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Morning Notes

by ARLnow.com | August 27, 2012 at 8:58 am | 2,621 views | 104 Comments

Streetcar Video Came at a Cost — An Arlington County-produced video that makes the case for the planned Columbia Pike and Crystal City streetcar lines cost the county $3,400. Arlington officials greenlit the video because they “felt there was a general ‘lack of public awareness and education’” about the streetcar. [Washington Examiner]

Beef ‘O’ Brady Eyes Arlington — The Florida-based Beef ‘O’ Brady chain of sports bars/restaurants is apparently looking to open in Arlington. Arlington is a “key component to the company’s growth strategy in Virginia,” according to a press release. “While there’s definitely a market for Beef ‘O’ Brady’s in the Arlington market, we’re taking a careful approach to finding a franchise partner with business savvy, tenacity and a readiness to reinvest in the communities they serve,” said James Walker, Chief Development Officer of Beef ‘O’ Brady’s, in a statement. “ [Restaurant News Release]

Donations Sought for USS Arlington Commissioning — The commissioning of the USS Arlington, a new Navy transport ship, is six months away. The USS Arlington Commissioning Committee is now seeking donations to help support the commissioning ceremony and to build a “tribute room” within the new ship. [Sun Gazette]

Flickr pool photo by Wolfkann

BrianKal

Streetcar Video: Cooking up some popcorn to get ready for these comments.
- Arlwhat
  
  I’m already weeping for the future.
  - Bender
    
    **they “felt there was a general ‘lack of public awareness and education’” about the streetcar**
    _____________
    
    Translation: There is too much opposition by a knowledgeable population so spin and a propaganda video filled with totally unsupported claims and projections are needed to confuse people.
    - Arlwhat
      
      *sniffle*
- SteveM
  
  hmmm, any hornets in here? let me poke a little…
- NoVapologist
  
  I would expect no less from a county that forces 5 year olds to wear 45lb backpacks while crossing busy highways in the dark during lightning storms just to get to school.
  - Zelda
    
    Then move to Fairfax and get higher property taxes and higher per student number per class…quit whining … you just want to suck up more white colar welfare subsidized by condo owners who can’t get services because APS suck up 50% of our property taxes.#
  - Whatever Troll
    
    I have a 5 year old – he won’t be carrying a 45 lbs backpack to school. He’ll walking .5 mile carrying a backpack with a sandwich and juice. and he’ll be fine. Those worried about this stuff are yet another example of Arlington “super moms” making something out of nothing.
    - Arlington Supermom
      
      My kid walks 10 miles with a 50lb backpack and has to hunt for food and water along the way. No sandwich for him. That’s weakling talk.
Really?

I think we are good on sports bars for now
- DarkHeart
  
  We surely don’t need sports bars with hillbilly names.
MC 703

I’d rather go to A-Town Bar or Wilson Tavern than a big chain joint.
- BrianKal
  
  and look at their website, makes me never want to step foot in that place. It’s like Applebee’s meets Denny’s meets a place you would never step foot in meets somewhere to go for food poisoning.
  - http://purple.com/purple.html Captain Pup McPuppo
    
    truly terrible
  - Ren
    
    Yeah, I know it’s naive to think they won’t come here, but the chain explosion is a downer. Even the press release from this one sucks.
    - Ren
      
      I should have said, “naive to wish they wouldn’t…” – [[my kingdom for a ARLNow comments editor! ]]
      - WeiQiang
        
        Use the Blue Book
  - Westover
    
    A Denny’s in Clarendon or Balston would ROCK!
bobco85

When I think of the name Beef ‘O’ Brady, I think of…
- bobco85
  
  (I’ll start off the chain)
  
  …a competitor to Hamburger Helper.
  - CrystalMikey
    
    Or a Chef Boyardee item
    - O Newton
      
      …a porn star from the 70s.
- WeiQiang
  
  Pre-Chewed Charlie’s
- SteveM
  
  an Irish porn star
  - SomeGuy
    
    That’s what I was thinking.
  - Secrets
    
    Beef O’Brady will be our guest performer this coming Thursday night.
    - SomeGuy
      
      Sweet. I’ll see if Clarendon Skank is free that night. If there’s anything tight with that girl, it’s her schedule, but maybe she can squeeze me in.
      - Quoth the Raven
        
        Well done, sir.
      - John Fontain
        
        +5.
    - DarkHeart
      
      They could move into the Days Inn on CoPi (or would that be CoPu)?
    - The Ghost of Sam
      
      He “killed” in his performance on Sam’s closing night….
Deshotz

What is up with the very similar photos for today’s Morning Notes on ARLnow and today’s Morning Roundup over at DCist?
- http://www.arlnow.com ARLnow.com
  
  Well, our friends at DCist clearly copied us in the 2 minutes between when we published and when they published.
- Whatever
  
  what do you care? you think your busting someone for cheating on their homework?? why not use something visually appealing whether it used someplace else or not??
OHtoVa

I grew up in Ohio where chain restaurants abound. Even by Midwestern standards, Beef O’Brady is tacky and cliche. I’ve never seen one in any of the wealthier suburbs of northeast Ohio, so I’m not sure why they think they’d succeed in NoVa.
- WeiQiang
  
  Perhaps they want to get the jump on a space in the parking lot of the Shirlington Wal-Mart.
- brown before green
  
  From their website, the only remotely nearby locations in this area are Hagerstown and Frederick, MD. Are the demographics of Arlington just like Hagerstown and Frederick?
  - Just Stats
    
    White and Latino? Then yes.
    - cirrusly
      
      well, nevermind the objection, then
Becoming indifferent

Will the trolley go to Beef O’Brady? Maybe Arlington will spring for a video to educate us about Beef O’Brady. What else can this county waste money on?
- South Awwlington
  
  Actually the new trolley route is as follows:
  
  Ford the Potomac
  Loop the Pentagon
  Pause at CCR
  Utilize the Incline over 395
  90 degree turn onto the Pike to Eamonns and Giant
  Quick Pass up Glebe through Buckingham Gardens
  Over to Clarendon for some brown flips flops and Whole Food Beer Bar…
  
  all before re-upping the water supply at Donaldson Run for it’s hydrogen power, rocket grenade propulsion system.
  - O Newton
    
    You forgot the over the water transportation to Norfolk VA and back provided by the USS Arlington (LPD-24), a San Antonio-class amphibious transport dock.
    
    “Brandy, you’re a fine girl, but my first love is the sea…”
Clarendon

There’s already a Beef O’Brady’s in Newport News, Va and one in Fredneck, Md – how many more do we need ? We are practically surrounded by them. Might want to rethink that strategy, Beef.
- CrystalMikey
  
  Not that I care for this place, but you do know Newport News is a 2.5 hour drive from here, right?
  - Clarendon
    
    That’s with zero traffic – highly optimistic. With the caliber and character of a place like Beef O’Brady’s I don’t think it needs to be any closer. But, that’s just my opinion.
    - CrystalMikey
      
      Oh, I agree (on both accounts, my parents live down there so I make that drive a lot), I’m just making sure you didn’t think it was right outside the beltway. LOL
      - O Newton
        
        The USS Arlington (LPD-24), a San Antonio-class amphibious transport dock, can make it there and back without traffic, albeit it would be about a 7 hour trip, one way.
Theater Critic

So the County made a video, about a streetcar they desire?

Stella!!!
ARLing

Put it in Ballston. That seems to be the place for bad chain food, and of course we need another sports bar. Maybe they can all coordinate their flat screens.
- DarkHeart
  
  Maybe Ballston Mall can morph into a giant Dave and Busters?
- Brian
  
  watch it. We also have non-chain places.
Caroline

Yawn. These comments are silly, boring, and sound like a bunch of wining school children. I’m going back to work; filing papers interests me more than reading this dribble.
- Josh S
  
  Don’t worry, the crowd is just getting warmed up. Besides, it’s Monday morning of the last week before school starts. Things should be fairly quiet…..
  - Josh S
    
    Checking back in four hours later and I see I was wrong……on all fronts.
- Tre
  
  “yawn” comments are worse in my opinion. Don’t like what you see, bring something better to the table. I retract this statement if you were merely yawning as a result of it being Monday morning.
- Becoming indifferent
  
  Why so serious?
- WeiQiang
  
  … but if you throw in a few topical memes, the curmudgeons thrown down.
- Wining School Children
  
  I hope your “work” involves taking a vocabulary lesson. “Wining school children” is a tactic used by pedophiles. And last I checked, no one here is shooting hoops or wearing a bib, so your drivel about “dribbling” might be misplaced.
  - Quoth the Raven
    
    Let’s hope “dribble” was a function of a weird auto-correction, rather than her belief that it’s the right word. “Wining” is just a typo…
    - WeiQiang
      
      I’m conflicted. While “whining” was likely the intent and I’ll give her the typo, “dribble” may be ok. Drivel is a synonym for dribble in certain cases. Man, I love these thrilling grammatical threads.
      - NoVapologist
        
        Drivel is only synonymous with dribble when it used to describe drooling.
        Dribble is not synonymous with drivel when referring to stupid or childish talk.
      - WeiQiang
        
        precisely.
      - Trolly Troll
        
        Can anyone realistically expect the County do anything good when so many residents argue over pure drivel?
        
        Get back to work citizens.
  - HOVA
    
    Fo’ shizzle my nizzle used to dribble down in VA
- http://purple.com/purple.html Captain Pup McPuppo
  
  SOUNDS LIKE SOMEONE HAS A “CASE OF THE MONDAYS”
  - WeiQiang
    
    Did someone say “suitcase”?
- YTK
  
  Whining school children. They are too young to tipple.
  - YTK
    
    HAHAHA Dribble? Ya means Drivel, right? Yes, go back to work already. Hopefully you don’t have a job editing dictionaries.
Arlington Cat

A new bar in Arlington, and the county wants to show the public that streetcars in Arlington are a good idea; somehow it is like I am seeing the same news everyday.
Ed

another terrible restaurant.
Hikin the pike

I’ve eaten at Beef’s and I liked it. I apologize in advance for being wrong.
nom de guerre

Speaking of beef, wine, and dribble. today’s special from Sam’s Food Truck features free range beef shoulder, infused with wine, herbs and garlic, slowly roasted on a spit made from reclaimed streetcar track, thinly sliced and presented on an artisan baguette with arugula, heirloom tomatoes and red onions, with a horseradish aioli dribbled on top. Only while supplies last.
- WeiQiang
  
  heh. spit-roasted
  - Jeff
    
    That’s what I was thinking.
JnA

FYI, there is an expensive streetcar information kiosk in the lobby of 2100 Clarendon Blvd.

If you want to see what state of the art articulated buses look like you have to Google “Las Vegas ACE Bus”.
- Hikin the pike
  
  +1
  
  That bus system is awesome and (shhhh, don’t tell anyone) makes money.
  - Zoning Victim
    
    This is a liberal town; flexible and effective transportation that generates income won’t fly here.
- WeiQiang
  
  Def concur.
Elle K

$3400 is peanuts for a video, fyi. – And I loathe the whole trolley as much as humanly possible.
- Brian
  
  Thanks for posting this. I was curious to see if there were going to be a lot of “$3,400??!??! That’s ridiculous!” comments, but it’s not a bad video – especially for the bargain price. I don’t really support the streetcar idea either, especially since it doesn’t connect Ballston to Crystal City. It takes me 45 minutes by metro to get to work vs. 15 minutes by car. Guess which mode of transit I prefer?
  - Zoning Victim
    
    I can’t believe this post has been here for 30 minutes and nobody has berated you for not walking or riding a bicycle to work… yet.
  - Clarendonguy
    
    $3400?? Either someone is working for free or they’re not including all the costs. I do videos, it costs more than that. Graphics, interviews, edit time… More like the $1000 per minute ballpark. And that is on the low side of fair.
    - LTruitt
      
      Seriously. $3400 is a steal, and hardly newsworthy.
Ted

Shhhhh…Vegas ACE articulated bus is supposed to be a big secret. But I located a YouTube video at:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BG-RJUc6hUM
- South Awwlington
  
  There is NOTHING secret about articulated buses…they drive up and down H St all day, just outside my office window as well as along several other bus routes through the District. Those same buses are being replaced by the H St Line of the DC Streetcar.
  
  Why? Because those buses have also already met their carrying capacity…and H St doesn’t have the planned density being introduced along the Pike. Instead of claiming wasteful spending, perhaps you and your pals could thank County Government for NOT wasting $$$ on articulated buses that would need to be replaced in two years because they too will suffer from the same crowding issues that the “secret” H St articulated buses do.
  - MPF
    
    What will happen when the streetcars reach capacity?
    - Juanita de Talmas
      
      Ride the Orange Line during rush hour for the answer to your question.
    - The Ghost of Sam
      
      Double-decker street cars….they have them in London.
    - Josh S
      
      You’re right – we should never build anything because it will eventually reach capacity.
    - Clarendonguy
      
      articulated busses
      - South Awwlington
        
        http://grammarist.com/spelling/buses-busses/
Suzanne Smith Sundburg

From PikeTransit.com: “Capacity is defined as the ‘comfortable standing load’ for a transit vehicle, which is measured using the ratio of total passengers on board (sitting plus standing) to the number of seats on the bus. WMATA uses a ratio of 1.2 to estimate comfortable standing load, which translates into capacities of 63 passengers on a 43-foot bus, 94 passengers on a 60-foot bus, and 35 passengers on a 35-foot ART bus. The comparable load for a streetcar vehicle is 115 passengers (4 passengers per square meter).” See http://www.piketransit.com/downloads/may2012/VolumeII/3%20-%20Transportation%20Conditions.pdf

So the difference between a bus and a streetcar capacity is 21. According to discussions on the streetcar in DC, there are approximately 30 seats on a streetcar: http://www.scribd.com/doc/87719574/DC-Streetcar-Design-Criteria-January-2012

Buses have approximately twice the number of seats as do streetcars, which lends support to the argument that buses provide greater comfort to riders.

The real problem on the Pike is not simply bus vs. streetcar but the fact that the corridor is already beyond capacity with respect to traffic. With increased high-density development along the Pike, traffic congestion won’t be meaningfully reduced no matter which transit mode is selected. Adding a dedicated lane in each direction for the bus or the streetcar would truly increase the corridor’s capacity, but it has been deemed too expensive.

Here’s what public transit planning consultant Jarrett Walker (Portland, OR) has to say about the streetcar vs. bus:

“Most important, I’m not saying in the abstract that streetcars are good or bad. I’m saying that they are a major capital expense that requires a justification other than mobility (“getting people where they’re going fast and efficiently”) when we compare them to the bus routes they replace, or that could be developed instead.” See http://www.humantransit.org/2009/07/streetcars-an-inconvenient-truth.html
- JohnB
  
  Oh Suzanne. I thought we already had this discussion. You don’t want Columbia Pike to become what is envisioned for it because you seem to be opposed to additional density. Please make your argument against the current vision for Columbia Pike and in favor of your vision instead of attacking the Streetcar as the improper mode. It is the proper mode for the vision of the Pike as expressed and the improper mode for your vision because it is significantly different than the vision as expressed in the Form Based Code, Neighborhoods Plan, Streetscape Improvement, and Multi-modal study. What is your vision?
  - South Awwlington
    
    I think if we all (myself included) stop feeding the animals, they will eventually go away.
    
    But then again, it is good typing exercise.
    - JohnB
      
      Not really. Ms. Sundburg likes to get herself quoted in the media. A simple google search for her name turns up quite a lot that will give you an idea of her viewpoint. I have to give her credit for her PR skills but I wish she would present her vision for Arlington. I think we’d overlap on a lot of things, but from what I can tell she’s more in the Green Party-Audrey Clement camp which I see as missing the forest for the trees. They often present things as a false choice between growth in Arlington or no growth in Arlington. The way I see it, there’s going to be growth in the DC metro region. I’d rather it be concentrated in the core than outside the beltway. I’d rather find ways to re-work the built environment to accommodate that growth than throw up track housing on farmland or clear cut forest.
      
      I support the vision detailed in this document: http://www.columbiapikeva.us/revitalization-story/columbia-pike-initiative/a-revitalization-plan-update-2005/
      - South Awwlington
        
        In total agreement with you. If we don’t manage growth, NONE of us will be able to afford living anywhere close to DC. It WILL happen, with or without our guidance.
April

Shhh another big secret in Arlington….also serving Las Vegas is the Improved Deuce double deck bus. I found this Youtube video:

http://www.youtube.com.watch?v=dctwqxy6Ohg
April

oops,

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dctwqxy6Ohg
Paula

Growth ON the Pike? Arlington Mercury blog recently reported that the Federal Transit Administration awarded a $1 million grant to Northern VA Family Services to fix up old autos and give them to middle class workers so they could find better jobs OFF the Pike outside Arlington.

I have called the USDOT Inspector General Office and asked them to investigate this entire Pike streetcar snake oil scheme, which smells as bad as Four Mile Run downstream from teh Pike.
- South Awwlington
  
  Good for you. I had lunch with Ray LaHood on Friday.
LP

More antics by the wonderful folks who gave us MWAA’s Rail to Dulles.
More Urban Village Idiocy

SouthAwwlington, JohnB:

Where the h-ll do you think the 90,000 or so new residents in Virginia in 2013 are going to live? Chain Bridge Forest? Or in new sprawl suburbs carved out of what was recently farm land or forest, 50 miles from Arlington?
Ashton Heights

Sorry, I’m getting confused. Is Beef O’Brady starring in the streetcar video?
Ted

America’s Smart Growth Future (2012 to 2032) – Urbanize all the older suburbs. Build new suburbs on productive farmland for the 60 million increase in U.S. population over the next 20 years. Wealthy Elite get to live in cities. Middle Class, Working Class, etc., get to live 50 miles out and drive into work in sub-living wage jobs in 10 year old autos provided at discount by nanny non-profits controlled by the Wealthy Elite, funded by grants from state and federal transit agencies.

UPDATED: Thunderstorm Threat Tonight Arlington Ranks #4 on List of the ‘Rich and Single’

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