The Georgetown Metropolitan

A happy game of musical chairs has taken place down on Grace St. recently. Some established shops have moved around and some new faces have appeared.

The Grace Street Collective is the brainchild of Jessica and Ezra Glass and consists of a series of commercial spaces on the north side of the street. Focusing on quality tenants with high co-tenancy (i.e. they work well together) the Glasses turned a sleepy side street into a millennial magnet. Walk into the space (at least pre-Covid) on any random day and it was packed with a decidedly young crowd sipping coffee, dressed in athleisure wear, chatting with friends.

Good morning Georgetown, here’s the latest:

• More on the lawsuit against the Georgetown fraternity and its executive director.
• Correction to GM’s early post on DC public pools: the hours are different this year. They will be open from 10 to 6 every day. That’s an hour earlier on the weekends, and two hours earlier on the weekdays. But it comes at the cost of closing two hours early on the weeknights, which is a really blow to working adults who want to get a swim in after knocking off.

GM always puts out an advisory in April to start watering your trees. And without fail, we end up with a wet April and/or early May, which largely makes watering trees, even new ones, not strictly necessary.

But that always comes to an end. And that end is nigh. June is already pounding us with summer heat and despite some rainy spells last week, we’re still in a bit of a drought. Any young trees on your block will need someone to water them stat. At least 25 gallons a week, all summer long.

Good morning Georgetown, here’s the latest:

• The DC Office of Attorney General sued the executive director of the Delta Phi Epsilon fraternity for abusing his authority for decades and directing the fraternity’s assets towards his personal use, among other allegations.
• GM makes an incredibly brief appearance in this piece on the new Stephen Starr restaurant.

Tuesday night, renowned restauranteur, Stephen Starr, announced at the ANC meeting that he is intending to open an Italian market/restaurant in the historic Georgetown Market building (formerly the Dean and Deluca).

The plans for the space were shown and described. As you can see from the floor plan above, the idea is that there would be a market/bakery/gelato/espresso area in the front of the building. And then the rest of the space would be taken up with space for the kitchen and seating areas for the restaurant. It would appear then that the market element of the plan would be rather small, one might say token. That’s notable since federal law actually requires the space to be used as a market.

Good morning Georgetown, here’s the latest:

• GM will discuss this more later, but Stephen Starr is opening an Italian restaurant in the old Dean and Deluca and everyone is psyched.
• Big items for Georgetown parks and facilities in the mayor’s proposed budget.

As previously discussed, parking enforcement has resumed in Georgetown (and the rest of DC). The city had stopped ticketing most infractions since the beginning of the pandemic, but that has (almost entirely) come to an end.

Not all infractions were overlooked over the past year. For instance, parking in an illegal spot could still garner you a pink reward under your wiper blades. But parking meters and other time limitations were unenforced. Some viewed this as a boon. Travel along the mall early in the morning and you’d see car after car with Maryland and Virginia plates, as nearby workers took advantage of the unlimited free parking.

But for residents in neighborhoods like Georgetown, it was a different story. Those same cars with Maryland and Virginia plates have been able to remain parked on residential blocks all day long with zero consequence. This in turn reduces parking for residents. It has also allowed the hundreds of off-campus Georgetown students to keep their out-of-state cars on the street all year. (Theoretically off-campus students could register their cars in DC and get a parking permit, but they rarely do).

Good morning Georgetown, here’s the latest:

• The tiny P St. house just sold again.
• Heavy turnover for off campus students this week. Are they moving in to do internships or just to get away from their parents?