NoMA and urban revitalization and community involvement and lessons for PG County

One of happy byproducts of doing things in the community is that you meet other interesting and involved people from particular neighborhoods and around the city.

I suppose if you are a member of groups like the DC Federation of Civic Associations or the Committee of 100 on the Federal City you also get to meet people. I find those organizations to be somewhat hidebound and less interesting to me.

When you testify before City Council, contribute to DC Watch (or blogs), lead tours of interesting areas such as the Florida Market, are involved in quality ANC committees, etc., you do get to interact with people. This is important because otherwise there aren't good structures for bringing people of like minds together from across the city.

One of the people who came on the Florida Market tour on Saturday was Tony Goodman, a very much involved resident of the ANC6C area. He lives a couple blocks from the M Street entrance to the New York Avenue Metro Station and therefore just a couple blocks from 1st and M Streets NE, which is becoming the retail epicenter of the NoMA district--a 24 hour!!!!!! Harris-Teeter is opening there in December, a 24 hour CVS is opening across the street, and cafes and such are starting to open on the block as well.

How cool would it be to be able to walk in less than 10 minutes to a great grocery store 24 hours/day, not to mention having the Metro access, and the easy access to everywhere else provided by the Metro system?

Tony has been heavily involved in the ANC6C Planning, Zoning and the Environment Committee, so he has been very much focused on community-enhancements that can come about as a result of the various NoMA projects.

He came on the tour not because he needed to learn about the Market (he already knows) but to meet me. Afterwards, he took me on an impromptu tour of some of the things that are going on in NoMA from the retail and housing side, and it was very interesting and exhilirating.

Back in the Fall of 2001, I wrote an email of conjecture about the impact of urban trends favoring the city and especially the Metro and the Station Place development on the future of the H Street neighborhood, especially along the railyard. The conjecture never got to the "micro level" of a 24 hour grocery store and it's amazing to see these changes coming together, in ways that we may not have considered.

It's also interesting to see how projects that might have been crap in terms of what they contribute at a micro level (e.g., the ATF building) take on a different shade when you think of them in terms of the overall progress and development of the entire area, how certain projects even if not great, do in fact start the process of reconsideration of an area, which in turn can--if you have the right potential assets and opportunities--lead to significant redevelopment, revitalization, and improvement.

This is important in terms of another article in today's Post, "Online info is used to try to entice developers to Pr. George's Metro stations," about a report, released by the Coalition for Smarter Growth about transit-adjacent opportunities in Prince George's County, as well as an article in yesterday's Post about Rushern Baker becoming the next County Executive, and hopefully righting PG County's somewhat downward trend to cronyism and self-dealing, "In Prince George's, Baker has big plans to improve schools, make government accountable."

In some respects, I think this effort is a bit misdirected. It's important sure, but I don't think most nonprofit types are clued into all the resources and information systems that developers have access to. Developers in the region know all about the opportunities in Prince George's County. It's just right now for a variety of reasons, they are likely to make more money, with less risk, developing elsewhere.

When the broader conditions change, the most enlightened developers will scoop up those opportunities. That's the lesson of NoMA, even if all the developers aren't enlightened, merely smart enough to buy land located within 4 blocks of a subway station.

What I think is more important is preparing residents and other stakeholder groups for change and their ability to shape the opportunities in ways that best help the community and the region grow, change, and improve. Sure the Envision Prince George's planning effort is one such method. See also from the Post, "Pr. George's residents' vision for next 20 years presented." Having a pretty good planning department is another, and PG County does have a reasonably decent planning operation.

What makes a huge difference is the political environment generally (i.e., the Growth Machine) as well as having a good group of involved, engaged, focused, and broad-minded citizens able to help shape the changes in the right way. People like Tony Goodman. That's where PG County has been at a disadvantage.

Plus the county is so large physically, with different interests (urban/rural, inner county vs. outer county, higher income vs. lower income, ethnic and race differences, etc.) that organizing on a broader basis is challenging.

In DC, activists did not understand what a difference it would make to the investment and development community in 1999, once Marion Barry was no longer Mayor, having been replaced by Anthony Williams.

What we didn't understand is what I refer to as "the velocity of change." It's not like the term is unique to me. But the changes that came forward were like a tornado. There were lots of parallel changes, lots of things happening, and we didn't have the right knowledge and skill set to represent community interests. Or enough people.

Plus we still don't have a system that produces neighborhood plans, so communities don't have a good framework from which to address multiple concerns simultaneously, working from a list of consensus priorities.

Plus, we don't have a transportation vision plan. And we lack a bunch of the necessary tools ("transportation management districts" urban-appropriate zoning codes, stronger requirements for design review, etc.) that help shape development in community-supportive ways. Etc.

That is the biggest thing. Advocates lacked the tools necessary to be able to best respond to the potential of and forces for change that were unleashed by the election of Anthony Williams as Mayor of DC in 1998.

The election of Anthony Williams made a huge difference, and came at a good time for the city, as various trends began to show significant takeup in terms of pro-urbanism/pro-living in the city/pro-investing in the city. But we didn't reap all that we could have in terms of "community benefits" because we weren't prepared.

DC of course has huge advantages compared to many communities:

- it has the steady employment engine of the federal government
- it has a pretty good transit system (it still needs investment and to be expanded)
- it has attractive housing stock and neighborhoods
- it has a pedestrian, bicycle, and transit friendly urban design given to us by L'Enfant
- it has history, identity, and authenticity.

(These are the five key competitive advantages that DC has vis-a-vis other communities in the metropolitan area and vis-a-vis other center cities along the east coast.)

PG County doesn't have these advantages in the same manner as DC. Most importantly, it lacks the right urban form to properly leverage investment in transit and higher intensity housing. It has a huge advantage though in having the University of Maryland and various federal research facilities such as one of the USDA experiment stations in Greenbelt, not to mention getting various federal facilities as DC-based space becomes more expensive.

Even if PG County doesn't have the same advantages as DC, activists there need to prepare for the velocity of change that can be unleashed by the change in the political and economic climate towards fairness and honesty.

A couple of years ago, I wrote a post about how "chance favors the prepared city."

Posts on chance and the prepared city:

-- How will Obama relate to the District?
-- End of starchitecture?
-- "Chance" continues to favor the prepared road builders

The point is that you have to have the right plans and community capacity in place in order to be able to reap the full advantages of the opportunities that come your way.

In other words, you worry about affordable housing and policies like inclusionary zoning before change is unleashed, not as a response many years after the problem becomes evident.

That's where PG County is now.

DC is still in the process of developing those plans. And after 12 years of change, that's almost too late.

The thing about meeting Tony Goodman finally (we have had e-dealings over the years) is that it renewed my faith in community involvement and that the city still has the potential and opportunity to improve.

I am kinda burned out in terms of the city and its future. But I realize that is in part the result of a change in what I myself am interested in and work on. I am interested in the big picture, big trends, in comparing cities, in working on big problems.

When you take on programs that take decades to see significant change, it's easy to get discouraged.

When you see the kinds of projects happening in NoMA and recognize that it takes the concerted effort of many interests and stakeholders, and that the results can be positive and can occur faster than you might think is possible -- 6 to 10 years -- it refreshes your outlook.

Image of construction in NoMA from the Invest Dest(ination) website which has an interesting article about this issue from the perspective of developers, "Washington DC: Best US Investment Destination for 2009."

MIT masters student thesis on urban revitalization and stadium development in Washington

Nationals Park
Originally uploaded by spinfly

My correspondent Nigel has uncovered this thesis* on the urban revitalization impact of the Washington Nationals baseball stadium Verizon Center.

I haven't read it yet, so I don't know whether or not I agree with the interpretation, but I figure other people want a crack at it in the meantime.

I have felt for a long time that there is a great deal of student work out there about Washington that we aren't reading. A lot of it is immature, but some of it is really good. (I get a bunch of queries from students and I always tell them that I am happy to interview with them, but they have to give me copies of their final product. For some, that turns them off and they never contact me again...)

(Flickr image of the interior of the Washington Nationals baseball stadium by Spinfly.)

* "Stadium Development and Urban Renewal: A Look at Washington, DC," by James W. Rizzo, September 2008.


Verizon Center at night.

Traveling Dangerously in America: series fails to consider walking and biking

A 23-part investigative series from Carnegie-Knight News21/Center for Public Integrity looks at transportation safety in the US.

The problem with the series is that it only focuses on the National Transportation Safety Board and its issues--the NTSB makes recommendations but lacks the authority to require that the recommendations be carried out.

Flickr photo by wallyg. Queens, New York City.

So the series misses equally important mobility safety issues concerning walking and biking--mobility modes that don't typically involve the National Transportation Safety Board, which focuses on high profile accidents involving railroads, transit, airlines, highways, and other infrastructure.

So systematic and systemic failures in dealing with pedestrian and bicycle related accidents, such as weak accident investigation procedures on the part of most local police departments, where police officers, perhaps without intending to do so, tend to favor the motor vehicle when investigating, and gaps in the law that favor motor vehicle drivers at the expense of pedestrians and bicyclists, remain unaddressed.

The regional bicycle blog Washcycle provides consistent coverage on bicycle accidents--some of which involve bicyclist error, but many of which involve driver inattention, and laws are pretty easy on automobile drivers when it comes to negligence. And recently, the Greater Greater Washington blog, also in the Washington region, has provided weekly coverage of pedestrian and bicycle accidents in DC. See the latest posting, "Struck in DC this week: 13 pedestrians, 6 cyclists."

There is no equivalent of the NTSB advocating for fairer treatment and greater concern when it comes to pedestrians and bicyclists.

In the Netherlands and other European countries, drivers of motor vehicles are required to take on much more responsibility for accidents involving pedestrians and bicyclists, because motor vehicles are much more powerful and able to cause harm. In those countries defenses such as "I didn't see the bicyclist" or "I thought I hit a deer" don't cut it. Instead, the motor vehicle/driver is automatically presumed to be at fault.

Because of the serious consequences that can result, drivers take far more care while driving in Europe, in contrast to how the system of highway safety and fatalities in the U.S. takes negligence for granted. See the 2001 article by Malcolm Gladwell, "Wrong Turn: How the fight to make America's ways safer went off course." from the New Yorker.


Toronto Star image.

Segway owner dies after falling off river cliff

From the Associated Press.

Half right is still half wrong

Colbert King writes in Saturday's Post that the current election discussion and results aren't about race, but about respect. See "The District, beyond the politics of race."

He gives the example of heavy African-American support for Councilmember Phil Mendelson, who crushed his opponents in the at-large race, and garnered more votes than either Adrian Fenty or Vincent Gray in the mayoral race, and for Assistant Police Chief Diane Groomes, who has been a favorite of people concerned about high quality police presence ever since she was a Sergeant in the old MPD District 5 (which at the time, included about 3/4 of the H Street NE neighborhood).

He's right that it wasn't about race, and not wrong that it was about respect. But it was about respect as a subset of a commitment to social and redistributive justice as the primary political and social agenda guiding the city.

If you're white and committed to that agenda, then you'll get the votes (Phil Mendelson) or support (Diane Groomes). If you're not committed to it, white or black, getting elected can be a problem. It was a problem for Mayor Fenty. (And it is for Jack Evans, when it comes to running a citywide campaign.)

Because of his civil rights bonafides, David Clarke was elected City Council Chair in DC multiple times, and he was white. This I would aver is another illustration of the same point.

So that means that DCist is half wrong too. See "Colbert King Restores Sanity to the Post's Op-Ed Page."

When ANC6A was still part of the problem (before redistricting effective with the 2002 election), I ran afoul of a group of ANC Commissioners who didn't support historic preservation, probably rightly so, because they saw it as a displacement mechanism. I had successfully secured a grant to the Near Northeast Citizens group from the DC Historic Preservation Office to begin a historic preservation study. This was not seen upon as a good thing by the traditional neighborhood stalwarts such as the H Street CDC, who were more into an urban renewal agenda, and keeping the neighborhood from becoming attractive to people with choice.

(In other words, as long as H Street remained disinvested and s***** and the Capitol Hill Historic District ended at F Street NE, you didn't have to worry about people with choices wanting to live north of F Street generally and north of H Street specifically. That's why the CDC mostly tore down historically eligible properties and pursued an urban renewal agenda. But the New York Avenue Metro Station changed everything, making living north of H Street extremely desirable, because of relatively low cost housing located within easy walking distance of the red line subway.)

My then mentor asked me, "why can't you just compromise?"

I said, "by definition, compromise isn't compromise when all the compromise comes only from one side, in this case, me."

The social justice-redistributive agenda is usually one way. You can be for it. But generally, within that coalition, there is little room for concessions, in this case, resources, for the other side, which again, in this case, is what we might call the "livability agenda."

The City Paper Loose Lips column from last week is about the most accurate media writing about the issue thus far. See "Vince Gray Takes Charge." From the article:

Bridging the city’s racial divide will probably be a tall order for Gray. Polls and precincts show that Gray clearly has the support of black D.C., but little love in the white parts of the city. The weekend before the election, his supporters were casting his him as the worthy successor of black civil rights heroes. “I’m going to vote for Martin Luther King, Jr. because I know that if he were alive and able to vote on Tuesday, he’d vote for Vincent Gray,” the Rev. Walter Fauntroy told supporters at a Saturday pep rally. His support at black churches on Sunday was in a similar vein.

On Tuesday night, it was clear that the election didn’t just vanquish four years of Fenty; many of Gray’s most passionate supporters were also shut out of the mayor’s office during eight years of Anthony Williams.

When Adrian Fenty beat Linda Cropp in the Primary election 4 years, the sense of getting back access to the spoils and benefits from government among the traditional political and economic elite that came to the fore in the city when Marion Barry was Mayor was palpable and heavy.

I truly believe that the fact that only a few people from this group of people benefited--mostly those who benefited were Fenty's fraternity brothers and training partners, and other people he knew through his tenure as Ward 4 Councilmember--was a big reason for the coalescing of support around Vince Gray.

It was also why R. Donahue Peebles considered running for Mayor, because he was flabbergasted that with his bonafides (being Mayor Barry's golden boy) he didn't get a development deal involving Stevens School.

It shouldn't be a surprise that the City Paper is so far more accurate about the state of the election and what it means. The Loose Lips column tends to be far more direct than writing within the Washington Post about how things work in the city. The Washington Post is part of the establishment and the establishment isn't too keen on outing itself. (See "The D.C. Lobby" and "THE DISTRICT'S POWER BEHIND THE SCENES: Washington Post-connected business group wields influence over city's legislative agenda" from the no longer published Common Denominator.)

How do you think I have learned? I've read the City Paper for 23 years. Cover stories on people like David Wilmot and Whayne Quin and coverage in the news columns about how development works in the city, as well as the weekly Loose Lips columns have taught me quite a bit, complemented by experiences of my own...

Impact of the closure of Walter Reed Hospital on Silver Spring, Maryland

One of the downsides of lack of density in the more eastern side of upper upper Northwest DC, is that we don't have enough population to support the provision of decent set of commercial services (retail) in one place that is relatively efficient to get to. I know I maybe over-extend the idea of the Reilly Law of Retail Gravitation somewhat, which was originally developed to explain why some (market) towns developed over others. But the general point is still relevant--population, transportation efficiency, civic attractions (i.e., Courthouse) are contributors to the development of market centers, and the places with more and better retail and attractions are the places that are preferred.

This is a long way of getting to the point that it is more "efficient" on many things for us to go to Silver Spring (in Maryland) than it is to go south into DC, such as to Columbia Heights--which is mostly a convenience goods destination anyway, and harder to get to by transit (no direct bus, subway requires transferring between lines, whereas we can walk to Silver Spring or take the subway one stop, or even walk a really long way up to Georgia Avenue to take the bus).

So we do. And it is the source of my criticism (I would call it critical analysis) that the retail program developed for Columbia Heights never had a second act. They attracted Target, built a new Giant, and have Bed Bath and Beyond, Best Buy, and Staples, but the lack much in the way of specialty retail and apparel (bookstore, some clothing stores) and entertainment options, thereby limiting the ability of this shopping district to further develop and capture more District of Columbia residents as recurring customers.

(Yes, it's convenient to go to Target on my bike. But there isn't a decent hardware store west of Wisconsin Avenue to the DC-MoCo/PG border north of Harewood Road. Hence, trips to Silver Spring for Strosniders, or now to Takoma Park for Takoma Park Hardware.)

Community (and bicycle) activist Casey Anderson of Silver Spring has an interesting post on the impact on the retail, restaurant, and accommodations business sectors of the moving of the Walter Reed Hospital from upper northwest DC (about 1.5 miles from the heart of Silver Spring) to Bethesda.

- "Walter Reed, Silver Spring, and the Future of Georgia Avenue" from the Citizens League of Montgomery County board blog

From the standpoint of jurisdiction-specific retail development and revitalization it's very important to be direct and analytical about your strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats.

Georgia Avenue needs better transit to become a premier retail and entertainment destination. Even so, the area lacks the right population density and demographics (the residents tend to be older, and as we get older we go out less and buy less) to support those kinds of establishments in a long term way.

I was originally skeptical of Dave Murphy's idea for a separated yellow line subway going up Georgia Avenue in part, because the area _right now_ doesn't have the density to support it. See "Imagine a separate Yellow Line" from Greater Greater Washington.

But long term, selective redevelopment could make such a proposal more viable. Especially of the Walter Reed Hospital site, and some of the blocks along Georgia Avenue. It would be very controversial though--not unlike how single family neighborhoods in Arlington County were eradicated to become "Virginia Square." And it's easy for me to say because redevelopment wouldn't trickle down to my part of the neighborhood any time soon.

Change management is disciplined and organized

From "The irrational side of change management" in the McKinsey Quarterly:

... It also hasn’t helped that most academics and practitioners now agree on the building blocks for influencing employee attitudes and management behavior. McKinsey’s Emily Lawson and Colin Price provided a holistic perspective in “The psychology of change management,”¹ which suggests that four basic conditions are necessary before employees will change their behavior: a) a compelling story, because employees must see the point of the change and agree with it; b) role modeling, because they must also see the CEO and colleagues they admire behaving in the new way; c) reinforcing mechanisms, because systems, processes, and incentives must be in line with the new behavior; and d) capability building, because employees must have the skills required to make the desired changes.

I think we can accept as a given that neither Mayor Fenty nor Michelle Rhee, Chancellor of the DC Public Schools, attempted to bring about change through the employment of this model and the four conditions.

Note that there is a reason I am keyed into this. I tried the more top-down, expert approach to change for many years (despite my familiarity with the organizational development field, and even having worked for a brief moment with Ronald Lippitt, one of the founders of the field) mostly to fail.

And I finally came to appreciate patience, how it can take even good ideas many years to be realized. E.g., it took the Center for Science in the Public Interest six years after I left the organization to come around and implement my proposal for a Canadian edition. That edition now has over 100,000 subscribers and generates a couple million dollars in annual gross revenue for the organization.

But at the time, I couldn't fathom why "they couldn't see it." I once said to my boss "it's not like I am brilliant, isn't this obvious?" (Although that was about how to reorganize and refocus the publishing program.) That didn't go down well.

It was in Brookland, working as a Main Street commercial district revitalization manager for an organization that became increasingly distant and disconnected from the neighborhood it was set up to serve, that I learned once and for all that the expert approach really doesn't go anywhere when you lack community engagement, support, and commitment.

And I was in my late 40s. Regardless of the belief in the young genius (see the New Yorker article by Malcolm Gladwell, "Annals of Culture: Late Bloomers: Why do we equate genius with precocity?") there is a recognition that wisdom come with age and experience amongst those always committed to learning and reflection.

Interestingly enough, through Ronald Lippitt I was exposed to NTL (originally called the National Training Laboratory), an academic and practice institute focused on training people in the field of organizational development. (Already I had learned about their journal, Journal of Applied Behavioral Science as well as the organization, the Society for the Psychological Study of Social Issues, which came out of the same group of people, and had read the textbook Social Psychology of Organizations.)

It's based in DC, at American University.

The city is full of people who work successfully on bringing about planned change.

It's just they mostly do it elsewhere.

(And what interests me the most is academically-informed practice.)

PSE

While I am broadly familiar with the discipline of public health, I haven't kept up with the literature. At the Pro Bike/Pro Walk conference, the public health related presentations all used the term "PSE" for policy, systems, and the environment, in terms of discussing how to bring about positive changes in health behavior.

This presentation from the Minnesota Department of Health explains the concept:

- Understanding Policy, Systems, and Environmental Change to Improve Health

It turns out that the American Public Health Association is having their 2011 conference in DC next year, and I met the person who chairs the built environment section. I have a bunch of ideas for him in terms of putting on programs. One is to have a Capital Bikeshare based bike tour of neighborhoods and the transit system.

Despite the various efforts of the CDC, the Active Living Research Network, and other entities, he claims that the public health field still hasn't fully bought into the link between the built environment and public health. So the Washington region, with its purposive examples of built environment and transit and walkability (Arlington, Columbia Pike) versus what we might call the fortunate legacy of the spatial design of DC from the Walking and Transit City eras, could provide some important lessons for interested public health practitioners.

Change management (is a discipline)

There are a number of "business" and "organizationally-focused" magazine/journals produced by business schools and consulting firms. The best known is the Harvard Business Review. The Sloan Management School at MIT and the Rotman School at the University of Toronto have similar publications. (Plus, MIT's general magazine, Technology Review, which was originally the alumni magazine, is also good.) Stanford publishes the Stanford Social Innovation Review. Plus McKinsey publishes their quarterly, and Booz Allen publishes Strategy+Business, which is available on newsstands.

I'd be lying if I said I read them all, but I do read HBR and SSIR, and the special Sloan sections in the WSJ.

HBR and Technology Review are carried in most main branches of public libraries. Sloan articles are often available as part of the special sections they publish in association with the Wall Street Journal.

McKinsey Quarterly's current e-letter calls attention to a number of their articles on change management, which seems to be particularly relevant considering DC's primary election results. Registration is required for access to the articles:

The psychology of change management

Why do so many corporate-transformation programs fail? Perhaps because too few companies understand that they must transform their employees’ mind-sets and daily behavior, not just their equipment, systems, and procedures. “The psychology of change management,” from 2003, shows how companies can renew themselves by using psychological principles that explain why people think and act as they do—and how they can learn to think and act differently.

June 2003
The psychology of change management

Related reading

March 2010
Making the emotional case for change: An interview with Chip Heath

March 2010
What successful transformations share: McKinsey Global Survey results

April 2009
Corporate transformation under pressure [includes audio]

April 2009
The irrational side of change management

November 2007
Driving radical change

With regard to the DC schools effort, I would argue that the Fenty-Rhee effort was directed neither at rebuilding robust organizational systems nor at rebuilding culture, at least in terms of the current staff. Instead, efforts were focused on replacing "bad" or "unenlightened" staff with new people who presumably already had the "right mindset" in place.

More things to do tomorrow: Community Forklift Salvage Arts department anniversary

Community Forklift, windows
Originally uploaded by rllayman

From email:

PARTY! Celebrating the First Anniversary of our Salvage Arts Section
When Sat, September 25, 9am - 6pm
Where Community Forklift, 4671 Tanglewood Drive, Edmonston MD 20781

Description

It's been exactly one year since we opened Salvage Arts, our vintage section, and we're celebrating with special discounts on antique door knobs, salvaged mantelpieces, vintage light fixtures, and more. We'll have food all day (feel free to bring a dish or baked goods yourself), and entertainment from DJ One HeART Muzik. Each hour, you'll have a chance to win raffle prizes and gift certificates. Stop on by!

What's democracy and participation got to do with it anyway?

There is a reasonably decent article in today's Post, "Other black mayors grapple with forces that led to Fenty's downfall," about how other black mayors are having problems with re-election. A major point made in the article is that the current generation of mayors is more technocratic and less concerned about righting social justice wrongs.

Many years ago I was talking with a public administration professor about Mayor Williams, and my concern that the government's concept was that people weren't so much citizens--drivers and owners of the public process and democracy--but customers of the city government.

She pointed out that most of Mayor Williams' experience in government came as an employee of government, and most of his experiences were shaped by the requirements of those roles as someone who in fact did "customer service."

Believing that you only have to go back to the people every four years in an election, that the people don't have to be consulted or brought along with you is a fundamental mistake in terms of civic engagement and democracy, not to mention in bringing about effective change, or when dealing with difficult, seemingly intractable problems.

Franklin Roosevelt did his "fireside chats" for a reason. He needed to rally the people in tough times AND AS IMPORTANTLY he needed to maintain their support of his efforts and policies in the face of often vicious opposition (read the book When Washington Went to War by David Brinkley and you get a sense of the opposition, which isn't all that different from what President Obama is dealing with now). Without the support and involvement of "the people" it's very difficult to shift policy and practice.

When you have to make tough choices, being imperious rather than inclusive costs you in the long run.

Today's press reports of the meeting Chancellor Rhee had with Vincent Gray yesterday--the first blog entry commented that Rhee appeared close to tears, but this didn't make it into the print edition of the Post ("Gray, Rhee talk - about schools, not her future" in print versus the original blog entry which was later edited to take out the reference to the tears "Post Now: Rhee grim-faced after Gray meeting")--reminded me of Paris Hilton and her being banned from Japan because of her recent conviction in Las Vegas for the possession of cocaine. In the U.S., she felt this was of no consequence. But in many countries in Asia, it means no entry. Her choices had consequences over the long term. And she had to cancel her "tour" of Asia.

Same with the what we might call the "total war" or "blitzkreig" approach to education "reform" embarked upon by Chancellor Rhee. A focus on new audiences (see "Recruiting Diversity: Michelle Rhee's campaign to diversify DCPS means wooing white parents" from the City Paper) and relative indifference to "old" audiences.

In a democracy, where you face recurring elections, unless those "old" audiences have been completely marginalized, eventually you lose when you didn't have to if you would have been inclusive from the beginning.

It's not any different with development projects that are contentious. The more time the developer spends up front, building support, meeting with the community, even if it "takes longer" comes back in return on investment in terms of overall faster zoning approvals and quicker receipt of building permits.

But when you see citizens as customers and hindrances, not as the foundation of the change process, this never occurs to you and sometimes the emperor really does have no clothes.

I'd be really surprised if Michelle Rhee read much on organizational development, planned change, successful social movements, and community organizing.

The same is likely true of the other technocratic mayors and other officials in the current generation of leadership.

Primary election special: Losing sight of what matters

I was at the Pro Bike/Pro Walk conference last week, so I was out of town during the election. (I voted the week before at one of the early polling stations.) I have plenty of thoughts about the election results, although I haven't fully pulled my thoughts together (plus it takes a long time to write one of those types of entries, a few hours).

But the column, "Losing sight of what matters in America: Do we value ‘value’ or just value ‘cheap’?," by Mary Newsom of the Charlotte Observer (she is one of the best journalists in the U.S. writing about urban design issues) pushes me towards writing about the election and what I think it means. She writes:

And in recent days I’ve written about the new greenway along Charlotte’s Little Sugar Creek. Not a few people have told me how they hate to see the “waste” of public money on things like the greenway’s stone bridges (actually, that stone is inexpensive molded concrete), public art and the rockwork clock tower (clock donated by the Rotary Club). It’s as if people here are so unused to places that celebrate the public that they think it’s wastefully lavish for a public park to hold anything nicer than cinder-block buildings and utilitarian metal bridges.

You’re probably wondering how these things – voice mail and airline travel and parks – are related. To my eye, they all illustrate something about America today: Americans have stopped believing that value is something everyone deserves.

We’ve stopped valuing workers. The country apparently no longer believes people who work hard deserve wages that pay them enough to afford the rent or a modest mortgage, or deserve a pension to keep them from penury in retirement. We’ve stopped expecting those things from employers – or at least they’ve stopped providing them. We’ve even stopped valuing public schools, stopped expecting them to have mowed lawns and drinking fountains that work.

What we value, instead, is cheapness. Rock-bottom prices. Low taxes. So we get tomatoes that taste like crunchy sponges, but at least we don’t pay a lot for them. Instead of percale bedsheets made in the USA we buy sheets made in countries most people couldn’t find on a map, with seams that dissolve within weeks. We buy food with no taste, clothes that unravel and appliances we have to junk after five years. Our public schools have knee-high crabgrass. People get hacked off if our public parks look better than pesticide factories. But at least they don’t cost us too much.

It's interesting to see some of the "traditional media" come around to my take on the election in terms of Fenty vs. Gray being more about who supports who. I don't think it is a race issue per se as much as it is about economics and cui bono" -- who benefits the most from the resources of local government.

I raised the election at one of the plenary sessions at the Pro Bike conference, that it appeared as if many people in the Gray camp, and other people running anti campaigns (such as Kelvin Robinson, who ran against the City Councilmember most committed to city quality of life issues, Ward 6 Councilman Tommy Wells) that quality of life, urban design, and placemaking were made out to be an issue of race and not something worth focusing on. I was pretty despondent about it.

At the conference, someone did pipe up that it is an issue of class, and it is sort of, but it is more complicated than that.

A lot of people are pissed about how most of the local and national press is making this out to be a matter of enlightened whiteys willing to sacrifice versus African-Americans who are not.

It is an issue of who controls the city, what matters, and where to put the resources.

And it's complicated by the fact that a lot of the so called newcomers to the city aren't too connected into the city and the city government and how it functions and operates. SO they have a tendency to be reflexive and not too knowledgeable about how things really work.

And the idea of how to improve organizational functioning generally and specifically with regard to schools, as communicated by the local press (the Washington Post) and the national press with regard to education (fire teachers, open charter schools, get rid of unions, dictatorial control by Mayors, high pay for performance, getting rid of tenure) flies in the face of deeper understandings of how the K-12 education system works (see for example the lead piece in this week's Talk of the Town feature in the New Yorker, "The overblown crisis in American education," by Nicholas Lemann).

But it's no wonder why we don't improve very much societally when the major communications institutions have such a flawed understanding of how social and organizational change really works.

Going in and beating people up and being abusive, arbitrary, and capricious isn't a method that is sustainable or effective, as the election results in DC have proved.

In Urban Fortunes: Towards a Political Economy of Place, the authors are somewhat derisive of city programs that direct resources to downtown revitalization and historic preservation, seeing it as a way for the relatively well off to capture resources needed by those less well off.

I think it is more a question of a delicate balance of providing municipal resources to those people who have significant and sometimes extreme needs versus how to maintain and extend the qualities of urbanism and urbanity and "city ness" that make a center city an attractive and desirable place to live for people who have choices.

And these same people with choices, yes, the relatively well off, are also significant providers of resources--property, sales, and income tax revenues--that a city/local government desperately needs in order to be able to succeed and compete within the metropolitan landscape of competitive jurisdictions.

I wrote about this on an e-list peopled with Gray supporters (justifiably he deserved support as Vincent Gray is smart as a whip, articulate, and committed) and my point about this was derided as "trickle down" economics. (My problems with Mr. Gray come down to his supporters for the most part, which I wrote about before: "Primary election special: Why I absolutely hate politics but am likely to vote for Fenty.")

I was pretty dismissive because the person completely missed my point, that if you want to spend $1+ billion annually on public schools, and upwards of $2 billion per year on human services, the money has to come from somewhere.

Actually the one good point raised by the wack job Mayoral candidate Leo Alexander is that every 10% reduction in people needing welfare benefits--not because you kick them off the rolls, but because through assistive, integrative programming and ongoing support, they no longer need financial assistance--you save $150 million, which can be used for other things.

Basically the point I am making is that the people coming into the city as new residents, those people who are being derided, sometimes justifiably (see the column by Courtland Milloy from the Post, "A vile caldron of hatred," which I might agree with about 50%), also need to be seen as ATM machines, people bringing money to the city and costing much less to serve with city services, compared to other segments of the city's population.

High income residents as ATMs for hardpressed municipalities.

Howard Gillette wrote Between justice and beauty: race, planning, and the failure of urban policy in Washington, D.C. about the tension between what we might call "placemaking" and "access to the resources and spoils" within the city and how the city is governed and managed.

The difference between the period covered in Gillette's book and today is the difference between direct federal control and indirect federal control of the city, and the focus on redistributive justice versus placemaking and quality of life.

This current period is but the latest chapter in an ongoing debate, which was made more complicated by the dictatorial nature and hubris ("tragic pride") of Mayor Fenty with regard to civic engagement and participation by involved citizens in the process.

Without acknowledging all of the failures of the current administration, which for the most part has ridden on the coat tails of programs and processes created under the previous administration, for the most part, the so called analyses in the national and local press are flawed, and we won't get anywhere going forward.

But it remains a fact that bike lanes, sustainable transportation, historic preservation, placemaking initiatives, design review, dog parks, walkability, etc., aren't the kinds of issues that motivate people concerned mostly with redistributive justice.

The sad fact is that this has been the case for as long as I have lived in the city, which as of last week, has been 23 years.

On the 1988 election ballot was a referendum for a "bottle bill", a law imposing a deposit on beverage containers. The beverage industry made it out to be a race issue, something that whitey environmentalists were trying to put over old black ladies. Of course, they roped in the African-American ministers to their cause with donations, and it did end up being a race issue. The run up to that election was very contentious, on this and other issues.

So how far have we come, really?

The irony is that for example, the redistributive justice people fight improvements to transit via streetcar, when the most significant advantages would accrue to the people currently riding surface transit, who tend to be low income.

These types of ironies run the board.

Washington Post graphic.

Lots to do this weekend (and nationally)

1. On Saturday September 25th, it's Smithsonian Museum Day. If you print out a coupon from the magazine's website, you can get free admission at participating museums ACROSS THE UNITED STATES. There are participating museums located in every state.

2. Saturday is also National Public Lands Day. I was joking with Suzanne that we could picnic in the "reservation" -- publicly owned land by the city I think, but it probably used to be under federal control -- a few houses down at the intersection of Quackenbos Street, 2nd Street, and North Dakota Avenue.

Last September, volunteers....

• Removed an estimated 900,000 lbs of trash
• Collected an estimated 20,000 lbs of invasive plants
• Built and maintained an estimated 1,320 miles of trails
• Planted an estimated 100,000 trees, shrubs and other native plants
• Contributed an estimated $14 million to improve public lands across the country

Public land reservation, 2nd and Quackenbos Streets NW

3. In DC, this weekend on both Saturday and Sunday we have the fall edition of WalkingTown and BikingTown, coordinated by CulturalTourismDC, with a variety of sponsors in support of the effort.

I will be giving a tour of Florida Market as part of the extravaganza. (Not doing alley tours this year, maybe next year. Too much work...)

9 - 11 am

Explore Florida Market/Capital City Market

Meet at the Florida Ave. exit of New York Ave-Florida Ave-Gallaudet U Metro station.
End at Litteri's Italian Deli, 517 Morse St., NE.

Metro: New York Ave-Florida Ave-Gallaudet University

Fitness: Low, 1.5 mile
Wheelchair accessible
Stroller accessible
No reservations required.

Ward: 5
Subjects: History

The Florida Market is the city's major wholesale food distribution center. The tour will stop at restaurants and vendors selling at retail, including the DC Farmers Market building, and address development issues that threaten the market.

Presented by the Citizens Planning Coalition, Frozen Tropics weblog, Capitol Hill North Neighborhood Association, and Rebuilding Place in Urban Space weblog; and led by DC resident and advocate for urban revitalization Richard Layman and two volunteers.

4. This weekend, the Cultural Landscape Foundation will also be sponsoring an open doors event too, What’s Out There Weekend, offering guided tours of 25 different spaces across the city.

5. Plus, the DC Preservation League has their annual conference on Friday and Saturday also.

6. This just in, an ad in today's Express alerts us to the fact that Saturday is also National Estuaries Day, and another opportunity to get outside, be active, and volunteer. Wow, it's as if this weekend is comparable to how people donate time and money to homeless shelters and soup kitchens around Christmastime.

This, in my opinion, is too much to offer, and ought to be better spread out in order to maximize impact. Instead, people have too much to choose from on two days and miss out more generally on similar opportunities on other days.

Tax breaks, developers, etc. and Union Station, DC

Union Station, February 13th, 2010. Technically the land in front of the station is controlled by the National Park Service, not Union Station. But after controlling the property for 20+ years, don't you think they could have gotten around to forging a memorandum of understanding with regard to snow clearance on the plaza? Shouldn't the Union Station Redevelopment Corporation have taken the lead on this, given that their customers are the ones inconvenienced by the failure to have a maintenance of way plan for this space? (Also see "A "maintenance of way" agenda for the walking and transit city.")

A tax break for Union Station again is delayed, according to the local papers.

I don't think I ever got around to writing about how Boston Mayor Tom Menino is incensed by Vornado Trust's failure to go through the redevelopment of the Filene's Basement site in Boston, which is now a big hole (see "Menino threatens to oust Filene’s site developer" from the Boston Globe). From the article:

Menino told Vornado Realty Trust in a letter last night that the city will explore those actions after comments last week by its chairman, Steven Roth, convinced him the New York company is deliberately neglecting the Filene’s site so Boston officials will help finance construction.

“This development is too important to Downtown Crossing and to the entire City of Boston to be used as a bargaining chip to improve your bottom line,’’ Menino wrote.

The mayor was reacting to comments Roth made during a presentation at Columbia University that were reported in the New York Observer.

Roth was quoted as saying he sat on the former Alexander’s Department store in midtown Manhattan in the 1990s, allowing it become blighted in order to squeeze money out of public officials.

Vornado acquired the site after the store closed and, similar to the Filene’s site, left it half demolished before eventually building a glass skyscraper that now houses the Bloomberg financial news company.

“Why did I do nothing?’’ Roth said, according to the Observer. “The more the building was a blight; the more governments would want this to be redeveloped; the more help they would give us when the time came.’’

When Mayor Menino saw a quote from Vornado Trust chairman about how they let the old Alexanders Dept. store site languish for a long time in order to extract maximum concessions from New York City government, he went ballistic, surmising that Vornado was trying to do the same in Boston. This made news in the New York Times and the Wall Street Journal too, not just the Boston papers.

I mention this because it is somewhat relevant to the issue of providing tax breaks/incentives to developers-property owners in DC and specifically with regard to Union Station. From "Council chairman pulls measure cutting Union Station's tax bill" in the Washington Business Journal:

D.C. Councilman Jack Evans, D-Ward 2, sought to replace the roughly $3 million annual possessory interest levy with a payment in lieu of taxes totaling $10 million over five years — a $5 million savings. The PILOT would have lasted through 2015, according to budget language, at which point the station would be entirely tax exempt.

(This is from an earlier article on the same subject.)

The current owners of the lease claim that they can't afford to invest in the property because of the high taxes.

This is the case even though Union Station has one of the highest retail sales per square foot of any shopping center in the DC region (see "Retailing Success on Track; Union Station Is Among the Region's Top Performers" from the Post).

This is the case even though they paid $160 million for the lease, which has 81 years to go. See "Ground lease for Union Station changes hands" from the Washington Business Journal.

If high property taxes and a high demand for reinvestment into the property were an issue, the sales price of the lease should have been heavily discounted from the actual sales price. (E.g., with a house, if it's in bad shape, it sells for less than the normal market value for a house in fully usable condition.)

I am not against providing "incentives" to developers. It's the way the real estate business works.

Something that we forget in the city is that even though a place like Georgetown or Union Station is relatively well off compared to other commercial areas in the city (say Kennedy Street or Upper Georgia Avenue or H Street), these districts are competing with all other in-demand destinations within the region, including Arlington and Alexandria and Silver Spring and Bethesda and Reston. Tax incentives and other inducements help DC-based projects stay competitive within the region.

Even so, I think a relatively permanent tax holiday for Union Station is a bad deal for DC and it shouldn't go forward.

Maybe I'd feel differently if Union Station:

• would shovel the snow from in front of the station when it snows

• hadn't built a butt ugly parking garage on the back, instead of something somewhat attractive

• would not have fought for many years combining the intercity bus station into the train station for a truly intermodal facility

• would have developed a quality cultural interpretation plan for the facility, with quality information graphics.

If you get tax breaks, zoning variances, etc., it is supposed to come with some broader benefits to the public other than the bottom line of the property owner-controllers. Tax breaks, upzonings, variances, exceptions, etc. are supposed to be a two-way street.

I don't see that here, not yet.

Local roads safety resource from the Federal Highway Adminstration

I was debating on mentioning this CD resource recently published by the Federal Highway Administration, and then I saw this piece in the Gazette, "Green Party candidate for U.S. Senate dies after being hit by SUV," which has been discussed in a couple different threads in Washcycle including "Maryland Senate Candidate in Critical Condition after being hit by an SUV."

Below are the recommendations that I wrote with regard to enforcement from the Western Baltimore County Pedestrian and Bicycle Access Plan:

Enforcement and Traffic Safety

Creating a safe environment for walking and bicycling depends not only how facilities are designed, but also on how they are used. Traffic safety enforcement, coupled with engineering, education, and encouragement, is integral to traffic safety.

Enforcement efforts should be built upon community partnerships and education, and encourage safe and lawful travel by strategically targeting high-risk behavior and locations. Balancing traffic enforcement with safety education and encouragement efforts will improve road safety for pedestrians, bicyclists, and motorists.

Through accident data compiled by the Traffic Analysis section of the Crime Analysis Unit of the Baltimore County Police Department, as well as from the Maryland Highway Safety Office, the traffic enforcement unit of the police department sets priorities for additional enforcement. An analysis that determines the primary factors contributing to pedestrian and bicycle crashes could lead to other types of engineering or education countermeasures. For example, an area experiencing a high rate of accidents may be due in part to the physical design of the roadway. Funding and capital improvement projects can be prioritized to address problematic situations.

Police officers are more likely to enforce laws they understand and acknowledge. All police officers should be trained on the rules of the road for bicyclists; types of illegal motorist behaviors that endanger bicyclists; dangerous types of bicycling behaviors; common causes of bicycle crashes; the importance of reporting bicycle crashes; importance of investigating serious bicycle crash sites; best ways to prevent bicycle theft; advantages to policing by bicycle; and the transportation, health, and environmental benefits of bicycling. As the amount of pedestrian and bicycling activity increases in Baltimore County, it will be important for police officers to become more familiar with relevant laws.

The Federal Highway Administration publishes two volumes, Pedsafe: Pedestrian Safety Guide and Countermeasure Selection System and Bikesafe: Bicycle Countermeasure Selection System, which provide solutions in response to common types of accidents, accompanied by software tools.

Enforcement Recommendations

1. Develop a coordinated accident analysis program designed to identify and correct problems that may lead to a disproportionate number of pedestrian and/or bicycling accidents. Participants could include the Traffic Analysis Unit of the Crime Analysis section and the Traffic Enforcement division of the Police Department, as well as other county and state agencies as appropriate. [in the original draft I specified the Office of Planning and the DPW, San Jose, Portland and Chicago do this, probably other places do too]

2. Continue to increase enforcement activities at locations experiencing a disproportionately high number of pedestrian and/or bicycle crashes and injuries. Targeting enforcement at locations with more accidents is an effective use of limited enforcement resources.

3. Continue through enforcement activities to target those motorist behaviors determined to be the greatest threats to pedestrian and bicyclist safety.

4. Develop continuing education opportunities for police officers on specific enforcement issues. Reach police officers in inexpensive and effective ways, such as screening videos at roll call and distributing Action Alerts, memorandums to police officers on specific enforcement issues.

-----
In a section of the plan draft that did not make it into the publicly released draft, I made 8 recommendations with regard to state programs, including the Maryland Highway Safety Office. One of the recommendations was the creation of an advertising program on the "3 foot rule" and bicyclists within the StreetSmarts effort in the DC and Baltimore regions.

Billboard from New Orleans, courtesy of the New Orleans Regional Planning Commission.

Modular doesn't have to mean ugly, even though it often does, at least in DC

DC MUD has an entry, "Phase II Underway at Capitol Hill Oasis," about second phase of a hideous housing development on 12th Street NE in the H Street neighborhood.

These buildings on 12th Street certainly illustrate the value and necessity of design review. I once blogged about them and one of the commenters criticized me for being against affordable housing, because they presumed by the value engineered design evident in the photo I used that it was of a low income housing development. But the original asking price for these behemoths was $1 million.

Back in 2001 I would be so excited to see footings laid for foundations for new buildings, until I learned through experience that for the most part, developers interested in sites in an area like the H Street neighborhood tended to have no concern or understanding about the value of design quality and the concept of context sensitivity, and that without design guidelines, the most likely result would be a s***y looking building that was out of place with the buildings around it. Pretty much that is the case with everything built new in the neighborhood north of H Street since 2000.

Despite the quote in the DCMUD article, the company that produced the prefab buildings on 12th Street, Deluxe Homes of Pennsylvania, have little understanding of rowhouse architecture design and the concept of articulation and differentiation.

You can have repetition, but builders in the late 19th and early 20th century, working with pattern books and the ability to buy building components from catalogs, understood how to create variety and attractiveness in a manner that is elusive to modern house designers. While designing to limiting the cost of construction, they didn't neglect design quality and attractiveness.

These rowhouses around the corner from the buildings pictured above, on Wylie Street NE, show how builders could construct buildings that demonstrated individuality of design within an overall archetype. Photo by Frozen Tropics.

This and other examples have led me to become a strong proponent of residential housing design guidelines for the entire city, whether or not a particular area happens to be historically designated.

It's not that you can't make taller buildings work. I saw some nice 4 story apt. buildings on the 300 and 400 blocks of 10th Street NE yesterday. But you have to care enough about longevity in order to do a decent, context sensitive design.

The Capital Oasis folks likely only saw the value of the location and the land, not the prevailing design sensibility present in the area (rowhouses from the 1880s to about 1920, encompassing Victorian and "S" type designs, the latter porch front oriented, a style popularized by Henry Wardman).

They could have even done a different model, the Montreal style "plex" which is basically a 3 story double wide rowhouse with 5 or 6 units and they likely would have sold out everything by now -- provided of course that they did a halfway decent design.

The advantage of plexes is that instead of having two small households in the ginormous buildings they constructed in each rowhouse space, instead you have 5-6 households in the space of two rowhouses (sometimes there is a single unit on one floor, and two units each on the other floors), bringing more people to the neighborhood, and more people to support local institutions, civic life, and commercial activity in the neighborhood and the city.

Montreal (tri)plex. Photo by Christopher DeWolf.

Capital Bikeshare launches on Monday

The reason I don't write about Capital Bikeshare, the bike sharing system in DC and Arlington County (and maybe eventually other locations in the Washington Metroplitan Area) or bikesharing much anymore is I have joined a business startup that focuses on what I call "bicycle facilities systems integration" although the website calls it bicycle parking and sharing systems.

In short, it means that our firm sells bicycle sharing systems, although we don't yet have any deployments yet. The technology that we sell is in operation in three cities in Brazil, although we will be using a different bike.

Any analysis I do of other systems ends up being proprietary and my business loses competitive advantages if we identify publicly the weaknesses (and advantages) that we may or may not discern in their systems. SO it's just easier for me to not blast out my analysis (you can call it "opinion") in the blog.

We are finalists for a system in Chattanooga, although so are Bixi and bcycle, and you know that old joke about IBM -- that it was the dependable vendor, and no one ever got fired for hiring IBM. We'll see what happens. The decision is supposed to be made by the end of the month. I will either be ecstatic or very down. But so far, we are still in the running.

Ironically, some of the "pathbreaking" points in our proposal were ideas that I blogged about and shared with DC, but they never used them, in advance of the deployment of the SmartBike DC program.

Jim Sebastian with the prototype bike of the first in the nation high tech bike sharing program. It works sort of like Zipcar. Jahi Chikwendiu/Washington Post.

That being said, bike sharing is cool, although there are some very basic requirements to make it work, and DC is just on the cusp of being able to be successful. It can be successful for sure in the core of the city. But if equity and other reasons demand that stations be put in other areas of the city where success is not assured, that can make overall success much more difficult.

The City of Portland Department of Transportation has a pretty good overview of the various issues involved in successful deployment. And I like Yonah Freemark's analysis of the DC system at Transport Politic, "Ensuring the Efficient Workings of a Bike-Sharing System" and of London's, "Can Bike Sharing Work in Cities With Monofunctional Job Centers?"

Bikesharing works differently than if you own a bike, where you mix errands and riding. With bikesharing, you don't have a lock. So you lock the bike in a station only--you're on the hook for the bike if you lose it, although the price being charged to DC for the bikes is just a tad over $1,000, and the charge for loss is less than the cost of the bike.

What it means is you do your errand first, and then get the bike.

There's still time to join Capital Bikeshare at the special introductory rate of $50.

And I recommend that you do so because it is definitely freeing.

Bixi bicyclists in the Ports of Old Montreal.

Of course farmers markets draw few food stamp users

This entry is in response to the Associated Press article, "Farmers' markets draw few food stamp users," which has run in many papers across the country. (I read it first in the Chattanooga Times Free Press.)

For the most part, farmers markets aren't initiated by people interested in dealing with food security issues as much as they are by people interested in quality of life and foodways issues. And then there is the issue of marketing farmers markets generally, and to people with food stamps benefits specifically.

Baltimore is one of the only jurisdictions I've seen that does a nice job promoting farmers markets with a campaign using bus shelter ads. The ad doesn't promote food stamp use, but it could, easily, and both the Baltimore Farmers Market on Sundays and the 32nd Street/Waverly Farmers Market on Saturdays could modify their marketing some to include this.

Baltimore Farmers Market ad, bus shelter, Penn Station. They also had smaller ads that were posted in the small community promotional slot on the back of bus shelters.

I came up with a typology of why farmers markets are created a few years ago in association with a grantmakers conference by the Project for Public Spaces in 2007. (See the entry "A follow up on the Liberty Market closure.")

Basically the point comes down to recognizing that there are at least eleven reasons to open a market, and while the purposes intersect at times, it means that decisions about what is allowable to sell need to vary according to the purpose of the market. Plus, the goals may vary according to whether you are a sponsor, operator (sponsors and operators are not always the same), or participating vendor.

Potential reasons to have a "farmers" market

1. Provide fresh food that is locally grown, supporting local and regional food security and policy;

2. Provide access to less expensive food

3. Provide access to "more expensive food" i.e., "organically grown" -- access to food that might not normally be available locally, although this is changing in metropolitan markets

4. Build rural incomes

5. Provide fresh food in an area that otherwise has few stores selling fresh food

6. to promote health and wellness (this is why hospitals and health organizations may get involved such as Kaiser Permanente, which supports markets in the DC region, but is actively engaged in market activities in California, their home base)

7. to aid commercial district and/or neighborhood revitalization by building activities and a reason for people to come out, gather, and resample the place (placemaking)

8. to promote entrepreneurship and local business development (e.g., some businesses, such as the Chateau Animaux pet store on 8th St. SE grew out of Eastern Market)

9. to promote a business and/or add additional revenue streams to a wholesale or retail business (e.g., Atwater's Bakery, based in Baltimore County, with three or four retail stores in the City and County, has a major presence in many markets throughout the Baltimore-DC region; Uptown Bakery, based in Hyattsville, is a wholesale bakery, but they allow their employees to sell products at farmers markets--while I don't know of many instances where they do it, Uptown products are sold at the Waverly Market in Baltimore)

10. to promote economic, environmental, and energy "sustainability"

11. as a property management tool/to generate rental income

12. as a for profit business venture

(11) and (12) might not be considered by some to be "legitimate" reasons for running markets, but the markets in Mt. Pleasant, U Street, and Bloomingdale are run by a for profit operator, which in part is an indicator that the sponsor of the market might have different goals from the operator of the market.

At best, providing access to fresh food for food stamp users is related to purposes one, two, five, and six but that leaves eight other potential organizing reasons for creating a farmers market.

Many markets develop programs to support food stamp users. The USDA has a program that supports the provision of EBT/ATM hookups at markets, although the management requirements are incredibly onerous and the equipment is expensive and given the limited usage, too costly for most market sponsors to handle without subsidies.

A major problem of course is that the markets typically are not located where food stamp users live. And frankly, most producers are interested in having markets where they are more likely to be able to sell for higher prices. And in DC, the organic markets such as Takoma Park Farmers Markets and the ones run by FreshFARM Markets have more expensive food anyway.

If you are going to recommend that food stamp users maximize the amount of food they purchase, you ought to recommend that they go to either lower cost public markets like the DC Farmers Market in Florida Market or to lower priced "ethnic" grocery stores such as PanAm International, where the food is priced much cheaper, but won't be sourced from a local farmer.

See "A World of Bargains: Asian Markets Attract Chefs and Budget-Minded" from the Washington Post and "Save 95% on Groceries, a.k.a. Why You Should Shop at Ethnic Markets" from the Cheap Healthy Good blog about buying less expensive food at ethnic markets.

The Takoma Park group also runs a market in Takoma/Langley Crossroads, but they have a separate fund to give people voucher credits to help subsidize the higher cost of the foods. See "Farmers market helps low-income shoppers buy fresh" from the Gazette.

A similar program is operative at Eastern Market in Detroit, according to the AP article. But at Eastern Market in Detroit it's probably more about giving people more food, while at the Langley Crossroads Market it's more about reducing the relatively high price.

A sign informing customers that the Bridge Card is accepted by a food vendor at Eastern Market in Detroit, Sept. 11, 2010, Carlos Osorio, AP.

Has the Fight Gone Out of Organizing? The Latest from Shelterforce, The journal of affordable housing and community building

From email:

We have seen community organizing under attack ever since the 2008 presidential elections, when the method was front and center. At the same time, for most community organizers, the hard work continues. In this latest issue of Shelterforce, we take a look at the post-ACORN world of organizing.

- Randy Stoecker in "Has the Fight Gone out of Organizing?" looks at why organizing is back on the defensive following what appeared to be a 2008 triumph.

- In What Kind of Community Organizations and for what purpose?", James DeFillippis, Robert Fisher, and Eric Shragge examine how community groups can make a difference by going beyond community boundaries.

- Michael McQuarrie looks at Cleveland's ESOP in a call for more confrontational organizing.

- NHI's John Atlas assesses the massive media fail when it came to ACORN.

- London CITIZENS' David Smith looks at how his group organized for affordable housing across the pond.

Also in this issue:

- Interview with Congressman Barney Frank

- Volunteerism in community development

- New Jersey's affordable housing policy

- Disappearing USPS branches

- The Community Land Trust Reader

Marketing Hyattsville as a cheaper but equal alternative to U Street, DC -- EYA advertisement.

Marketing Hyattsville as a cheaper alternative to U Street, DC -- EYA advertisement.
Originally uploaded by rllayman

Although I've been told that the obscure diner at the corner of Gallatin Street and Route 1 in Hyattsville is pretty good, it's definitely puffery to claim that this particular housing development offers the same things that attract people to living in the U Street corridor in DC:

(1) an amenity rich neighborhood (restaurants and culture and developing retail)

(2) a subway station within a couple blocks as well as frequent bus service on both 14th and U Streets

(3) it's part of the center of the city and within walking, biking, and transit distance to the Central Business District and other attractive areas of the city (Dupont Circle, Adams Morgan, Columbia Heights).

By contrast right now the Hyattsville location of the advertised housing has:

- walking distance access to one restaurant and a couple coffee shops, and a cool gift shop with a great beer selection

- one of the worst walking environments of any major thoroughfare in the region -- Rte. 1 between East West Highway and Farragut Street in Hyattsville

- the nearest subway station is about one mile away, and the bus service along Rte. 1 is about one bus per hour in each direction + the UMD bus, maybe, but I think they discontinued this route

- although a commercial development is coming, to a location across the street, and the Prince George's Plaza Metro Center and shopping center within about 2-3 miles is full of a variety of shopping and restaurant options, plus a cinema.

Still, I think this is puffery.

A bad day to leave home without my camera

At the last minute, I decided to ride to Capitol Hill via the Metropolitan Branch Trail--to boost the use numbers for the trail! Normally, I ride down North Capitol Street to Capitol Hill and back via the trail.

1. I saw that at least one bikesharing station has been installed to serve Catholic University/Brookland, placed adjacent to the Brookland Metro across from Catholic University on John McCormack Drive/Brookland Avenue.

2. I saw that vegetation needs to be trimmed on the trail.

3. That a graffiti wall had been converted to a mural on biking.

4. That at least one family was walking their daughter to school, from North of New York Avenue. They were probably going to the Two Rivers Charter School at 4th and Florida Ave., a couple blocks from the New York Avenue Metro station.

5. That the lip between the asphalt of the trail and the start of the sidewalk at the M Street entrance-exit for the Metropolitan Branch Trail is pronounced and should be fixed.

"Uptown"-Shaw-Mid City-Heart of the City Arts District meeting tonight

"Uptown"-Shaw-Mid City-Heart of the City Arts District meeting tonight
Originally uploaded by rllayman

I had intended to write more about this project, although I've written about it in the past.

I think that it's an earnest effort, but I don't think they are "planning" in the right order. Part of that is a fault of how the "Neighborhood Investment Fund" is structured, in that it focuses on doing "quick and dirty" projects that might not really be the right thing to do, or the most important thing to do, but are one of the funding areas specified in the grant announcement.

The other is that the issue of "branding" vs. positioning-identity is a more serious question that treads on advertising-marketing vs. the kinds of values that propel the nonprofit world.

Branding is a problem when you haven't first figured out your purpose. Now, I have come to believe that this effort in Shaw, although not planned the way I would do it, is worth going forward with, because the City of Washington needs to see stuff before it begins to do the right thing in terms of planning or destination development or arts and culture planning.

At the ASLA conference, there was a great presentation on Friday, "Creating a Great Street: The Regeneration of West Main Street" covering the process for improving West Main Street in Louisville, Kentucky (a place I happened to visit in 2004).

The online presentation is visuals only. You needed to hear them speak, and they focused on the three part planning and implementation process they developed there:

1. Planning and Design
2. Implementation and Financing
3. Programming and Maintenance

I would probably term it a little differently:

1. Scoping and identification of assets
2. Planning and Design
3. Financing and Implementation planning
4. Infrastructure and asset investment (assets include the Louisville Slugger baseball plant and museum, an arts museum, the Ali Museum)
5. Management structure and programming
6. Operations

The reason that the Shaw effort is problematic is that it is focused on a logo and idea and banners, but most of the steps of an overall process are missing.

What's needed is an arts district management plan. Just how the Maryland Heritage Areas Authority requires that Maryland's heritage areas have a management and development plan before they can be designate.

Closest to DC is the Anacostia Trail Heritage Area, designated by the State of Maryland, which has a management plan and an evaluation (oops, their website seems to be down) online.

Similarly, the Gateway Arts District in Prince George's County started with a management plan. (Although I don't think there's been an evaluation.)

Start with a plan, and have it be nuanced, with separate sub-district plans for different parts of the districct (14th Street, U Street, 9th Strete, etc.).

But throwing up banners and coming up with a logo are only a couple of deliverables from what should be a more complete planning and implementation process for the maintenance and strengthening of the arts and culture programs in the Greater Shaw neighborhood.