I'll go in order from newest to oldest, starting with peering down into holes that you might not be looking into yourselves.

Three residential projects that began excavating in the spring are already starting to climb upward, as you can see in the above photos from 1000 1st Street and the Maren at Florida Rock. Tishman Speyer's mystery residential project that covers all of what's known as Square 696 is a hybrid, with some excavation still underway while the eastern half is now starting to rise. (and no, we still don't have renderings.) Then there's phase two of One Hill South (Two Hill South? One Hill South Two? Return of One Hill South? One Hill South, Electric Boogaloo?), where digging is being hampered by complaints of fumes emanating from the site's past life as a gas station.

Next we turn to the neighborhood's EIGHT projects that are above ground but not yet topped out. (I could call it six, since there are two projects with two buildings going up concurrently, but let's call an eight an eight.)

Let's start with residential projects The Garrett at 2nd and I, Parc Riverside Phase II at Half and L, and the second phase of Novel South Capitol at 4 I, which was kind of a shocker to see go up since it was never really announced that the entire project would be under construction at once:

I'll note that the photo of the Garrett is a bit of a triumph, because it's the first one I've gotten from the northeast, now that the wrapping up of tunnel construction has given me some sidewalk access to the intersection at 2nd and H. (Which hopefully will be open completely by Oct. 18, the Whole Foods Day of All Days.)

Next, let's wander down to the Ballpark District, where the National Association of Broadcasters headquarters is a whisker away from topping out and its sibling the Avidian condo building is now well visble. One block away, 1250 Half is in its final minutes of not being completely above ground, as the portion closer to N Street is now right even with the street, while its northern portion has been skeletoning for quite some time. And at 3rd and Tingey, the combo project of the Thompson hotel and the Estate apartment building are beginning to change the feel of the western side of the Yards Park.

{Pant, pant.}

Now, a quick look at the buildings getting their faces on, since this is the stage when everyone is pretty much tapping their toes and waiting for the projects to be finished already. (There's a section of Virginia Avenue that qualifies for that, too.) May I present West Half at Half and N, the Harlow mixed-income building at 3rd and L, the Bower/Guild condo/rental buildings, and the new DC Water headquarters.

To wrap it up, there's one additional ghostly building to keep an eye on, though I don't wish to be flippant about it. Ward 6 councilmember Charles Allen is holding a hearing on Oct. 25 about the fire and response, for those interested.

And that's "it." Ha. Ha. I imagine the next major update will be in December, when I will spend most of the time complaining about how the low sun angle and a decade's worth of construction has made it impossible to take photos unruined by shadows. I may have to (gasp!) go out on cloudy days until spring.

This weekend I brought the JDLand camera to a ballgame for the first time in a while, and spent much of the time wandering from vantage point to vantage point to take pictures. It's really hard for me to believe that it's been nearly 11 years since I first was shepherded up to the upper concourse and out onto various viewing platforms, with someone holding the back of my jacket while I shot because the railings weren't in place yet.

The obvious skyline view, of the buildings now going up along Half Street and N Street, is the subject of much discussion these days (Lookit tthe cranes! Why did they allow them to block the dome? What about the parking garages?), but I also have great fondness for the viewing platform on the southeast side. So here's a quick sampling (click to enlarge):

If you want to see many more photos from these vantage points, dig deep down into the site for my Overhead Photos gallery, and choose either Ballpark, Southeast Viewing Platform, or Northwest Viewing Platform.

Plus, they are probably the two most watched projects in the neighborhood at the moment.

These are two views of JBG Smith's West Half 420-unit residential development, which, if I can count floors correctly, is still not yet topped out, but which, as seen in the second photo, is already hanging glass on the lower floors, presumably to protect the spaces from the roving gangs of All-Star hooligans that will descend next month. I think both photos do a good job of showing the very unique structure of this building, as it appears from the north to be funneling down into the ballpark. It also looks like the corner of the building facing the ballpark is prepped to have some signage hung. Digital? Temporary? Permanent? We Shall See! This building is expected to have about 65,000 square feet of retail on its first two floors.

And, across the way, we have:

The east side of the street will be home to 1250 Half Street, a residential project that is both a nearly topped-out skeleton (on the north end of the site) and a still-not-yet-out-of-the-ground hole to peer into (on the south end of the site). It is actually all one building, it's just that the foundation was built on the north end back when Monument Realty had plans to develop the rest of the block as it was building the 55 M office building, before, well, you know, Things Happened. So this allowed Jair Lynch Development Partners to plow ahead with above-ground work there while prepping the rest of the former Monument Valley hole to go vertical. This building will have as many as 440 rental units and over 60,000 square feet of retail (including anchor tenant Punch Bowl Social) when it's finished, though I should note that it is going to be completed in two phases, with construction of the phase two "boutique residential building" facing N Street coming later.

And here's what both will look like to people exiting the ballpark when they are finished.

Which is a little different from:

With that, I am done running down all of the latest construction statuses (statusi?). If you are worn out, don't blame me, blame the SEVENTEEN separate construction projects underway (19 if you include the Virginia Avenue Tunnel and the new South Capitol Street bridge).

May I present to you the residetial projects of: Square 696, 1000 1st Street, and the Maren. Check the project pages for details.

And, speaking of Square 696, there still are no publicly available renderings for this 800-unit two-phase residential project by Tishman Speyer. So, you know what that means....

* At left, we have what is now known as "Novel South Capitol," previously known as 2 I Street, aka The Building That Took Away McDonald's and Broke JD's Heart. And, as a tidbit for loyal readers who actually read what I write in this posts, I see an approved building permit for phase two of this project, at 4 I Street. (There's a reference in the permit to a name "Velocity"--I assume someone will point out the error of that at some point.) This first phase is a 380-unit apartment building.

* At right, we have the still-as-yet-unnamed mixed-income apartment building at 2nd and L, just a few steps from Canal Park. It is slated to 179ish units, of which 36 will be for public housing residents. This building is part of the huge Capper/Carrollsburg redevelopment, and may before long have DDOT as a sibling on the south side of that block. It's also supposed to have a small amount of retail in the portion of the ground floor that faces the park.

But wait, there's more!

*Transition from beige brick to red brick, we have the latest look at the Bower, the 138-unit condo building at 4th and Tingey in the Yards. This photo is taken from its east side, at what will be a new intersection of 5th and Tingey. And behind the Bower, where you see the green wall covering, we have...

* The Guild (at least we think it's going to be called the Guild), the 190-unit rental building that is actually two parallel towers that run north/south behind the Bower, as more clearly seen in the middle photo. There will be a new block of Water Street running between the Guild and the parking lot, hooking up with the new 5th Street to the east.

* Lastly, I decided to toss in a photo of the back of the new DC Water headquarters, to not only show how the new building wraps around the existing (and still operational) O Street pumping station, but how the back of the building now has colored panels that mimic the front's glass, so that it isn't the stark green monolith that had people a little nervous a few months ago.

Head to the project pages of each of these buildings to see more before and afters, renderings, sliders, and whatnot.

Coming next, a look at two projects that are refusing to adhere to my facile skeletons/facings/holes construct.

But there's no way that these seventeen projects can be well surveyed in one post, so let's start with the five projects now that have arrived above the fence line or right at it in the past few weeks:

* First up is the one that's probably making the biggest splash, which is the new National Association of Broadcasters HQ at South Capitol and M. (Its sibling, the Avidian condo building, isn't quite keeping up, and is still below the fence line.)

* Meanwhile, up at Half and K, It's taken a while but the second phase of the Parc Riverside apartments is now visible from street level as well.

* Trekking over to the Yards, the Thompson Hotel on the south side of Tingey Street is visible, while *its* sibling, the 227-unit apartment building apparently dubbed The Estate, has rebar juuuuuuust poking up above the fence line, but not obvious enough to bother with a photo. (See, I'm not COMPLETELY OCD about this.)

* The last new arrival, the third portion of "The Collective" group of apartments known as the Garrett, is past the fences.

Stay tuned for more.

Of course it made me think of that spot's "before photo," which is one of my absolute favorites, because it shows the old Normandie Liquors building, all alone, in May 2006. Just one block to the south, demolitions were underway to clear the site that would become Nats Park, but this photo gives no hint of the radical changes about to come.

And then I thought about how I have taken so many photos of this corner since 2006, because the actual corner lot took so long to be developed, and because so much happened right around it. And I realized that it is probably one of the best spots to illustrate what has happened in the Near Capitol Ballpark River Yards neighborhood over the past 15 years.

Let's take a run through just a few of the 102 photos I have taken of that corner since 2006. Click to enlarge/slideshow 'em:

By June 2007, cranes are visible to the south, as work on the ballpark is well underway. Later that year the distinctive steel work of 55 M appears next door, and the new building rises up above the Normandie--until February 2008, when the little yellow brick building meets its demise. The ballpark is now clearly visible from 1st and M, just in time for its debut in late March, 2008, and by the end of that year, 55 M's exterior is finished.

And then the view freezes. It's the same for all of 2009, and 2010, and 2011, and 2012, and 2013, until at last a crane appears at the south end of the 1st Street block in spring 2014. Up goes the Hampton Inn, and it is followed in 2015 and 2016 by F1rst and the Residence Inn.

Finally, in May 2017, 11 years after the Normandie stood alone, the southwest corner of 1st and M finally has a skeleton of its own, as 99 M at last makes it above ground.

And now, one year after that, the sidewalks are open, and the garage-like doors where Circa will host hordes of stadium-goers are visible.

I'm guessing the beverages at Circa will cost a little more than they did at Normandie.

This is of course just one of a whole lot of corners that have radically changed in the past 15 years, and some of them even had a similar start-stop-start timeline, but I do think if one corner has to be picked to tell the story, it's this one.

In the meantime, you should keep checking the site on a regular basis, and I'll post new threads up every so often and invite people to check out what they might have missed, which in this case includes:

* News of the neighborhood's "Rooftop Hop" on Saturday starting at 2pm (RSVP required).

* A farmers' market at Nats Park on Sunday, June 3 starting at 10 am.

* A Post article on complaints of excess vibrations with the new Virginia Avenue Tunnel(s).

* Greystar's purchase of the big CSX parcel that runs from New Jersey Avenue behind ORE 82 and 70/100 Capitol Yards.

* The folks behind Circa deciding not to bring their Open Road "concept" to 99 M, but instead a new venture. And Circa is still coming, too.

* Chase opening a branch at New Jersey and M.

So keep checking on this post to see what tidbits will come, but I already know of one, which is the news that the new Circulator route that will run down M Street from Southeast to Southwest will start June 24. Here's what I wrote about it last year.

According to ANC 6D commissioner Meredith Fascett, DDOT is wanting to occupy its new space by early 2021, which would mean construction would need to start in early 2019.

This location is directly across from the US Department of Transportation, which means that I'll be forced to call this stretch the DOT block of M Street, SE. It also will share the block known as Square 769 with the currently under-construction mixed-income apartment building on the north end of the block.

There are ANC and zoning approvals to be had, including giving the okay to WC Smith's desire to lower the building height to nine stories (as, ahem, illustrated at right), cut back on the ground floor retail space, and drop the expected parking spaces to 177 on three underground levels (instead of 197 on four).

This building is actually part of the Capper-Carrollsburg PUD, and it was 10 years ago this month that the plan for an office building on this site received its preliminary zoning approvals. Then the Great Recession came along, building office buildings without substantial amounts of space pre-leased became a relic of another time, and WC Smith had to file for four two-year extensions to that zoning approval, the last in late 2016.

As for DDOT's current home, it was in May 2010 that the rumor first came out that the agency would be moving to 55 M, which was a big get for that building and for the neighborhood in general at the time.

And, this lot also is dear to my heart because it was the subject of one of the first photos I ever took in the neighborhood, with my film camera (with bad film in it, dammit) in the fall of 2000. And I thought when I first really started tracking the neighborhood in 2003 that it took what seemed to me to be for-eehhhhh-ver for that little gas station to be demolished, nine whole months after I started watching, one month after the photo at right was taken in August of that year. Little did I know.