The Georgetown Metropolitan

Yesterday I celebrated the return of leaf peeping season. Today I’m, well, not celebrating, but announcing the far less glamorous leaf picking up season.

The city did a fairly poor job of collection leaves last year. Some of this can be chalked up to weather, but the long and the short of it was that people followed the city’s instructions when to put out leaves, the city was extremely late, and the piles and bags of leaves turned into a giant mess in the meantime. In some cases the bags broke open, frozen solid and created a genuinely dangerous tripping hazard.

The city acknowledged its shortcomings and is trying a different approach this year. Instead of giving a far off window for when the crews plan to service a particular neighborhood, the city is waiting until much closer to the date before alerting residents. So there’s no target date for when leaves will be collected in Georgetown as of right now. But we will get a notification the week before our collection. That way the leaves will be out on the sidewalk a much shorter time-frame. The notifications will come a variety of ways, including from door hangers and from the website. I will try to spread the word as it comes in as well. The collections begin October 30th. There will be (at least) two passes through each neighborhood.

Will this work better than last year? We’ll see! It’s hard to imaging it working worse.

Good morning Georgetown, here’s the latest:

• Madeleine Albright’s former house sells.
• Georgetown Women’s Basketball coach dies.

Fall foliage is a little late this year in Georgetown due to the warmer days. But it’s right around the corner. And when it arrives, there are plenty places to take it in right here without hopping off for the country.

In 2013, Casey Trees pulled together some recommended walking routes around the city to take in the brightly changing leaves. In Georgetown it recommended a meandering trail through the heart of the village to enjoy its sugar maples:

Good morning Georgetown, here’s the latest:

• Former Capitol Police officer pleads guilty to unauthorized high speed chase and a hit-and-run that left a cyclist injured on Wisconsin Ave. in 2020.
• How a 1949 Washington Post article reportedly inspired the Exorcist.

Good morning Georgetown, here’s the latest:

• Help Black cemeteries in Georgetown by securing your holiday wreath now!
• What Metro could mean for Georgetown.

In this month’s Old Georgetown Board plans, a new sign application appears to indicate that Brompton is opening a shop at 1214 Wisconsin Ave. (formerly the Scotch and Soda).

For those not into niche bikes: Brompton makes high quality foldable bikes. The idea is that after you use the bike, you can compact it down and transport or store it much more easily than a normal bike. Here’s how they work:

Good morning Georgetown, here’s the latest:

• Fancy new tasting room opens up in second floor at Apero.
• The long planned sports betting parlor is apparently still coming to the old Ri Ra space.

This week for Georgetown Time Machine, I’m dipping back into the collection of 1993 shots I have. This one features one of the former classic fast food restaurants that used to be in Georgetown: Roy Rogers.

Nowadays this spot (southwest corner of Wisconsin and Prospect) hosts the Wawa. Prior to that for many years it had the Restoration Hardware store. But from sometime in the 1970s through to the 90s, it had the Roy Rogers. Although at its peak this chain stretched across the country, it has its oldest roots right in the DC area. It was started in the late 60s by the Marriott Corp to compete with Bob’s Big Boy. The first location opened in Bailey’s Crossroads, with may more scattered around the DC suburbs to follow.

Good morning Georgetown, here’s the latest:

• Canal boat “ghost tour” tickets on sale!
• It was an extremely long time coming, but demolition of the West Heating Plant has finally begun.

Live music will come to the Georgetown library on October 28th. The event, called Library Jam Fest, will feature DJ Wonder and three DC bands: Kinda Evil, Red Medicine and Lucky So & Sos. It will run from 2 pm to 5 pm and take place in the rear of the library.

In case you’re curious, here’s a clip of some of the bands to play!