We've Moved

The Triangle blog has moved to a new location: www.mvtriangleblog.com. Please update your bookmarks and join us on the new site.

For those who read our blog on RSS reader the new feed is http://www.mvtriangleblog.com/?feed=rss2

2009 Year in Review

This past year was a busy year for the neighborhood and the blog. We published 414 postings, more than doubled the prior year's site traffic and welcomed Kim as a new regular contributor in August.

Events

• Presidential Inauguration
  
• 2nd & Mass Tree Planting
  
• MVT Homes Tour
  
• Heart of DC Picnic
  
• New weekly Farmer's Market on Mount Vernon Square

Open for Business

• Lunar Massage
  
• The Passenger
  
• Taylor Gourmet
  
• Absolute Thai
  
• Henry's Soul Cafe
  
• Ping Pong Dim Sum
  
• Urfa Tomato Kabob
  
• Royal Thai Cuisine
  
• Chinatown Coffee
  
• Vapiano

The Promise of More to Come

• The Arts at 5th and Eye
  
• Buddha Bar
  
• Kushi
  
• 29,000 SF of retail at 425 Eye
  
• Ming's
  
• Fourth Street reconfiguration underway
  
• Public art installations at Madrigal Lofts and City Vista
  
• Updated Mount Vernon Place site plan
  
• New corporate ownership at the DuMont
  
• DDOT unveils streetcar network proposal

A few of my other fave posts

• Future of the K Street Streetscape
  
• Chinese Community Church exterior upgrade complete
  
• Discussion on temporary urbanism
  
• Ledo building is swiss cheese
  
• Updated design for 2nd & Mass Park
  
• What can be done with 4th & L?
  
• Bye-Bye Billboards
  
• Plans for Chinatown Park
  
• Pets of Mount Vernon Triangle
  
• Shepard Fairey poster removed in Chinatown
  
• Can't pick one? Go with two and stack them

Top Referral Sites

1. PQLiving
   
2. Matt Yglesias
   
3. DC Metrocentric
   
4. Life in MVSNA
   
5. DCist
   
6. Greater Greater Washington
   
7. Renew Shaw
   
8. Prince of Petworh

The Most viewed posts

1. More on Lift Off
   
2. Buddha Bar Update
   
3. DDOT efforts at 5th and Mass create new hazzards
   
4. DuMont still a sinking ship
   
5. Great Wall of AIPAC

Most Comments

1. Vacant buildings take a step toward progress (55)
   
2. Recap of DNA ABL Public Meeting - Level (30)
   
3. ANC 2C endorses Single Sale Moratorium exemption (25)
   
4. KC Pit BBQ at 6th and NY Ave (22)
   
5. Several tied at 18

Twitter updates

I created a Twitter feed for the blog back in late March and embedded it in the right sidebar. Updates were sparse and sometimes 3 weeks apart. Now that I've upgraded to a 3G phone I'm using the medium more.

Twitter will be a source for shorter and quicker updates that share facts that aren't worthy of a full blog posting or hint at posts to come. I don't anticipate relying on the tool too heavily as I know over 140 of you subscribe through Google Reader and thereby don't benefit from the feed and other sidebar content I've embedded on the blog.

Here are a few tweets from the last several days:

• The DuMont served notice of infraction (re: standing water/algae) by DCRA today and will be served violation if still unresolved on Friday (5 PM Aug 18th)
  
• DCMetrocentric posts a rendering for 600 Mass (sporting an urban moat?): (9:09 AM Aug 18th)
  
• Contractors have begun working inside Taylor Gourmet at City Vista today! HT @john_thompson (5:25 PM Aug 17th)

A new voice in the Triangle

[Ed note: Please welcome our newest contributor Kimberly. She will be posting under the name KimFromtheK]

---

Long Time Reader, Occasional Commenter, and First Time Blogger Kim here. I live in The K at City Vista (hence the name KimFromTheK) and have been in the neighborhood since the summer of 2005 (renting at 400 Mass before we closed on our condo last fall). I moved to DC in 2004 and really enjoy living and working in the downtown area. My friends consider me to be a foodie as I'm always interested in the newest restaurants and trying new cuisines, so I'm guessing that my posts will lean towards food-related topics but hopefully I'll expand my horizons as well.

I hope to share a new perspective on life in Mount Vernon Triangle with you, loyal readers.

To kick it off, I thought I'd share with you the top things I love about living in Mount Vernon Triangle:

• Meeting my neighbors--old and new--who are excited about living here
• I walk to work
• Penn Quarter Farmer's Market on Thursday afternoons
• All of the new development and retail slated for the near future
• Having a supermarket in my building after living in DC for 4 years and needing to drive to get groceries
• Being greeted by name at my favorite sushi place (Momiji) since I'm there about once a week
• Accessibility to public transportation via the circulator and 3 metro lines (plus 2 more if I'm willing to walk a bit further) when I want, but also easy access to 395 and NY Ave
• My new favorite cheap eat restaurant, Taylor Gourmet, is coming to my building very soon!

Despite all the great things about the neighborhood there are a few things I think we're lacking (namely, a quality nail salon!) but I'm curious what everyone else enjoys about living here. Please share in the comments--maybe I'll discover something new to explore.

Looking for new voices

I just wanted to remind our readers that we have a standing open invitation to community members to join our blog.

We would love to have a contributor representing each of the buildings that reside within or share a border with the Triangle such as Yale Lofts or 400 Mass. Equally important to us to represent a diversity of perspectives. I tend to gravitate towards development news but would love to have this forum touch on a wider array of community related topics.

If you have interest in joining the writing staff for the Triangle please contact me via email (mvtriangle|at|gmail|dot|com).

Word Cloud

Yesterday the Prince of Petworth posted a word cloud for a discussion he and his readers had on Room 11 wine bar. These clouds present a visualization of word frequency as a weighted list. Larger fonts represent the most frequent words while brighter colors signify most recent use. According to wikipedia, the first high profile used of tag clouds was the flickr photo sharing site. The technique has grown in popularity with other realms such as politics.

While this blog does use a tag cloud I was intrigued by what a word cloud based on all of our past postings and comments would look like. I exported the blog and submitted the text to wordle.net to come up with the following representation:


I'm very surprised to see "just" and "like" outsizing "retail", "Safeway" and "MVT". Perhaps I have been blissfully unaware that I write like a valley girl...

Twitter

I added a Twitter feed to the far right hand margin of the blog over the weekend. Most of my twitter postings will be to share facts that aren't worth a full blog post (such as today's re: museum square) or hint at posts to come. Occasionally my personal responses to other bloggers twitters will find their way into this stream.

A year ago today

A year ago today I joined the writing team for this blog. Over these 12 months I've contributed around 320 postings!

No More Wasted Space

I've enhanced the blog to use a new wide 3 column format. Big thanks to Jaime from Stop, Blog and Roll for the help.

The Year Ahead

The natural follow-up to our recap of 2008 is a preview of the year ahead.

The next twelve months will pose many new transformations for the Mount Vernon Triangle. We can speculate on some of the big stories for the year ahead:

News on current space

• Will The DuMont go apartment?
  
• Monitoring sales at Madrigal Lofts and City Vista
  
• Buddha Bar to open in late 2009?
  
• City Vista retail space for lease
  
• One small retail space still available at 455 Mass
  
• Space for lease at 400 Mass and Mass Court
  
• When will Ledos open?
  
• Will Paramount begin upgrading the CAAB building to Class A office space?

New Development

• Yale West construction will continue
  
• Mount Vernon Place may break ground on an office building
  
• The Arts at 5th and Eye will continue assemblage and begin permit and zoning processes
  
• Douglas Development will continue to refine the concept for Squares 450/451
  
• Will MRP initiate any progress on 6th and K?
  
• Will Steuart Investment begin to discuss concepts for Squares 483 and N-515?
  
• How much progress will Dreyfus make on engineering studies to build over I-395?

Public Space

• The restoration of Fourth Street to two-way traffic
  
• When will the Mass Ave sidewalks in front of DuMont ~AND~ Ledos reopen?
  
• Will progress begin at the park at 2nd and Mass?
  
• Will the planned public art be installed in front of Busboys and Poets?
  
• Will any improvements begin at the Chinatown park at 5th and Mass?

Quality of Life

• What will happen with Single Serve Moratorium Exemptions?
  
• Will DDOT finally listen and increase crossing times at 5th and New York?
  
• Will the homeless problem improve?
  
• Will the prostitution issues improve?

While all this is happening around us we hope we can continue to grow online community through participation with new blog contributors and readers.

2008 Year in Review

This blog was born on January 28, 2008 as a DuMont contract holder using the pen name Mediocre Bad Guy aimed to build an online community of residents both present and future. Just three short days later a Madrigal Lofts resident using the pen name Madrigal Blogs became an author for the blog. Early postings talked of Architecture, buildings lost forever, DuMont rumors and Peapod grocery shopping.

In mid March I finalized my condo hunt and chose Madrigal Lofts to be my new home. I responded to Mediocre Bad Guy's open invitation and joined the team. Other commitments have dramatically scaled back the involvement of our original two contributors to the blog. However since I took full adminstrative authority in June and commited to a frequent and dependable posting schedule the site traffic has more than tripled. I am also proud that and we've recently added Yale Loft's resident SteamingMyLaundry to the team.

Below are some highlights from the year.

Open for Business

• Papa Johns
  
• 5th Street Hardware
  
• Safeway
  
• Busboys and Poets
  
• Results the Gym
  
• Chevy Chase Bank
  
• The V Apartments
  
• The UPS Store

The Promise of More to Come

• The Arts at 5th and Eye
  
• Buddha Bar
  
• City Vista retail space for lease
  
• Mount Vernon Place
  
• Douglas Development's concept for Squares 450/451
  
• Yale West

So long, farewell, auf Wiedersehen, goodbye

• ICE leaves CAAB building
  
• National Public Radio moving to NoMA
  
• Demolition of a few vacants on 3rd
  
• WSD gives up on proposed Eye Street Lofts and sells parcels

A few of my other fave posts

• Bill McLeod on the Mount Vernon Triangle
  
• DCMetrocentric features The Triangle
  
• Block Group 3, Census Tract 47
  
• Mayhood presentation on Madrigal Lofts
  
• $2Million declined for a $200,000 property
  
• Big Green Monsters
  
• Tony Cheng's 5th Street property
  
• Firehouse Facade at 400 Mass
  
• Park Improvements at 2nd & Mass (proposed)
  
• Tracktwentynine on Back to the Future
  
• Good, not Great Stuff
  
• Bid Smackdown - Capitol Riverfront

Stats via Google Analytics:


Top Referral Sites

1. PQLiving
   
2. DCist
   
3. Life in MVSNA
   
4. Renew Shaw
   
5. DC Blogs
   
6. Greater Greater Washington
   
7. District Chatter
   
8. DC Metrocentric

The Most viewed posts

1. 5th & I Public Meeting recap
   
2. 7th & Hell
   
3. Safeway Flickr Stream
   
4. Shattered Windows at City Vista
   
5. MVSNA endorse Single Serve Moratorium Exemption (Most comments)

Welcome Jonathan!

The Triangle welcomes Jonathan from Yale Steam Laundry condominiums to our blogging team. Jonathan is on the MVSNA board of directors and the association's Pedestrian Safety and Transportation committee. Using the screen name SteamingMyLaundry, Jonathan will post semi-regularly and share his views from the north end of the Triangle.

We look forward to adding more neighbors who wish to contribute to the blog in the future. If you're interested drop me an email, we would love to be able to represent all of the condominiums in the Triangle!

and again, if you live across the street from the physical boundaries of the Triangle at one of 400 Mass, Yale Laundry, The Meridian, or Mass Court, you are still most definitely part of the Triangle community. Community doesn't truncate at invisible lines on a map.

Looking for new voices

I just wanted to remind our readers that we have a standing open invitation to community members to join our blog. A prominent voice from the liberal blogosphere, who recently moved to City Vista, nearly joined our cast but it ultimately fell through.

We would love to have a contributor representing each of the buildings that reside within or share a border with the Triangle like Yale Lofts or 400 Mass. It's also important to us to represent a diversity of perspectives. I tend to gravitate towards development news but would love to have this forum touch on a wider array of topics. If you have interest in joining the writing staff for the Triangle please contact me via email.

With a huge influx of new residents in the coming years a neighborhood forum such as this blog and many others can really make a difference in the community!