The Columbia Pike Blues Festival was held on Saturday.
Featuring live music from acts like Tinsley Ellis and The Curbfeelers, plus nearly 50 market, craft and food vendors, the annual event drew a large crowd to the two-block stretch of Walter Reed Drive just north of the Pike.
Contractor Says ART Drivers Weren’t Fired — The contractor that operates the Arlington Transit bus service says 23 striking drivers were suspended pending an investigation, not fired, as the drivers claim. ART reports that it is operating this morning with minimal delays on most bus lines. [Washington Post, Arlington Transit]
No Republicans Stepping Up for Board Race — County Board incumbents Mary Hynes and Walter Tejada are still without a Republican challenger. Today is the local GOP’s self-imposed deadline to find a candidate for the race. [Washington Examiner]
You might get the summertime blues on the Pike this weekend.
The 16th annual Columbia Pike Blues Festival kicks off at 1:00 p.m. Saturday on South Walter Reed Drive and Columbia Pike. The free event runs through 8:00 p.m. and features acclaimed acts like southern blues rocker Tinsley Ellis, along with Columbia Pike’s own blues and soul band, The Curbfeelers.
An off-duty Arlington County Detention Center guard was assaulted by a former inmate outside a 7-Eleven on the 3000 block of Columbia Pike this afternoon, authorities tell ARLnow.com.
The guard, an Arlington sheriff’s deputy, was treated at a hospital after the attack, according to Maj. Mike Pinson of the Arlington County Sheriff’s Office. The injured deputy was spotted talking to police officers after the attack while wearing a small head bandage and an arm sling, but Pinson was unable to confirm the exact nature of his injuries.
Update at 10:45 a.m. — The scene has reportedly been cleared and the closure lifted.
South Joyce Street has been closed between Army Navy Drive and Columbia Pike due to police activity.
Update at 9:30 a.m. — The accident has been cleared and Columbia Pike has reopened.
Westbound Columbia Pike has been shut down in front of the Arlington Cinema Drafthouse due to a truck fire.
“The history of this place has not been good,” admitted owner Farhad Assari, a former international investment banker who left a lucrative gig in Dubai to move closer to his family and pursue his culinary dreams. Like many other food entrepreneurs these days, Assari started small — launching several food trucks that served hearty world cuisine — before trying to translate his street success into a four-walls-and-a-roof restaurant.
Despite the building’s ignominious past and off-the-beaten-path location near Four Mile Run, Assari said he couldn’t imagine opening the restaurant anywhere else.
Much of the Pike — with four travel lanes, a turn lane and, eventually, a streetcar line — does not have room for bike lanes. Meanwhile, traffic tends to be too fast and too congested for safe shared use by bicyclists. And the sidewalks are too narrow for bicyclists and pedestrians to safely co-exist.
So what are cyclists — and county planners — to do? The solution being discussed tonight, which has been in the works since 2004, would create two “bicycle boulevards” that run on quiet residential streets parallel to the Pike.
Gooljar wants to raise $200 to get local, independent coffee shop Rappahannock Coffee & Roasting (2406 Columbia Pike) some new WiFi gear. It seems that the cafe’s existing wireless router is slow, outdated and can barely accommodate more than four simultaneous WiFi users. To remedy the situation, Gooljar is asking customers to make donations to help update the equipment.
“It’s a small coffee shop and the owners don’t make that much to be spending it on things like this but people are here all the time and we could benefit from a new router!” he wrote on ChipIn.com, a web site that helps users conduct grassroots fundraisers.
Update at 9:05 p.m. — The number of Dominion customers without power in Arlington is now down to 350.
Dominion is reporting that just over 2,500 customers are without power in Arlington after a line of storms raced through the area just after dinner time.
The two-car accident happened this morning on the on-ramp from eastbound Columbia Pike to northbound Washington Boulevard. No injuries were reported, though the ramp was shut down for awhile.
The on-ramp was mentioned in our Most Dangerous On-Ramps list in February for its lack of room for merging cars to get up to speed.
Padrino’s Fine Italian Cuisine hopes to first open its doors at some point near the end of June, according to owner Sami Khan, who said he’s excited to be opening a restaurant on the Pike.
“This is a beautiful place,” he said of the still-developing strip.
