Tommy Wells and ANC 6D02 commissioner Ed Kaminski will be testifying in support of returning the building back to DC's control, and to make it all even more festive, the hearing is going to be held in the warehouse itself, at 9:30 am on Thursday, April 25.

Rep. John Mica (R-Fla.), who is the chair of the committee, has been making his displeasure known about the (lack of) speed with which GSA has been disposing of excess property. And, as Housing Complex puts it today, "At the time, Rep. Jeff Denham (R-Calif.) said the subcommittee would consider holding hearings at vacant federal properties around the country if GSA didn't start moving on them more quickly. Now, the congressmen appear to be making good on their pledge."

This would probably be the perfect forum to ask some of the questions that have been posted in the comments here, such as whether the new boulevard will have an intersection with 13th Street, and how the pedestrian/cycling trail planned to be built alongside the boulevard will be handled.

The "idea and design team" -- now with neighboring ANC 6D07 commissioner David Garber taking on a larger role and 6D02 commissioner Ed Kaminski having "stepped away," according to Garber -- are wanting to have the building become a "public market, restaurant(s), and culinary incubator/training center."

There's no indication from GSA that the building's move to the surplus list is imminent, and there's also questions on how exactly the building (on such valuable land, just north of the Navy Yard Metro station's Half Street entrance) would escape being auctioned to net the feds millions of dollars and instead be transferred to the city and/or some as-yet-uncreated nonprofit group. This would have to happen under the federal guidelines for acquiring federal real property for educational purposes, which includes applying to the Department of Education to sponsor the transfer and which would seem to require that the incubator/training center be the centerpiece of the building's new mission. On the other hand, Garber recently described the project in an e-mail to his neighborhood mailing list as "still in its infancy and constantly evolving," so no doubt the organizers of the drive to acquire the building have a plan they feel will meet the feds' requirements.

I probably won't be at the meeting, so if you're interested in the project, best get thee to 200 I on Tuesday rather than looking for a summary here.

Withthe recent application by the Architect of the Capitol for changes to the plant's permits bringing renewed push-back from the community about the plant's continuing burning of coal, Wells has organized the meeting to "hear your concerns and discuss next steps." The District Department of the Environment will be there to present background information about the plant, and Wells is also intending to include a discussion of "strategies for addressing broader concerns about the power plant, particularly the ongoing use of coal as a fuel source."

The Architect of the Capitol has posted these responses to the questions raised about the permits. (Unfortunately, I can't suppress a snicker at the photo used to show the plant, taken on tulip-filled spring day from one of the parks along D Street SE, showing the plant in a fabulously bucolic setting. My photo might be a bit more realistic.)

The meeting is at 6:30 pm at United Methodist Church, 421 Seward Square SE (just south of Pennsylvania Avenue between 4th and 5th streets).

There isn't much else of note in the newsletter (noise studies ongoing, Section 106 historic preservation review ongoing, how to comment, etc.), so I'll admit this post is mainly a sneaky way to once again point out my new Virginia Avenue Tunnel page, where you can get an overview of this project and see the concepts currently being evaluated, along with plenty of photos from along the tunnel's path.

According to an e-mail forwarded around by ANC commissioner David Garber (I haven't seen mention of the event anywhere else), the meeting's primary purpose is to get ideas about the kinds of attractions and features that OP would then want to put into the design competition they plan to hold for the bridge. There's no funding for any actual construction at this point, and a private partner would probably have to be found to foot the not-miniscule tab to build a new decking across the river on the footings that will remain now that the current deck is being demolished.

But there are also two Near Southeast items of interest listed: an update on baseball game-day parking from DDOT (first discussed at the May meeting) and the Capper Community Center PUD extension request (also discussed in May).

I'm not yet up to sitting through a meeting of that length (though I'm coming along), so if these items are of interest, get thee to 1100 4th St. SW at 7 pm on Monday.

This is the stage of the Environmental Impact study where the initial lineup of possible concepts have been winnowed down to the four that will be evaluated for the final EIS:

* Concept 1 - "No Build" (i.e., leave as is);

* Concept 2 - Rebuild tunnel with a temporary track running in an open trench to the south of the existing tunnel;

* Concept 5 - "Permanent Twin Tunnels," with a new tunnel built via open trench to the south of the existing tunnel, which would be rebuilt as well;

* Concept 6 - "Rebuild Online," where the current tunnel would be rebuilt via open trench along the existing alignment, and trains would run in that same trench during construction.

Also contained in the slides is information about how traffic would be routed with the closure of Virginia Avenue on the south side of the freeway between 2nd and 11th. As has always been stated, north/south traffic on the numbered streets would be maintained across Virginia, and temporary driveways/access are shown on 3rd and 4th Street for Capitol Quarter and the 200 I/225 Virginia loading dock. It's also shown that Virginia Avenue north of the freeway would become two-way between 6th and 8th streets, so that traffic exiting the Southeast Freeway at 6th would all be directed left under the freeway and then would be able to continue to 8th Street on Virginia.

There's also some slides on the vibration and noise analyses being done, and how Virginia Avenue might be improved after construction is completed (with bike lanes being a possibility, which immediately warmed David Garber's heart).

The draft Environmental Impact Statement is expected to be released this fall, in which the design for construction will be identified; the entire process would be completed in spring, 2013. Comments can be submitted to contact@virginiaavenuetunnel.com or via the web site.

To allow you to properly plan your calendar for the week, I'm posting this nice and early:

These designs are part of the quest to make changes to the original design approved by the commission in 2008, chief of which is to switch the first phase of the 1.1-million-square-foot mixed-use project from an office building to a 300ish-unit apartment building at 1st Street and Potomac Avenue, along with a series of other changes that I've written about previously. (Dear heavens, don't make me write it all again.)

Here are the slides that were presented by the developers, which should be of interest even without the accompanying narration. The renderings are much more detailed and "showier" than those given to the Zoning Commission back in February, which was part of what the developers were tasked with providing in their next go-round with the ZC.

Most obviously, the developers appear to have gotten the "more retail!" message that had been delivered pretty clearly at the last two zoning commission sessions on the new design, with 18,650 square feet of retail now covering most of the first floor of the Phase I residential building, bumped up from 12,520 sf in the previous version (some of which the developers had been wanting to mark off for "temporary resident uses" until the market for retail in the area could be proven). The entire site is now designed to have 48,360 sf of retail, but this is still down from the 64,200 sf that was in the plans approved by the Zoning Commission back in 2008. (This increase in retail also means that the "four red doors" facing Potomac Avenue that sent zoning commissioner Michael Turnbull through the roof back in February are now gone.)

There was also much time spent on the designs for the public spaces that span the 5.5-acre site. With large lawns, wetlands-type areas that would actually be bio-filtration mechanisms, quieter tree-covered spaces, and a marina that could potentially have 40-50 slips, the additions could be seen as echoing the Yards Park a couple blocks to the east.. But there are also some "beach" areas where sand would be placed, and a large sculpture could be included in the "Riverfront Plaza" at the foot of 1st Street. The esplanade is still a major part of the design, but there is no longer a separate bike path--pedestrians and cyclists would share the boardwalk as it runs through the entire site, from South Capitol Street to Diamond Teague Park. And there may even be locations where some of the concrete blocks from the old concrete plant site would be incorporated into the public spaces.

I could write more about the specifics, but since the project will be back in front of ANC 6D looking for a resolution of support in July, and then at the Zoning Commission on Sept. 20, I'd prefer to save some words for the presentations to come.

I've added some of the renderings from this presentation to my Florida Rock project page. And, when looking at all of this, remember that the western two buildings (phases 3 and 4, an office building and a hotel), are not be able to be built until the new South Capitol Street/Douglass Bridge is built a bit to the south of the current bridge, which now runs directly through the Florida Rock footprint. And there's as yet no timeline for that new bridge.