The Best Corner To Live On In Washington, DC

[DaveO]

"Want The Urban Lifestyle? DC's Best Corner Is ..." by Dan Malouff on GreaterGreaterWashington.org makes a case for the best corner in Washington DC, to take advantage of as many amenities as possible, being 14th and P, NW.

What do you think?

[TedE]

Sure, if your criteria don't include schools or Metro access (equidistant from all Metro lines <> convenient to any of them).  Oh, and you have lots of money and work downtown.  There's a ton of fun shopping and eating and drinking related things to do in Logan, and there is a nice upscale grocery.  If those things are the sum of your day-to-day life experience then 14th and P probably cannot be beat in this city.

[DonRocks]

Sure, if your criteria don't include schools or Metro access (equidistant from all Metro lines <> convenient to any of them).  Oh, and you have lots of money and work downtown.  There's a ton of fun shopping and eating and drinking related things to do in Logan, and there is a nice upscale grocery.  If those things are the sum of your day-to-day life experience then 14th and P probably cannot be beat in this city.

I have this "thing" in my yard called a tree. I kind of like it.

As I typed that sentence, I heard a bird chirping outside my window.

But in all seriousness, depending on your lifestyle, 14th and P is a fine place to live.

[lackadaisi]

Using their criteria, I would actually say that 11th and M would be the best corner.   It is actually walkable to all lines, has capital bikeshare, is on a major commercial street, is one block from a grocery store (Capital Supermarket), four blocks from another (Giant), and five blocks from a third (Whole Foods).

Bonus points, there are three parks less than a block away, it is less than a block from the CVS, and the Passenger is pretty close.  I'm just saying.

[The Hersch]

I have this "thing" in my yard called a tree. I kind of like it.

You seem to imply there are no trees in the neighborhood of 14th and P NW. There are, in fact, a lot.

[DonRocks]

You seem to imply there are no trees in the neighborhood of 14th and P NW. There are, in fact, a lot.

I was waiting for someone to say that. There aren't "a lot," but they certainly exist.

[The Hersch]

I was waiting for someone to say that. There aren't "a lot," but they certainly exist.

There aren't very many trees on that part of 14th Street, and because most of the 1400 block of P Street was newly built in the last fifteen years, there aren't many mature trees there. The 1300 block of P is very leafy, however, and the lovely urban oasis of Logan Circle, just a block east of 14th and P, is filled with a profusion of trees both old and young. The 1500 block of P Street, where I lived in the early 1990s, is lined with fine trees. It's unclear to me what your link is supposed to demonstrate.

[Banco]

I lived on 13th and N in 1988-90. The boarded-up houses on Logan Circle looked like sets for the Addams Family, and Marion provided entertainment on the TV, although I could have seen the bitch-set-up live if I had just walked down the street a couple blocks and booked a room. I should have sluished my grad school scholarship toward real estate on the Circle and Vermont Ave. But at the time, I could not have done that without feeling like a pimp.

[Barbara]

I lived on 13th and N in 1988-90. The boarded-up houses on Logan Circle looked like sets for the Addams Family, and Marion provided entertainment on the TV, although I could have seen the bitch-set-up live if I had just walked down the street a couple blocks and booked a room. I should have sluished my grad school scholarship toward real estate on the Circle and Vermont Ave. But at the time, I could not have done that without feeling like a pimp.

I know exactly what you mean. I still simply marvel at what has taken place as I ride the Circulator Bus from AdMo to WF down 14th St. to P. Modern technology led to the demise of the "block" of sleazy businesses; but, where did the "ladies" go?

[DonRocks]

Modern technology led to the demise of the "block" of sleazy businesses; but, where did the "ladies" go?

The internet isn't *all* bad, and has changed / is changing / will change the world in more ways than television ever did.

Dictators will fall from power as their citizenry meets secretly on PaulRevere.com.

Misogynistic nations will vanish as their leaders are caught yanking it sitting at their desk.

Oaky wines will wane in popularity as purists engage others who don't pine for heavy lumber.

[DaveO]

I know exactly what you mean. I still simply marvel at what has taken place as I ride the Circulator Bus from AdMo to WF down 14th St. to P. Modern technology led to the demise of the "block" of sleazy businesses; but, where did the "ladies" go?

hah.   I worked in commercial real estate back in the day.  During the  entirety of the 80's was when RE developers were buying up swaths of land and building office buildings.   My office had the best, most active land sales people in the city and we were involved in a lot of those deals around 14th street and other streets.

It was called the "meeting of the well heeled and the high heeled."       The well heeled "bought out" the high heeled.   But where did the "high heeled go?"   where are the ladies?   geez.  i miss em.

[SeanMike]

But where did the "high heeled go?"   where are the ladies?   geez.  i miss em.

Online, and to hotels. No need to walk the streets if you have an ad on backpage.com and either a driver or a room at a decent enough hotel. There have been busts at a couple of hotels in Ballston, and I've always called the hotel where La Caraquena there the Hooker Hotel for a reason. Crystal City also attracts a lot of them.

(One of my favorite hangover activities with a friend of mine was to surf the hooker ads and Gchat each other the most amusing.)

[The Hersch]

It was called the "meeting of the well heeled and the high heeled."     

I love that. Never heard it before. As I recall from my residence at 15th and P in 1990-1992, the ladies of the lamplight had largely already disappeared from the area around 14th and P, even though almost no gentrification of the area east of 15th Street had yet occurred. There were still lots of street drug peddlers, mostly east of 13th.

[The Hersch]

Online, and to hotels. No need to walk the streets if you have an ad on backpage.com and either a driver or a room at a decent enough hotel.

But there were always call girls using hotels. The typical streetwalker of the 1980s and earlier wouldn't have had the resources to operate that way. All through the 1980s, I lived on the 1500 block of Church Street (a block north of P) across from a parking lot much used by the hookers doing their business in the cars of their customers. (The parking lot, owned by the adjacent church, was usually littered with used condoms.) Getting a room at a decent hotel would not have been an option for them.

[DonRocks]

But there were always call girls using hotels. The typical streetwalker of the 1980s and earlier wouldn't have had the resources to operate that way. All through the 1980s, I lived on the 1500 block of Church Street (a block north of P) across from a parking lot much used by the hookers doing their business in the cars of their customers. (The parking lot, owned by the adjacent church, was usually littered with used condoms.) Getting a room at a decent hotel would not have been an option for them.

You and John Wabeck.

We used to drive into town from Silver Spring, point, and giggle when we were in high school. We would literally drive all the way into town just for a quick lap around the block which was simply amazing to us astoundingly innocent suburban boys.

The no right turn signs remained up until recently - I mean within the past year or two, I think. When did they finally come down? Talk about relics from another era!

[lackadaisi]

There are still a lot in the neighborhood. Early morning is the activist period, about 5-6:30.

[Joe H]

Interesting topic.  I worked at the Safeway on 14th just south of U street and parked on Swan street a few yards off of 14th when I bought my first car in high school in 1963.  That was the "lower end" of the redlight district (there was a heirarchy of streetwalkers decades ago) with the upper end Vermont avenue which dumped into Thomas circle.  Does anyone reading this remember "Thisisit?"  Or the Casino Royale?  (Never mind the Gayety on 9th street-no, not the Baltimore Gayety but the D. C. Gayety.)  Off topic, Rand's or the Rocket Room? (Big Al Downing?  Link Wray?  Jimmy Dean?  Yes, THAT Jimmy Dean...)

14th street has a rich tradition in D. C.  I might have thought a favorite street corner would have been Wisconsin and Macomb (where i once lived) or Connecticut and Woodley or Wisconsin and Calvert.  For those of us in Silver Spring Georgia and Alaska and Morris MIller was important, too, but 14th street.  There is history there.

34th and M is worth a mention, too.  And Dupont Circle where I was gassed protesting a war in '68....

...oh, and the author of the article at the top of this thread works in Arlington.  And went to school in Colorado.

Of course 14th and P.

[The Hersch]

Actually, the best corner is Connecticut Avenue and Belmont Road, where I live. One of the leafiest neighborhoods on earth. Less than a ten-minute walk to 18th and Columbia, less than a ten-minute walk to Woodley Park Metro, 10-to-12-minute walk to Dupont Circle. A five minute walk to the dog park at Walter Pierce Community Park.