Posts by David Alpert — Founder
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DC is creating another bus lane, this time on 14th Street
In 2019 DC got bus lanes on H and I streets NW, and a bus lane on 16th Street will start construction this summer. Now, there’s also a bus lane in the works for part of 14th Street in Columbia Heights. Keep reading…
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WMATA wants your opinion on its next budget (and you should give it to them)
It’s been in the news, at the WMATA Board, and here on Greater Greater Washington. Now, WMATA has officially opened up public comments for its next budget, which includes more late-night service, free transfers between bus and rail, fare increases, some bus service increases, and a larger number of bus cuts. Keep reading…
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The Red Line could have offered riders a peek at Rock Creek
Early plans considered putting trains inside the Taft Bridge between Dupont Circle and Woodley Park. Keep reading…
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The good, the bad and the unexplained: what you need to know about the WMATA budget
Soon, WMATA will formally be asking riders and other members of the public to weigh in on its next budget. There’s a lot riders should understand, and weigh in on, in addition to proposed cuts or changes to bus service which have rightly attracted a lot of attention — some of which transit advocates have been requesting for years, and other items which are worrisome. Keep reading…
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Why the streetcar from Union Station to Georgetown died (mostly)
“DC Streetcar to Georgetown is dead,” read the headline. But the once-proposed DC Streetcar extension, likely in dedicated lanes, from Union Station to Georgetown didn’t just die. It died a long time ago. It’s just that reporters saw the death certificate, and that lent a certain finality to what many suspected and others already knew. Keep reading…
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Rail ridership is up, bus ridership may be leveling off, and we can learn all this from a new Metro data tool
Want to know how many riders there are on a certain bus line, or Metro station? How much it’s changed over time? How weekends compare to weekdays? Now you can learn that and more, thanks to a new data portal WMATA released in December. It has three tools, one for rail ridership, one for bus, and one for parking. Keep reading…
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Big opportunity: Work with us on transportation policy!
Greater Greater Washington is seeking a Transportation Policy Advisor to lead coalitions of transportation stakeholders and support our other thriving transportation policy and advocacy initiatives. The Transportation Policy Advisor will work with the rest of the GGWash transportation policy team to develop our agenda and expand our profile in the region. Keep reading…
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DC historic homeowners get the green light to ask for front-facing solar panels (but don’t make them green, or blue!)
Responding to outrage that followed Greater Greater Washington’s report on that hearing, the DC’s Historic Preservation Review Board revised its guidelines to say that front-facing solar panels could be okay if “necessary” to achieve climate goals such as DC’s 2019 clean energy law. The board approved the guidelines, including the proposed changes, at that meeting as the start of what will surely be a long conversation within the preservation community about how to integrate planetary preservation. Keep reading…
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In 2020, we’ll be emphasizing lenses of equity and sustainability
Greater Greater Washington has always centered around “urbanism” and, specifically, we write about housing, transportation, and public policy in DC, Maryland, and Virginia. We’ve always seen equity and sustainability as fundamental elements of urbanism, but in the coming year, we’re doing a few things to make this explicit. Keep reading…
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On solar panels, DC’s preservation board puts aesthetics over addressing the climate crisis
“I applaud your greenness and your desire to save the planet,” said architect and preservation board member Chris Landis, “and I realize that we are in crisis politically as well as sustainably. But I just have this vision of a row of houses with solar panels on the front of them and it just — it upsets me.” Keep reading…