical Assistance (business plans, marketing, etc)
- Permitting and licensing (ISD)
- Design Services
- Façade improvement grants
- Liaison to other City departments
- Financing

Restaurant Size: Restaurants that will create 10 or more jobs will be eligible.

Financing: The City’s loan can be in a junior position. Senior must be from a bank or other institutional-type lenders. Flexible terms will be negotiated on an individual basis, with up to a ten-year repayment schedule at a market interest rate. The maximum loan amount per business is $100,000.

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This is quite interesting, although many of the kinds of entrepreneurs likely to open up restaurants in such neighborhoods in DC might not be able to meet this level of underwriting criteria. Nonetheless, it's worth exploring the idea, especially if you believe in the importance of restaurants to seeding revitalization of neighborhood commercial districts. See "Richard's Rules for Restaurant-Driven Revitalization" for a discussion about this from a few months ago.

Joe Englert's (et alia) efforts on the H Street corridor were discussed in an long piece in last Friday's Weekend Section of the Washington Post. In "Plans to Set The Bar High On H Street NE," Fritz Hahn discusses Englert's intimate familiarity with revitalizing commercial districts. Hahn is a bit skeptical but seems to figure that Englert's track record, such as on U Street NW, is in his favor.

A lot of people have fear, not just in a neighborhood like H Street, but even on Barracks Row (8th Street SE) where I work, about "becoming another Adams-Morgan." (For some discussion about these issues in Adams-Morgan, see "Dr. Transit offers some thoughts on the Adams-Morgan Transportation Study" from March, and this on Barracks Row, "The Future of Barracks Row? A Counter-point to letter to the editor about Smoke-Free Restaurants" and "A creative idea for adding "entertainment" to your commercial district" from June and July.)

I think these fears are misplaced. The greater Capitol Hill neighborhood is a sea of single-family housing, with about 1/3 of the population density of the area around Adams-Morgan. So you have fewer residents and not much to do. A few places are not going to all of a sudden create a hip 1223 or Dragonfly kind of vibe.

Plus, a big problem that both H Street NE and 8th Street SE have is a dearth of young office workers nearby, eager to go out after work and hang rather than to get back to their cosy American Dream suburban abode (most of the workers in the Navy Yard area, particularly the government contractors tend to live in the suburbs and have little interest in hanging out in DC after work). The 200 and 300 blocks of Pennsylvania Avenue SE are convenient to post-work Capitol Hill staffer activity, but clearly it's not enough to get the area really hopping--the Capitol Hill Cosi closes at 10 pm, while the Cosi stores in Dupont Circle (Connecticut Avenue) stay open til at least 1 am... and they are busy busy places.

Without the kinds of places where people can hang, drink in comfort (after all "it's more fun to eat in a saloon than drink in a restaurant," which is more fun than being at home...but more expensive), it's difficult to generate the level of business necessary to support a wider range of restaurants and other retail in neighborhood commercial districts.

Without restaurants, people have no place to go to a restroom. Without restrooms, people can't really linger and shop in commercial districts because at some point, their "needs" become pressing. This means that their retail visits are short and purpose-driven errands. Restaurants (and restrooms) are part of a complete destination. By this criterion alone, H Street is incomplete.

The Ghost Bus stops at establishments on the 200 and 300 blocks of Pennsylvania Avenue SE, the 700 block of 8th Street SE, at Tunnicliff's on 7th Street SE, and at Trusty's Full Service on the 1400 block of Pennsylvania Avenue SE on the way to RFK Stadium.

The end of the Hahn article also has an interesting bit about the "Ghost Bus" initiative designed to corrall baseball-going patrons to Capitol Hill area restaurants before the game, by providing transportation to RFK Stadium. This is an idea that could be "ported" to H Street at some point.