The Georgetown Current
Wednesday, August 16, 2017
Beach Drive overhaul touts first milestone
City tackles Water St. safety after homicide
NAMASTE
■ Georgetown: Lighting,
security cameras among plans
By ALEXA PERLMUTTER Current Correspondent
The first phase of the Beach Drive reconstruction project has concluded, and the newly refinished stretch of roadway from Rock Creek Parkway to Tilden Street and Park Road NW is scheduled to open fully by the end of August. To celebrate its completion, the National Park Service and Rock Creek Conservancy are hosting a block party on Sunday. The rehabilitation of Beach Drive and its adjacent pedestrian/ bicycle trail began in September 2016, and road closures will continue in phases through fall 2019 as the project advances north toward the Maryland line. The Aug. 20 block party, during which guests are invited to try out the upgraded trail and roadway on foot or on any non-motorized vehicles, marks the end of 1.82 miles of construction. The festivities will begin at 1 p.m. at the Beach Drive entrance to the National Zoo. The entrance has been outfitted See Beach/Page 2
By GRACE BIRD Current Staff Writer
Following last month’s fatal shooting under the Whitehurst Freeway, officials are taking steps to improve public safety in the Water Street NW corridor, which include improving lighting and installing security cameras. While proposed changes often divide Georgetown residents, worries about crime-conducive conditions along the waterfront draw a
firm consensus: Something must be done. “It has definitely been an ongoing issue in Georgetown,” Joe Gibbons, chair of Advisory Neighborhood Commission 2E (Georgetown, Burleith), said in an interview. In the early hours of July 8, a double shooting in the 3500 block of Water Street killed 19-year-old Kennedy Javier Amaya-Olivares and left another man injured. The homicide took place in the area near the road’s terminus at the Capital Crescent Trail beyond the Key Bridge. Following the incident, the See Water Street/Page 10
Georgetown Day modifies Tenley development plans ■ School: Mixed-use project
Brian Kapur/The Current
Last Wednesday’s “Sunset Fitness in the Park” installment featured a one-hour class presented by Georgetown Yoga. The summertime program at Georgetown Waterfront Park continues weekly through Aug. 30.
dropped from GDS proposal By GRACE BIRD Current Staff Writer
Effort seeks to link gas leaks, dying trees By GRACE BIRD Current Staff Writer
Last week, after spending two days examining trees in Georgetown for signs of gas leak-related decline, natural gas industry veteran Bob Ackley recorded 40 to 60 leaks in Georgetown and “many dying trees.” Ackley has claimed a connection between gas leaks and dying trees since leaving his industry job a decade ago. However, his contention that urban trees suffer slow deaths when exposed to natural gas has drawn some skepticism. According to Michael Chuko of the D.C. Urban Forestry Division, there is no evidence to suggest that leaks commonly cause
Vol. XXVII, No. 3
Serving Burleith, Foxhall, Georgetown, Georgetown Reservoir & Glover Park
Grace Bird/The Current
Bob Ackley checks Georgetown’s trees for issues he links to gas.
trees to die. The agency does not test trees for signs of gas damage because it doesn’t have the equipment or the expertise to do so, Chuko said. However, Washington Gas is required to call the city’s arborists when it performs an
emergency tree excavation, and Chuko said he has never seen evidence that gas leaks are causing trees to die. Mark Buscaino, executive director of the Casey Trees nonprofit, shares Chuko’s skepticism. Most urban trees die from a lack of soil, he said. If a tree were to die from a gas leak, it “would be brown all the way from the top to the bottom, it would just be dead. … It’s a sudden death,” Buscaino said. In Ackley’s view, the Urban Forestry Division and Casey Trees are ill-informed about natural gas. “They don’t have any data supporting or against what I’m talking about, so how would they know?” See Trees/Page 5
Georgetown Day School has revised its expansion plans, modifying the design of its planned lower/middle school and indefinitely suspending a proposed mixed-use development. The school had originally developed an ambitious proposal to transform the area around its 4200 Davenport St. NW high school, with hopes at one point of breaking ground by mid-2017. In 2014 Georgetown Day purchased the Safeway supermarket across Davenport, along with the former Martens car dealerships along Wisconsin Avenue across 42nd Street. The Martens property was to become two large mixed-use buildings, providing revenue for the school’s operations. The Safeway site was to become a new home for the lower/middle school, currently located in the Palisades. At the July 20 meeting of Advisory Neighborhood Commission 3E (Friendship Heights, Tenley-
Brian Kapur/The Current
A school building will replace the old Davenport Street Safeway.
town), school officials presented a more modest approach. Now, the new lower/middle school building would be about 24 percent smaller than earlier plans and sit 120 feet farther from residences on 43rd Street. And the mixed-use project, the subject of extensive community controversy, is not moving forward in the foreseeable future. But even the revised proposal faces community concerns about the local traffic impact, with ANC 3E members and other residents challenging the school for allowing so many of its students to arrive by car. According to estimates provided by the school’s See GDS/Page 11
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