Downtown DC’s recovery hinges on one word

Options.

Most people want downtown DC to be…not what it is right now. We need to get serious about articulating what it will be instead, and build the infrastructure and policy that will help bring that about. Until then, we’re wasting valuable time arguing over intermediate steps that will get us to vastly different, disjointed outcomes.

We have options. Do we want downtown to continue to be dominated by offices and office workers, as it was for decades? We found out that was good for tax revenues, but not a resilient or equitable model for urban development. Do we want a variety of public, commercial, and retail amenities, underpinned by a dramatic increase in housing, and accessible primarily via foot, bike, and transit? Whiter, male-er, wealthier office workers, or a diverse mix of people engaged in activities that aren’t necessarily office work? A walker’s paradise, or a driver’s paradise?

“All of the above” seems to be our current answer, but it isn’t an answer that will generate any useful strategy. It’s partly why we could not proceed with a major transit infrastructure project after decades of planning: few people knew what it was for anymore, or for whom. The K Street Transitway became an infrastructure Rorschach Test, on which anyone could project their own preferences and fears. It’s no surprise, in the absence of a clear direction in which the District’s moving.

In the absence of an intentional vision, what message are we giving people right now about who we want downtown, and how we want them to get there?

“Cyclists have other options.”

That’s what a speaker told me at a recent webinar on DC’s downtown real estate market. Having heard the panel praise the commercial resilience of neighborhoods like NoMa and Navy Yard, I’d asked if they thought investments in walking, transit, and biking facilities–prime features of those neighborhoods–could make downtown more appealing, too. “Cyclists have other options,” a panelist replied dismissively, not acknowledging the other modes I’d mentioned. The others followed suit.

I’d attended the panel hoping to hear ideas about how to attract lots of people downtown, to make it appealing, as other advocates have called for. Instead, the framing was one I’ve heard countless times in the last three years, which boils down to: employers (ahem, federal government) need to win a battle with workers, to reduce their options so that they have no choice but to come into the office, or alternatively entice them back with “pop-up tea shops.” (Next up, deck chairs on the Titanic). Inspiring stuff.

Indeed, cyclists have other options. They can opt to stay home. They can opt for jobs at offices to which they can safely ride a bicycle. They can drive, and add to the congestion and demand for parking spaces that I thought we all agreed were bad for business. Or, they can risk their lives. Would any of these options be socially or economically preferable to the person safely taking the mode of transportation they would choose, which happens to cause fewer problems for society?

At that point, I logged off the webinar, out of the bleak realization that there was nothing new here. Downtown recovery will take a lot more than just drivers: a key component is making it easy to get downtown without a car. Bus and bike riders and pedestrians have, after all, other options, including staying home.

Are we meeting people halfway, or not at all?

I had just started registering for an in-person event about “revitalizing” DC last week, when I noticed the start time: 8:00 am.

Historically, 8:00 am was a reasonable time for movers and shakers to meet to discuss the future of an urban business environment. But that’s a problem if you’re trying to revitalize–as in, bring life to–a place. People are different: starting an event at a time when a lot of them are seeing to their lives instantly deprives that event of everything those folks could bring to the table.

In my case, at 8:00 am I’m feeding two small humans breakfast before they go to school. I have the option of calling on my spouse, but every household has finely calibrated a system to make our worlds operate efficiently, and subverting it requires hoop-jumping for all concerned. I’d just about made up my mind to disrupt that system, because I think the topic is important.

Then I realized: I wasn’t wanted. Why put my family through disruption to show up at an event designed with the assumption that no important participants needed to do anything before 9:00 am? I’m not advocating solely for reconsidering meeting timing, or the needs of parents with jobs (who make up 40% of the workforce), but to put some intention into who we want to be part of the future downtown. Choices we make now–from employers subsidizing parking but not transit, to building multi-lane roads that are scary to cross for the young, old, and mobility-impaired, to insisting on full-time in-person work only–will determine who participates.

This way of thinking leaves a lot of people at home (that’s true for workers as it is for anyone). They know where they’re not wanted.

I used to bring my children to daycare on the D6 bus, alighting at 18th and K NW. Watching their chubby little legs toddle across six lanes, the same thought recurred to me each day: “They really don’t want you here, my darlings.” Tell me, how many lanes of vehicle traffic would you want your children to walk across every day, even holding your hand? Every parent considering an activity downtown will make the same calculation.

It’s reasonable for cities’ leaders to want people, office workers and otherwise, to spend time engaging with the city, not just at home. There’s no urban recovery if most of us stay on our couches or in our cars. So maybe we can’t necessarily “meet people where they are” (at home). But let’s at least meet them halfway. That means safe and reliable routes for everyone, not just drivers; hours that work for a broader swath of the workforce and population as a whole; and fundamentally, recognizing that people know when they’re wanted as opposed to just needed.

Plus ça change, plus c’est la même chose

The French, thoroughly beating us on the urban appeal front, tell us: “the more things change, the more they stay the same.” Urban amenities–things to do, public space, room for sidewalks, bikes, and transit, good air and sound quality, public art–as opposed to space for cars are what people have fought over for decades. Post-pandemic recovery is just the latest round for DC. But sustainable transportation and economic development can, and should, go hand in hand.

The good news is, the prospect of a more appealing DC exists. We’ve already articulated a lot about what it should involve via explicit official policy documents. DC’s goal is to reduce the proportion of commute trips taken by car to 25 percent in nine years. DC’s goal is to reach zero carbon emissions by 2050. DC’s goal is to build mixed-use neighborhoods downtown, accessible to diverse income levels. DC’s goal is to keep all road users safe and alive. I didn’t invent these goals; I’m just reiterating them.

Goals alone aren’t a vision, but they provide valuable information about what policies and projects we should prioritize. The problem with reverting to a car-centric, male-centric, office-centric District–which we may do by delaying critical safety projects like Connecticut Avenue and postponing a grownup discussion about why we subsidize driving instead of getting drivers to pay their fair share–is that it’s unintentionally pulling us away from our long-term goals, not on the basis of logic or even consultation, but fear.

Choices, choices

Panic’s not our friend – and whether management can win an imaginary battle with workers over returning to the office, or whether doing anything to dissuade driving spells doom for downtown, are the wrong questions. They’re distracting. But recognizing we have options and, crucially, choosing which ones we’ll pursue at the cost of which others, based on our existing values, will move us forward.

People do have more options than before, and they like having those options. Workers aren’t the only type of person who can generate valuable activity–even profitable activity. I’m reminded of a former deputy mayor for economic development who used to observe that “children don’t pay taxes” as a reason to leave them out of the economic equation. (He would have been floored to know how much their daycares bring in). I’m reminded, too, of a business leader who once told me “you can’t take a date on the bus.” Are the 35% of DC residents who don’t own cars all leading loveless lives?

We can develop a vision that welcomes all of these people, and build out options accordingly, or not.We will live with the consequences.