image uploaded by *yasuhiro on Flickr
It may be a cloudy, rainy start to the week but 80 degree weather is on its way! It’s one of the most beautiful times of the year in DC…if you can get past the hoards of tourists and insane pollen counts. But you’ve got a great weekend ahead to enjoy with the nice weather: the flea market at Eastern Market is sure to be packed, the Cherry Blossom Festival is underway, the Nationals return to town for an exhibition game on Saturday and their home opener on Monday. So pack up some Claritin and sunscreen and get ready to go out and enjoy! Oh wait, it’s only Tuesday. Okay then get back to that cup of coffee, catch up on the following news, and start day dreaming about your weekend a few days early.
- Speaking of baseball, be sure to leave PLENTY of extra time to get to Monday’s game. As announced by several local blogs, President Obama will be throwing out the first pitch, which means massive security lines. And if it’s anything like the last time they had magnetometers for the home opener, it’s sure to be a logistical nightmare for the fans. I don’t remember who it was last time (Cheney maybe?) but the lines were loooong and painfully slow.
- If you park in the Auto Zone parking lot at night when you go out on H Street, beware. They are giving some big tickets, according to Frozen Tropics, who wrote quite the rant about the business, which has a history of being a less neighborly to the corridor.
- Young & Hungry has the details on the latest gastropub to come to H Street. Queen Vic is hoping to open in mid-June.
- JD Land has an update on Canal Park, Ballpark news, and Ballpark parking and traffic issues.
- Thanks to Frozen Tropics sharing a tweet from Tom Sietsema, Toyland may become a lot more crowded. Inked also went back to try some of the food on their new menu and agreed it’s very much worth another visit.
- DC Mud has another update on the development along the H Street corridor, with lots of details about The H Street Connection, a 433,000 square foot residential and retail project that will replace the strip mall between 8th and 10th Streets.
Actually, last year’s first pitch was thrown out by the five branches of the armed forces. Cheney threw out the first pitch while the Nats were still at RFK. The reason why the lines are so long on opening day is because it’s one of the few times of the year that the stadium sells out so the max amount of people are trying to get through the gates, ergo lines. I was going to try to get game day tickets since I couldn’t buy them online, but it may be impossible now with the Prez there.
I finally remembered – it was in 2008. President Bush threw out the first pitch so they had heightened security and magnetometers, so the lines were longer than usual, even for an opening day game. They did not have any of the logistics down, and I don’t expect it to be much better this time around.
If I had a business by autozone on H, I would be seriously ticked about that – especially with the construction going on, there is absolutely nowhere to park. Plus that lot is huge, do that man people really even go to autozone?
There has to be something the city can do to allow parking there, especially after 5 PM? If autozone had any brains they would put someone out there and charge $5 or $10 for parking – instead of letting the city collect the parking ticket fine.
Autozone allows parking after they close at 9pm. This is somewhat helpful for the bars and restaurants but doesn’t do the theatres any good. Until then they are ruthless with ticketing and towing.
Everyone has at some point tried to negotiate with them about allowing some parking. They did allow us to use the parking lot (after closing) for the Thriller on H event and we considered that progress.