The Georgetown Metropolitan

This week for Georgetown Time Machine, GM is returning again to the Willard R. Ross postcard collection. Specifically he’s checking out a photo from New Year’s Eve, 1928, of the Renwick Chapel in Oak Hill Cemetery.

Not a whole lot has changed of this scene ninety plus years later:

Of course one very significant thing has changed: the ivy. It covered the chapel in 1928 and is gone now. It’s unclear when the ivy was first grown over the building. It was described as “ivy-covered” in 1888 during the funeral of William W. Corcoran (who created Oak Hill Cemetery and commissioned the chapel):

The chapel was built in 1850 and designed by James Renwick in his famous gothic revival style. Growing ivy over it was probably in keeping with the ancient look Renwick was aiming for.

Good morning Georgetown here’s the latest:

• New book released documenting the history of GU owning enslaved people.
• Speaking of GU: Max Scherzer didn’t let GU commencement get in the way of his workouts.

Yesterday, the Dc Council committee on Ward redistricting held its first public hearing. It did not take long before the tensions around this process emerged. But (at least for yesterday) the discussion revolved around possible changes elsewhere, particularly Ward 6. This makes sense since the changes there will likely have to be the most drastic of this cycle. But Ward 2 will need trimming too. And GM considered this possibility last November. And this is what he wrote:

With the 2020 Census wrapping up, the contentious steps of reapportionment are on the horizon. And while DC sadly does not have any Congressional reapportionment to worry over, we do need to redraw the ward boundaries again. And given the huge population growth in other parts of the city, it is not beyond the realm of possibility that Georgetown could rejoin Ward 3.

The reason to redraw the ward lines is that the city is required by law to maintain roughly equal populations for each. So essentially the city takes the total population counted by the Census and divides it by eight. That resulting number is the target population each ward must meet by either growing or reducing in geographic size. So, if a ward grew faster than the average, then it has to be reduced in size to bring its total population down.

But reducing or growing a ward isn’t done in isolation. That land has to come from or go to another ward, which itself might need to grow or shrink irrespective of what the first ward needs to do. So needless to say it’s a complicated matter! And that’s just talking about math and geography. It gets exponentially more complicated when politics enter. And next year will likely be an explosive year on the politics front, as GM will explain.

Good morning Georgetown, here’s the latest:

• The plan to bring a floating canoe dock to the canal appears set to be approved.
• More on the new canal boat.

It was just about a year ago that GM lamented the fact that the public pools were unlikely to open that summer. And it was just last month that GM was celebrating that the pools would be open this summer, albeit with a 50% capacity limitation. Well now the city has announced that the pools are opening on time this weekend and with no limits on capacity.

This is incredibly welcome news to residents who baked with little relief from the heat last summer. Georgetowners are blessed with two fantastic outdoor pools at Volta Park and Jelleff. And it will be fantastic to take a dip soon. The hours will be the normal pre-Covid hours: 11-8 on the weekdays and 11-6 on the weekends. Volta is closed Mondays and Jelleff is closed Wednesdays.

There will be reams of papers written debating whether closing outdoor pools in the middle of a pandemic was the right call or not (particularly when you’re opening restaurants for indoor dining at the same time). But for now, let’s take a breath and dive in!

Good morning Georgetown, here’s the latest:

• “Chambongs” (and other fancy booze) available at the Donahue cocktail bar.
• How Georgetown is reacting to “Georgetown”, the movie.

The DC Department of Transportation is pushing ahead with its plans to repair sidewalks throughout Georgetown with composite material over the objections of the ANC.

As every resident knows, while they are lovely, brick sidewalks can be hazardous. It does not take much to make them a tripping hazard. And growing tree roots are especially a problem in terms of pushing the bricks up. Historically, to fix this the city would occasionally come in and remove the offending bricks and replace them with an asphalt patch. This would often sit for months or years before the city would then get around to rebuilding that portion of the brick sidewalk.

Starting recently, the city began taking a different approach. It started using porous flexible pavement (PFP). PFP has the appearance of asphalt but is–as the name suggests–flexible. This has the benefit of allowing the sidewalk to bend around the growing tree root while still maintaining a smooth and safe sidewalk.