by Paul Harrison
Congrats to our neighbors on 35th Street, who advocated for installation of a paved sidewalk on their street between Alton Place and Yuma Street (the residential block just behind Bread Furst, Zips and the car wash).
There are many families with children in the immediate area, and the lack of a sidewalk on either side was particularly unnerving and dangerous because cut-through motor vehicle traffic from Yuma comes down a hill and around a blind curve.
Former ANC Commissioner Teri Huet first highlighted the issue to the ANC 3F Streets and Sidewalks Committee, and almost exactly one year after we first met with neighbors at the corner of 35th and Alton the new sidewalk is in place! Thanks to current and former commissioners Courtney Carlson, Marilyn Slatnick, Adrian Iglesias and Amy Rofman, who also engaged.
So, next time you’re out to get some steps, take a detour and enjoy the new sidewalk on 35th Street. While it can appear that they are working in people’s front yards, in fact DDOT only builds sidewalks on city-owned land. But they do consult with neighbors and are very thoughtful about the design.
As the included pictures show, DDOT’s sidewalk design and construction team has a variety of tools that they use to work with the city arborist and neighbors to preserve mature trees and adapt to driveways and hillsides.
For example, the pictures show the use of lightweight and water-permeable “flexipave” to route new sidewalks over established tree roots, as well as the ability to build retaining walls for hills and to route the sidewalk directly next to the street when provision of a tree box would otherwise cause problems with concerns like elevation or neighbor’s existing front stoops.
We’re very much looking forward to DDOT’s next sidewalk gap construction in the community, including commitments for new sidewalks on Davenport, Linnean and Fessenden.
Paul Harrison is chair of the ANC 3F Streets and Sidewalks Committee, and is an at-large member of the DC Pedestrian Advisory Council. He lives with his family on the 3000 block of Albemarle Street.