The District’s Department of Transportation has partnered with Clear Channel Outdoor to bring Smart Bike, North America’s first bike sharing program, to DC. Starting next month, program members will be able to borrow bicycles from ten locations around the city for a maximum of three hours at a time. Membership costs $40 for the year, a comparatively small sum for unlimited transportation use during a time of oil price increases.
But the limited number of rental stations may not make this the most convenient mode of transportation for many in DC, especially Georgetown students. The closest Smart Bike docking points to Georgetown are in Dupont Circle and at George Washington University—yes, they get their very own station at Foggy Bottom.
If Georgetown can’t manage to secure a Metro station, you’d think we could at least get some free bikes. To learn more, check out Smart Bike DC online.
- Lynn Kirshbaum, Photo Editor. Photo of Paris bike share from Flickr user rekha6.
When Google Street View was first launched way back in May 2007, I was disappointed that D.C. wasn’t among the five starting cities (New York City, San Francisco, Denver, Las Vegas, and Miami) , but wasn’t too upset. This is only the tip of the iceberg, I figured, and D.C. would be added shortly.
Well, I was half right. 43 little cameras spring up on Google Maps now when you hit the “Street View” button, but not a single one even comes close to D.C. We’re coming up on the one year anniversary of Street View’s inception and, though Fairbanks, AK and Madison, WI have Street View, our nation’s capital is still Street View-less. D.C. was still a moderately important city, last time I checked; how could this be?
I shot an email over to the good folks at Google asking if/when they might be correcting this omission of theirs. The response I got, while good-natured, hardly cleared anything up. Elaine, of Google’s Global Communications & Public Affairs, first extolled the virtues of Street View (calling it “a useful and interesting tool for users everywhere”) before breaking the bad news.
We have gathered imagery in Washington DC, but we do not have any launch plans to announce at this time. The time between gathering imagery and making it available in Google Maps varies by city and is dependent on a variety of factors.
What kind of factors? Maybe Google is being slowed down by some silly red tape, courtesy of Homeland Security, the Park Service or any of the three thousand other bureaucracies which claim jurisdiction in the District?
I can’t get into many specifics, but we the imagery collection time varies by city given conditions like size of the region being covered (since we cover more than just the core downtown area), weather, etc. We also then spend time ensuring the quality and accuracy of images before posting them.
Sorry, D.C. residents, but it looks like it might be a while. While you wait, check out a few of the locations which have been added to Street View:
Spokane, WA: Both D.C. and Spokane, WA have the word “Washington” in their name, except one is home to some of the most influential people and institutions in the world and one’s claim to fame is hosting the largest 3-on-3 basketball tournament in the world.
Manchester, NH: I lived in New Hampshire for three years, and unless you have a great passion for New England foliage or winter, there’s not much to see here.
Yosemite National Park: A National Park before D.C.? But we’ve got at least two dozen of those!
Irony and flash mobs collided in an unfortunate way two few weeks ago at the Jefferson Memorial when a small group of twenty-something libertarians decided to commemorate Jefferson’s 265th birthday. They celebrated the agrarian republic-lover by dancing silently (each equipped with their own iPhones or iPods) at his memorial at midnight on April 13.
The geekphoria was dashed when one of the faithful was told she couldn’t dance there, and then arrested for asking why not. One guy had a video camera and caught the whole process on tape–it’s troublesome, and not just because libertarians can’t dance.
In the video, no one is being disrespectful or disorderly. The monuments are open 24/7, and the libertarians planned to come out at night so as not to disrupt tourists yelling on their cell phones or rowdy school groups. As the officer leads the arrested woman out of the rotunda, the videographer asks him to “Read these walls, I mean, you’re the security guard for this memorial. Thomas Jefferson is looking down and he is very dissatisfied. This is not the America he wanted.”
Satisfying Thomas Jefferson’s whims, projected through an unflinching stone gaze, must be difficult. But while it’s troubling that the officers arrested someone for peacefully and quietly celebrating, it’ll be worse if they don’t withdraw the charges in court this Tuesday. Maybe the guard misunderstood what kinds of activities people could do at the monuments (which are technically public property), but they should be able to admit their mistake and not prosecute her further. There’s no reason why Washingtonians should be afraid to have gatherings/protests/birthday parties of any peaceful kind on monument ground when it’s well within their rights.
-Sara Carothers, Voices editor. Photo from Flickr user Subtleness.
Got a DC neighborhood you’ve been wanting to see, or just want to know more about Georgetown? This weekend’s the perfect chance, as WalkingTown DC on Saturday and Sunday has organized a bunch of walking (and biking) tours around the capital. Here’s a schedule (PDF) so you can plan the outing, courtesy of the District Zen masters at Greater Greater Washington.
I’m thinking of hitting up one or two of the tours, depending on how wild Friday gets (it’s Georgetown Day, after all). The picture is a house in Brookland, taken on a previous walking tour. I’ve been meaning to learn more about Brookland for a while because I keep hearing about it from people but don’t know anything about it. If my cover story about Anacostia piqued your interest, check out the Anacostia bike tour Saturday morning.
Thinking about doing any walking tours, or are you swamped with finals? Hit us up in the comments.
-Will Sommer, Blog Editor. Flickr photo from user Stgermh.
There’s loose talk about Metro considering a subway stop in Georgetown. The typical reaction from Georgetown students is that neighbors afraid of rail-mounted criminals and homeless would block the stop just like they did last time–but ah, that never happened in the first place.
According to Metro history The Great Society Subway, nosy Advisory Neighborhood Commission types had nothing to do with it. Instead, Georgetown was rejected because it didn’t have enough jobs in the area and because of the difficulty of building across the Potomac. But we’ve got an entire university here, and Metro planners are considering an elevated rail over the river. With luck, the class of 2025 won’t have to worry about GUTS bus routes at all.
At the Green Apple Festival yesterday on the National Mall, fans of the Roots got American Idol runner-up/beatbox extraordinaire Blake Lewis instead. Pulitzer Prize-winning New York Times columnist Thomas Friedman got boos and jeers from the crowd before being ushered off the stage by Chevy Chase. And though everyone present got very, very wet, it’s probably fair to say that few at the environmental festival got what they came for.
After an electrical storm during jam band Umphrey’s McGee’s set put the festival on hold as the crowd took shelter in nearby museums, the environmental festival was called for good. Headlining bands the Roots and Gov’t Mule did not perform and Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-NV), who was scheduled to speak, was nowhere to be seen.The D.C. event was one of eight across the country aimed at raising awareness about global warming and encouraging people to call their congressperson on Earth Day with concerns about climate change. Like many activist concerts, the event was a strange marriage of musicians, policy wonks, and celebrities, matching bands like O.A.R. and Mambo Sauce with speakers like actor Edward Norton, and climate scientist James Hansen.
The weather may have put a stop to the concert, but it didn’t deter the crowd from celebrating 4/20. Attendees were openly smoking marijuana, fumes drifting across the Mall, and cheered loudly when several of the musicians made references to the holiday. As Marc Roberge, the lead singer of O.A.R., put it, “It smells like California in D.C.”
The U.S. Attorney’s office of the District of Columbia dropped all charges against Philip Cooney (MSB ‘10) relating to an assault that occurred last fall which attracted controversy on and off campus.
Cooney was charged with bias-related assault by the Metropolitan Police Department last September, but the U.S. Attorney reported that “subsequent investigation raised doubts as to … whether based upon available evidence we could prove beyond a reasonable doubt that the defendant in this case was the person who actually committed the assault.”
“Philip was always completely innocent of the charges against him and the dismissal of the case has vindicated him entirely,” Danny Onorato, Cooney’s lawyer, wrote in a statement. “To know Philip Cooney is to know a young man of exemplary character who was wrongfully accused in this case.”
The U.S. Attorney’s office has indicated that they continue to consider the assault, in which a male Georgetown student was beaten by an assailant who shouted anti-gay slurs, a criminal act. Cooney was originally implicated in the assault through a Facebook.com profile and, later, a police photo line-up. During the pre-trial period, the prosecuting Assistant U.S. Attorneys, Mary Dobbie and Joseph Spurber, determined that they would not be able to firmly establish that Cooney was present at the time of the assault.
Neither Cooney nor the spokesperson for the U.S. Attorney’s Office were available for comment. It is not clear at this time if any investigation into the assault will continue.
For the Voice’s comprehensive coverage of the case, click here. Check this blog and Thursday’s edition for more information on the dropped charges.
35th street between Prospect and M is reminiscent of the famed hills of San Fransisco. For one thing, it’s incredibly picturesque, so much so that Hollywood filmmakers frequently use it in their films (such as the upcoming Burn After Reading). For another, it’s dangerously steep—I’d put it in the ballpark of 40 degrees.
Unfortunately, the driver of this giant hulk of a bus (see above) didn’t fully appreciate this second fact. Around one o’clock, he made the imprudent decision to navigate his bus down the hill. It’s been stuck ever since. According to one of the cops on the scene, they’re going to have to get an oversized tow crane to drag it off the incline. Until then, I’d try to avoid driving by the area—apart from the congestion, I saw one of the cops hand out two tickets to cars driving by in as many minutes.
Runner-up headline: This is why we don’t have nice things.
And the winner is … D.C. Schools! Man, they just can’t seem to catch a break. First the school closings, now this.
For those who haven’t been obsessively following the B.W., in response to Chipotle’s free burrito day on Monday, Qdoba extended their half-price Mondays to Wednesday as well, which, if I’m doing my math right, cuts the profits of this fundraiser in half. I guess DCPS just have to wait until next year for a makeover (because there’s no way we’re asking the for a bail-out).
Vox Populi is the staff blog of the Georgetown Voice, Georgetown University's preeminent newsmagazine since 1969. The opinions expressed in Vox Populi are those of their authors unless specifically stated.
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