Photo by Everett Mar on Flickr
Every so often, I am scrolling through our archives for something and end up stumbling upon a post that brings back memories development or changes that were so controversial…but seem so insignificant years later. My most recent find was this post from 2009 about the debate over whether or not to reopen 7th Street SE in front of Eastern Market on weekends.
Some of our readers may not remember the days when that stretch of 7th Street SE simply narrowed to make room for the vendors’ trucks. It was otherwise still open to two-way vehicular traffic all the way from North Carolina Avenue SE to Pennsylvania Avenue SE seven days a week.
The stretch between North Carolina Avenue SE and C Street SE didn’t close to traffic on weekends until after the Eastern Market fire in 2007. Once the Market reopened, merchants argued that the street should be opened again to help with their business. As explained in this We Love DC post, “Stores along market row report[ed] a 35% to 75% drop in business since the road closures began.” A comment on the blog post from a business owner on Market Row indicated that their position was not well represented, however. Comments on our post were fairly even.
I remember a good article in Voice of the Hill on this, which I had linked to in my original post, but their archives are sadly no longer live, which is a shame since they likely had many great details that would be useful to revisit. Oh, how I miss the Voice of The Hill and We Love DC!
Now that the stretch of 7th Street from C Street to Pennsylvania Avenue, SE is also closed on weekends, how do you think things are working? Should they continue to remain closed to vehicles on weekends?
Before the weekend street closure in front of the market years ago, I recall thinking that if I am going to get hit by car, then it will be here. There was something about doing my shopping at the market and crossing back and forth to get lunch and so forth, that made me less attentive about the cars. Maybe it was restricted visibility around the farmer trucks or something, but the pedestrian street strikes me as so natural that I had almost forgotten what it was like when it was open to traffic.