Washington City Paper: Contents for Jan. 14

Lost In Space
Mix grandiose planning, bare concrete expanses, and daunting streams of traffic. What do you get? D.C.’s unfriendliest public spaces.

Cover Story

Washington is America’s most intentional city. We have long, deliberately unobstructed vistas. Statues on plinths in circles. Rigid design guidelines. A government panel that dictates the collective taste. Big, imposing projects that represent big, imposing ideas.

Sometimes you wish everyone would just stop trying so hard. Because all that heavy thinking is getting us nowhere. The big idea is attractive when it’s still on paper, and it remains tantalizing as the city breaks ground. But once it’s born, once the concrete plaza is completed, the concept loses its luster. It becomes part of the never-changing pattern of the city—the same maddeningly simple hard expanse, the same gurgling fountain.

The city’s best public spaces evolve with time and grow into their surroundings. Take Rock Creek Park: This wild tear in the urban fabric sends fingers of untamed woods into a dozen neighborhoods. You can actually get lost. But most public spaces lack that spontaneity and end up feeling inert. Take the Mall: Jogging along the gravel, you might as well be running on a treadmill.

Spaces like this reinforce the isolation of urban life rather than the collective vitality of the city. Curiosity about what or who is around the corner becomes a solipsistic lack of expectation. Sameness begets boredom, and boredom breeds neglect; the city is full of very expensive places that were very well planned, but that we’d rather not visit.

Marie H. Reed Community Learning Center, 2200 Champlain St. NW... Continued

Issue of Jan. 14 - 20, 2005

News and Features

Lost In Space
Mix grandiose planning, bare concrete expanses, and daunting streams of traffic. What do you get? D.C.’s unfriendliest public spaces.
Cover Story By David Morton
Half Circle
Trying to make a Northwest neighborhood name stick
The City By Dave Jamieson
Hall Monitor
Selected readings from D.C. Public Schools incident reports*
The City By Mike Kanin and Katherine Marsh
Across the Great Divide
The Mail By Abdul Kamus
Capital Connection
The Mail By Bell Clement

Columns

Jones’ Town
Cheap Seats By Dave McKenna
The Soup Across From 1701 Euclid
City Desk By Jason Cherkis
Cushion Job
City Desk By Mike Kanin
You Can Certainly Go Home Again
Dept. of Media By Erik Wemple

Eats

Turning Water Into Wine
Young & Hungry By Todd Kliman

Movies

Flash in the Tran
Film Review By Tricia Olszewski
Happy Together
Film Review By Mark Jenkins
Racing Stripes
Film Reviews By Louis Bayard

Music

No Dark in America
Music Reviews By Justin Moyer
Safe at Home
Music Reviews By Joe Dempsey

Theater

Barking Dogma
Theater Review By Pamela Murray Winters
White-Trash Russians
Theater Review By Trey Graham

Arts and Events

Tender Is the Pike
Artifacts By Dave Nuttycombe
Card Sharp
Artifacts By Joe Dempsey
Invisible Cities
Frank Gehry’s museums are supposed to reinvigorate downtowns. But until one had to fit into Washington, that wasn’t really an issue.
Arts By Mark Jenkins
TEQUILA SLAMMER
Show & Tell By Chris Shott