Deadly Fire Only Feet Away Deauville

The fire at 3132 16th Street NW yesterday morning happened only feet away from the 2008 apartment building fire at the Deauville, 3145 Mount Pleasant St.  The buildings are nearly back-to-back. The stories related to yesterday's fire will come out over the next few weeks. However, here are some collected by the Red Cross from residents of the Deauville. I hadn't seen these accounts before last night.

Yesterday morning's fire was, unfortunately, deadly. One man, identified as Patrocinio Perez, died attempting to escape the building. Just a very sad turn of events during a week of other heartbreaking news of personal tragedies in the DC area. 

The investigation is ongoing regarding the cause, but the impact is obviously immediate for those involved. There are over 100 people temporarily or permanently displaced. Clean up crews, DC Fire and MPD were on the scene late into last night and this morning and will be for the near future. Several residents are still hospitalized, some seriously. 

Yesterday, Old School Hardware (3219 Mt P St, formerly Pfieffer's) was collecting donations to be delivered at the appropriate time. I assume that is still the case for today, but have not verified that. MyFoxDC is also reporting that Martha's Table is collecting donations on site at 2114 14th St NW and that Neighbors Consejo is collecting donations to help transport Mr. Perez' body back to his home for burial. More information at the bottom of this page.

Early Morning Fire at Mount Pleasant Building

Early morning fire at Mount Pleasant apartment building; 3132 16th St NW. Sadly, there is a report of one person who has died and several who are injured.  Over one hundred displaced at the moment. Apparently it started sometime after midnight and was called in around 3:45AM. The investigation is ongoing at this point regarding the cause. 

Burritos Fast is Now Tex Mex Burrito?

Perplexed by this change. During Fiesta DC, I stopped by a fairly busy Burritos Fast for what ended up being my dinner. I picked up what I thought was a menu from a nearby competitor, "Tex Mex Burrito." But, then I opened it and it had pretty much the same selection. Then I looked on the back page and sure enough, the address of Tex Mex Burrito was listed as 3213 Mount Pleasant Street NW, the same as Burrito Fast.

They're changing the name. Not sure why. The new name is written on the front window. I'm partial to Burritos Fast, but hey, maybe Tex Mex Burrito is more exciting sounding.

The website listed on the new menu wasn't active yet and it also advertised for catering and delivery, which I'm pretty sure they didn't offer before this name change? New territory for Burritos Fast. The veggie burrito I ordered was huge and tasted the same as always, so I'll be back.

Amsterdam Falafel Shop Going National

Adams Morgan's own Amsterdam Falafel is going national. There's one location to date, 2425 18th Street NW. The owners are now offering franchise opportunities that will take the brand --and its vegan friendly menu-- to the other 50 states. 

To start, they're offering franchising in 15 mid-Atlantic and southern states. Another 10 other states from the Midwest and Northeast are being considered for the next round. Start small, then take over the world. Or country.

Not sure how much one would have to invest to acquire a franchise.

Amsterdam has done a good job building its brand in DC over the last few years. The menu is simple, they're open late night, and the food is cheap. Although it wasn't the first to serve falafel in the District, it did beat Maoz Veg to the DC scene and spawned a few falafel competitors including Old City Cafe and Shawarma King.

Now to convince someone to open a franchise in my hometown of Richmond. Give Aladdin Express a run for their money. Good luck guys!

Shelter Closing, Apartments Planned

rendering of proposed towers

La Casa, the closest shelter to Mount Pleasant, is closing. I first read about the possible closure a few weeks ago in a copy of Street Sense. Obviously they editorialized against the closing noting that as of last year, there were over 6,000 homeless in DC per the annual count. They anticipate that number to increase for 2010.  

La Casa, at 1436 Irving St NW, is a 90 bed facility, houses only men, offers bilingual services and is open 7pm until 7am daily. According to the Street Sense article, there are currently 72 men in the shelter and the adjacent trailers. It will close as of October 15, 2010.

The paper trail on the new project spans a few years and is somewhat contradictory and incomplete.  However, this is my understanding:

After La Casa closes, it will be torn down and replaced with two new buildings: an addition to Donatelli Development's Highland Park Apartments and a community based residential facility.

Highland Park was originally built as a condominium building and went rental, like many other DC projects during the economic downturn. Apartments there currently rent from $1,800-$3,900 per month.

The land under La Casa shelter (and adjacent lot) is owned by the District of Columbia.  They have a deal with Donatelli to allow an extension of Highland Park, but also to build an 82 bed community based residential facility (CBRF) on that land.  What is a CBRF? From the proposal: "Community Based Residential Facilities (CBRFs) are single room occupancy facilities for homeless residents in the District. These facilities combine living quarters with job training, housing placement, case management, and other needed services that promote self-sufficiency."

La Casa is currently operated by the District and the DC Coalition for the Homeless, a non-profit. No indication of who would run the CBRF (the city, another non-profit, a private entity?) or if it would serve any of the same people housed at La Casa. 

The CBRF would be in the rear of the property (see rendering).  The new apartment tower --dubbed Highland Park West (HPW)-- would front on Irving Street and be physically connected to the original Highland Park, sharing a courtyard.  Both CBRF and HPW were proposed as seven floors tall. They would be separate structures.

Originally, Highland Park West was supposed to have 69 units, top out at 86 feet and have a 64 space underground garage.  There would be a penthouse level rising 9 feet above the roof line as well. 

That may change soon. The developers have a zoning hearing on September 30 in order to propose several changes. They want to increase the number of apartment units from 69 to 143.  They want to increase the roof line from 86 to 90 feet (plus 9 foot penthouse level above). And finally, they want to eliminate the parking garage and alter the façade from what you see in the rendering to an aesthetic that more closely matches the existing Highland Park.

It is not clear if Highland Park West will include ground floor retail like the original building does.  They are just about to fill out that retail space with a sports bar (allegedly). Highland Park is already home to a bank, coffee shop, sandwich shop, pizza parlor, burger joint and gastropub.  

What will happen to the beds eliminated by the closure of La Casa? Street Sense suggests the additional beds will be made available in empty spaces of the DC General Hospital site (near Stadium Armory Metro stop).

Will the CBRF help ease the transition for some of its residents from homelessness to permanent housing?  That is the plan. Will the elimination of beds for the homeless in Ward One make for a more difficult winter for those men (and homeless women, children and families) who will have to travel further for the same services? I hope not. If I find out more about this story I will keep you posted.

For updates on this story and more, follow The42 on Twitter.

Highland Park Apts (left) and La Casa shelter

Fiesta DC Visits Mount Pleasant on Sunday

now on Twitter @The42BusDC

Fiesta DC is this Sunday! And it's now the de facto Mount Pleasant Day. After the neighborhood's namesake fest died years ago --2005 saw the last large scale Mt P Fest-- Fiesta DC became our only major yearly street festival. Even after it was thiiiiiiiis close to relocating to Columbia Heights, Fiesta DC is still strongly associated with Mount Pleasant and I think we're the rightful home at this point.

Because it's held up and down Mount Pleasant Street NW, Fiesta DC might be considered a quint, small time party with booths to stroll by and enjoy casually without being at all crowded. It's not. This Fiesta attracts tens of thousands of visitors. The street is packed and I often wonder how the Parade of Nations even happens or is seen. But it happens. And I always go because it's fun, the parade rules and the music rules (5 stages!). And it's ours! I hope it never moves to 14th Street, which I guess is still entirely possible.  

Fiesta DC was first held in 1971 and honors Hispanic History Month. It will take place this Sunday, September 26 from 11:00am until 7:00pm. Generally, all events are held on Mount Pleasant street NW between Park Rd and Argonne Pl.  Recently, the some of the music stages have spilled over onto Argonne Pl, Kilbourne or Kenyon.  The highlight is always the Parade of Nations, which features dancers, musicians and performers from over 30 groups representing various nations.  The Parade is scheduled from 1-3pm and begins at the top of Mount Pleasant and heads south the length of the festival route.

Last year:

Mount Pleasant West: The Mission and Clarion Alley

After my first visit to the Bay Area in high school, I fell in love with San Francisco, Berkley and the little bit of Oakland I saw. On a recent visit I spent most of my time hanging around the Mission in SF and pretty much living as a local (who ate every meal out and had soy lattes a couple of times per day).  I even looked for the 42 bus (doesn't exist) and the 43 bus (does, but I didn't ride it). 

The Mission neighborhood is very much like Mount Pleasant, with higher density and more restaurants, coffee shops, vintage stores and used book shops.  We could aspire to be it in a few years.  Like Mount P, it has several important and busy traffic thoroughfares and is adjacent to other busy neighborhoods (Castro, Noe Valley).  There are hardly any chain stores (off the main strip anyway) and coffee shops dominate the landscape (not the case here).  Wonderful  neighborhood.

Another great part of the Mission and SF in general is the public art, specifically murals.  We have public murals in DC and some not so public ones.  There are the WPA murals inside government buildings, outside murals to prominent Americans, and murals used to teach about murals.  Clarion Alley is in the Mission and is literally an alley connecting Valencia and Mission Streets.  Over the years, talented SF artists have filled its walls, fences and doors with mini murals. Some are political, some are spiritual and some are fantasy. Is there a DC version of Clarion Alley?  I know of murals-graffiti in alleys, but not in such a concentration. Here's a taste of Clarion Alley:

17th and Newton NW

Bread and Puppets at St. Stephens

Our friends Puppet Underground are back with Vermont's Bread and Puppet theater.  You may have encountered Puppet Underground at the Las Posadas or Chilly Day Cabaret  performances of last winter. They seem to come through NW DC two or three times a year.  This time they are performing at St. Stephen's church across the street from Mt Pleasant at 16th and Newton.

The Decapitalization Circus will be here next Tuesday and Wednesday, September 28-29. Performances are at 7pm each day.  There is a sliding scale for donations --$5 to $15-- although I can't imagine anyone will be turned away, per the usual policy.  

The description from Bread and Puppet:

"The Decapitalization Circus demonstrates in numerous death-defying stunts the phantastic effects of the capitalization of life in the U.S. and citizens’ courageous efforts of decapitalization. The performers represent the whole scale of the social spectrum from benign billionairism to despicable homeless anti-social-elementarianism. All the acts are FDA and FBI certified displays of patriotic correctness and defy all imaginable forms of terrorism. The Possibilitarians, a multi-instrumental variety ensemble, provide the appropriate-inappropriate sounds for the circus."

H Street Festival This Weekend

Ahhhhhh....  I've really enjoyed attending the H Street Festival the last two years.  Unfortunately I will have to miss it this year, but the show will go on and you should join in!  It's tomorrow, Saturday September 18, noon until 6pm.  Here are photos from the 2009 Fest and this year's looks bigger and better.  

Included this year are a "hands behind your back" pie eating contest and --an event I'm sad to miss-- a tattoo contest!  Got a great looking tattoo?  Unique one?  Not so great looking one?  Show it off and maybe win a prize (actually just bragging rights and a trophy).  If you have one of the worst tattoos, you could win tattoo time to "fix" your not-so-favorite piece of work.

Other highlights include:

*Gallery art shows at Studio H and City Gallery

*3 stages of live music (now on par with Adams Morgan Day)

*Fashion show complete with catwalk (this was a blast last year)

*Boxing ring (I guess for boxing?)

*Speed chess challenge

*Bike valet (FREE!)

*Shuttle buses from Eastern Market and Gallery Place (new this year, I believe)

*Of course festival food, local vendors and patio style partying at various restaurants on the strip

Did I mention it's tomorrow!  Sorry I can't be there, so take a shuttle, listen to some music and play a game of speed chess for me.  To those of you with bad tattoos, don't be scared!  Just do it.

Adams Morgan Day 2010: More Photos

A few more, just for fun...

Capital Bikeshare Now in Mount Pleasant

Shame on me!  I was super skeptical last weekend when told that Capital Bikeshare would be ready for its September 20 launch.  1,000
bikes? 100 stations? No way!

Yes way!

And it's already here in Mount Pleasant. The new Capital Bikeshare station has been installed and is in service (sans bikes) right in our very own Lamont Park. The station is solar powered, the card reader is operational, signage is up and the automated bike dispensers are in place. Just awaiting the bikes!

One question I had was answered by visiting the station. I knew that a one-day membership was $5, but I wondered what CaBi (their abbreviation!) would do to insure riders returned the bike. Well, similar to a common car rental practice, CaBi will place a $101 hold on your credit card for a 24 hour membership until the 24 hour period is over.  Of course if you register for a longer term (30 days or 1 year), that won't be the case.  Your card will already be registered.  You'll get the bike for no cost for 30 minutes, then pay more depending on how long you keep the bike before docking it back in a station. According to Capital Bikeshare, they've signed up close to 1,000 members already.  They have an introductory offer of $50 for one year, down from the regular fee of $75.  Pretty cool.  Some photos:

Gimmie 5: The 42 Now on Twitter

I owe myself 5 bucks.  I bet myself that I would never join Twitter, but I lost.  I guess technically the blog joined, but I'm be the author, so yeah, I lost.

I will try to make it about news, but also some funny stuff I think of riding the bus, walking the streets, people watching and taking part in the 24 hour media cycle that DC is blessed/cursed with.  Probably will be more opinionated than the blog; as much as one can opine in a single sentence.  And I'll link to cool articles or news items.  I'll take some photos as well.

If you ended up losing a bet and joining Twitter as well, you can add The 42 Bus here.  Or just look at the sidebar at the top of the screen and new messages will show up on a regular basis.

Vote Today for DC's Mayor, Council

With all due respect to the Republicans and Statehood Greens, the election for Mayor of Washington DC happens today and will be determined by Democrats. Although today's vote is technically a party primary, DC's overwhelming registered Democratic majority virtually ensures that that party's primary winner will prevail in the general election.

If you live in Mount Pleasant, you are likely voting in one of two schools:  Bancroft Elementary at 1755 Newton Street NW or Bell Multicultural High at 3101 16th Street NW.  Some of you way down on Harvard St NW closer to Adams Morgan will vote at H.D. Cooke School.  Check your registration card or DC Board of Elections and Ethics website. Where ever you vote, the polls are open from 7:00AM until 8:00PM.

You have to be registered as a member of one of the three major political parties to vote today (that's Dem, Rep or Green).  Those registered as Independent will vote during the general election on November 2, 2010.

Ward One residents who are registered to one of the three major parties will cast votes for:

*Mayor

*Council Chair

*At-large Council Member

*Ward One Council Member

*Delegate to the U.S. House of Representatives

*United States Representative

Here's a PDF from DCBOEE with all candidates for all three parties across all DC Wards.

Only the Democrats are fielding candidates in each office for Ward One.  Republican and Statehood Green Parties are fielding partial slates, although all voters are entitled to write in a candidate for any office or not vote at all.  Good luck and see you at the polls.

Adams Morgan Day 2010 in the Books

A rainy morning and a tragic animal death created a bummer of a start to Adams Morgan Day.  A friend told me about the shooting of a dog that happened just minutes before I arrived, but I heard nothing else of it until I got home and read reports on several news sites and watched the evening news.  

Unaware, most of the thousands of visitors enjoyed the improving weather and streamed up and down 18th Street throughout the day.  Some of the other notes and highlights from the day, and photos too.

*Very much like Columbia Heights Day, politicians and their supporters were a dominant force.  Fenty, Gray, Graham, Smith, Weaver, even ANC candidates had a presence.  

*Madam's Organ was Vincent Gray central and actually opened this year.  They closed in protest last year.

*Ben's Chili Bowl made their first ever appearance at Adams Morgan Day.

*The Green and Health Pavilions returned, as did the kids' area complete with multiple moon-bounces.

*Three music stages with rock, soul, cover songs, indie music and more. 

*PETA's "lettuce ladies" got lots of attention and handed out veg friendly info to festival goers.  Sorry, no photos, but one of the ladies had also run a triathlon yesterday morning.  Impressive.

*Keren Restaurant was still putting together the pieces after a drunk driver hit two people and destroyed their storefront last week.

*Karaoke outside Peyote Cafe is now a tradition and as expected performers were either lounge singer good or cringe worthy bad.  Not many middling types.  One guy played a violin to the music instead of singing.

*Once again, people watching topped all other activities as DC's best, weirdest, prettiest, quirky, over-dressed, under-dressed, fashion challenged, stroller pushing, mouth stuffing, skinny, chubby, mostly happy crowd descended upon its most unique neighborhood.  

As crazy as this neighborhood gets on certain nights of the week, it's DC's best for having a good time.  Adams Morgan Day Fest is possibly the best of the local neighborhood festivals.  We didn't need a nice dog to be shot and killed to make it a memorable day.  Here's to a less violent finish to the festival season.

Friday Fun Post: 90s Redux

For reasons unknown 90s music has dominated the last week for me.  Coming up on my music players' playlist, my friends' fb pages, all over random TV commercials.  As of next year, the 90s will officially be more than a decade behind us...  Crazy!  So, I was thinking about my favorite music from the 90s.  gotta give a tip of the hat to Red Hot Chili Peppers, and here's one of their best songs.  And, you know what, it's actually from 1989, but yeah, so what.   Red Hot Chili Peppers ruled much of the 80s, 90s and 00s alterna-scene.  This is Knock Me Down from Mothers Milk.  Have a great weekend!  See you at VegFest!

History in Art and Story: Portrait Talks at Smithsonian's NPG

The National Portrait Gallery always has great programming to go along with the stellar collection and gorgeous building.

These talks are based on specific portraits hanging in the Gallery, which shares the old Patent Office Building with the Smithsonian American Art Museum. NPG is located at 801 F Street NW, one block away from the closest 42 bus stop. As a former Richmonder, I think I need to see the Edgar Allan Poe talk. And as a sports fan, maybe the Babe Ruth talk, too!

From the Gallery:

Face-to-Face Portrait Talks
Thursdays, September 9, 16, 23, and 30, 6:00 - 6:30pm

Join a curator, historian, or special guest speaker to learn more about the people and their portraits hanging in the National Portrait Gallery. September Face-to-Face talks feature the theme paper trail. Each Thursday a different portrait is highlighted. Meet in the F Street lobby.

September 9 (TODAY!)- Historian Jim Barber speaks about Babe Ruth by William Auerbach-Levy

September 16 - Researcher Warren Perry speaks about Edgar Allan Poe by Samuel Stillman
September 23 - Curatorial Assistant Amy Baskette speaks about Carl Sandburg by William A. Smith
September 30 - NASA Curator of Art Bert Ulrich speaks about John Glenn by Henry Casselli Jr.

Mitchell Park, Hidden Gem in Sheridan-Kalorama

I love the hustle and bustle of Adams Morgan, Dupont and all the life along the 42 bus route.  But I also appreciate the area west of Connecticut Avenue and north of Dupont; the quiet and reserved neighborhood of Sheridan-Kalorama.  It's home to princely private mansions, immaculate embassies and even the home of a former President.

And add to that list a beautiful hidden gem: Mitchell Park.  At 1801 23rd Street NW, the park is nearly equidistant to Massachusetts and Connecticut Avenues.  Mitchell Park recently underwent a $1.2 million renovation and it shows.  

Elevated a few feet above street level, you really have to walk up to appreciate the beauty.  Wild grasses and diverse plant life surround long park benches and the field house-recreation building.  A open grassy field,  multi-sport courts courts and children's playground area complete the park, which is about the size of a whole city block.  It's one of several park-based sites where the District operates it's Cooperative Play initiative during the school year for the city's youngest citizens; ages 18 months to 5 years.

Neat history tidbit: Part of the land under Mitchell Park used to belong to the German government.  The United States seized the German property during WW II and consolidated it with the existing, adjacent parkland.  However, before the seizure, in 1929, the Germans razed a farm house on the parcel that was built  in 1795 by Anthony Holmead.  The Holmead family were major land owners in the District and Anthony Holmead also owned, subdivided, sold and even helped name almost all the land that became Pleasant Plains, then Columbia Heights and Mount Pleasant.  Pretty cool.

Adams Morgan Day is September 12

Yes, it's about that time again!