alternative hippopotamus

This is how I commute when I take the Metro. Which I will probably avoid for the next week or maybe longer.

It’s actually quicker for me to bike. So, that’s what I’m going to do.

Update: Since the story broke yesterday it just keeps getting worse. WaPo has an update here. Nine people have died. And, it sounds like the train that initiated the accident was one that was being phased out. If the problem was in the signaling system why was it just being phased out? This is starting to sound like a more systemic problem. I’m waiting for a rational explanation of why Metro riders shouldn’t be concerned about the other cars in the fleet, that, like this train, are being gradually removed from the system.

Update 2: From the WaPo chat:

Very good idea to work from home today. I think this may be an underrated change in our response to emergencies over the past few years. Many people now have the inclination and the technology to telecommute.

In fact, I think that may have diminished the problems today. My personal experience involved wandering around downtown Silver Spring, then taking the Metrobus shuttle to Fort Totten, then boarding a Yellow Line train to Gallery Place and a Red Line train to Farragut North, so I could join you for this chat. What I saw was much better than what I expected to see, as of last night.

I’m going to make a derivative point. Which is that there’s usually other ways around town, but which involves knowing the various quirks of the Metro Bus system. These days everyone has a cell phone, and usually one with messaging capability. I can’t believe the routing software could be that complicated. You should be able to text a start and end destination and get back a couple of routes that include any emergency situations or scheduled construction.

Chuckette:

Many thanks to all of you who voted for us for Best Liberal Blog at the 2008 Weblog Awards. You still have time to vote if you haven’t yet today. Apologies to those blogs we recommended whose leads were squashed by the spiteful actions of The Blog That Must Not Be Named. They sort of ruined the fun for the rest of us.

As a rule of thumb, try to have a sense of humor about yourself, and if you can’t, at least try to pretend that you do. This was a case where Wonkette, after the thin skinned ones went on and on about how Wonkette cheated, endorsed the PUMA competitors in other categories. Chuckette was the one who lost awards for the other bloggers.

A word about Wonkette, by the way. Wonkette is the only A list blog that takes the time to link to local DC blogs, including this humble hippo. The writers and commenters are funny, if a tad snarky. I’m glad to see them win in the liberal blog category. The best men and women truly did win in this case.

LA Times. (As far as I can tell this is not a spoof article):

“I have the same feeling that I think many Americans have, that it’s really remarkable that — what we’re going to do here in a few days, is swear in the first African-American president of the United States. When I came to town in 1968, we’d had the Martin Luther King assassination, Bobby Kennedy assassination, riots in the cities, major, major disturbances, a lot of it racially-motivated around the country.

“And in fact, things have changed so dramatically, that we’re now about to swear in Barack Obama as president of the United States. That’s really a remarkable story and I think a record of tremendous success and progress for the United States.”

Apparently, momentarily taken aback by the vice president’s positive tone on his party losing the White House, Blitzer mumbles, “Pretty historic. Pretty exciting.”

And Cheney agrees! “It is,” he says.

Now, many of us are not sure whether Cheney will actually leave the VP mansion. Biden may show up in a week or so, and Cheney will say “Go f*** yourself,” and slam the door in his face. KCinDC also has a theory that Cheney has used the last few years to dig an elaborate system of tunnels under the VP mansion. Actually, that would explain why it’s pixelated out on google earth. Anyway, the idea goes, instead of leaving, Cheney will just relocate to his underground bunker.

I think Dick is just giving us heads up that he has no intention of leaving.

After reading through this Marc Fisher Washington Post article on the “Purple Line”, I’m going to say this is a good example of local journalism. The comments are pretty good, and compliment the piece. By “compliment” I don’t mean they’re flattering, but round out what wasn’t said in the original post.

So here’s how the Post lays out the situation:

Pam Browning and Ben Ross have spent decades fighting to get the Purple Line built the right way. Both live where they do, in Chevy Chase and downtown Bethesda, respectively, because they love the convenience of an urban center in a suburban location. Both cherish the Capital Crescent Trail, the former railroad bed that has been transformed into a linear park, a busy pathway for mothers with strollers, exercisers out for a constitutional and bicycle commuters.

But that trail between Silver Spring and Bethesda exists because the government bought the right-of-way from the B&O Railroad in 1988 to build an east-west transit line connecting Prince George’s and Montgomery counties. And that plan is where Browning and Ross’s paths diverge.

The conflict, as Fisher describes, is between the bike path going from Silver Spring to Bethesda center and light rail occupying the same path. As far as I can tell, the bike path pretty much dies east of Meadowbrook Park, but I understand the long term plan does include a path going out to Silver Spring center.

This is a question I’ve had for some time. How can the Purple Line and the bike path coexist? I invited Chris Carney from Sierra Club to Drinking Liberally to talk about green initiatives in DC. One of the questions I put to him was just this one about the bike path. His answer to me, avid bicyclist to avid bicyclist, was that the two can exist at the same time. While I want to believe that, I’m not sure if I see that as a realistic possibility.

Here’s what the Post piece says:

the passageway is so narrow that at one point, in a tunnel in downtown Bethesda, the pedestrian trail would literally run on a deck above the railway

This is of course referring to the tunnel just before Bethesda downtown. Indeed, I can’t see any way that light rail and bicycles can fit on the same bit of earth.

One of the decisions we’ll need to make as a region going forward is how much we want to look like the Netherlands. While my answer to that is “Just like them and moreso” I’m not sure my fellow Washingtonians are there yet.

I had a very nice Thanksgiving break. Thank goodness I’ll get a chance to do it all over again in 3 weeks.

On Friday, still reeling from the triptaphan, I walked into my local Hudson Trail Outfitters. When I was growing up this was where you got stuff to go camping. Well, JC Penney had some camping gear. But things like kick-ass hiking boots you got at HTO.

Times have changed, of course. Now there’s a bunch of chains competing for the lucrative outdoor/travel clothing dollar. But, HTO has something they don’t have.

Longboards. That’s right, imagine my surprise when I saw that the HTO in Tenley now carries longboards. Good ones, may I add. I may not have discovered skatesonhaight.com if not for the lack of longboards in the DC area.

The bike paths here make for great longboarding. I can’t say how nice it is to skate the path between Old Town, Alexandria and Crystal City. I just never thought that the local businesses would catch up to it.

Though the profit part continues to elude me.

On Saturday I conducted an experiment I’ve been considering for the last week. The premise is that the distance between the Woodley Park Metro and Adams Morgan can be neatly collapsed into a mere singularity by use of a skateboard. Of course, that’s a bit hyperbolic, but the idea is that this would be a straightforward (and quick) way of crossing the Calvert Street bridge.

I began thinking about this approximately one week ago while using my newest longboard to traverse the sidewalk along Madison Street. That’s the one that passes by the American History Musem, Natural History Museum, and National Gallery of Art. Sections of the pavement use a rough, gravel-like surface that is impossible for a typical skateboard wheel, but is reasonably acceptable for my Landyachtz (72 mm Gumball wheels). Still, even with a monster board like a Landyachtz, the surface was rough enough to cause the screws on my front trucks to shear off. At the time I estimate I was going 7-8 mph (based on my rate of passing walking pedestrians). That’s pretty respectable. After replacing the damaged screws, I began to realize that surfaces that were previously out of bounds would now be worth trying.

The Calvert Street bridge uses a similar slab to the ones along Madison, so I though this might go reasonably well. And, it did for a bit. I didn’t notice before that there’s a significant uphill at about 1/4 mile. Between the grade and the surface it’s pretty tough going. Going back from 18th St to Woodley might not be so bad, but that’s an experiment for another day.

There is, of course, a bike lane along the Calvert Bridge, but I wasn’t ready to go there, yet. Still, that might be another solution to getting to Adams Morgan by skateboard.

I’ve been aware for some time now that the local bookstore would soon join the local dairy farm and the local butcher shop as relics of an earlier era. I’ve started to write about it, but put it off, knowing that writing about it could even hasten its demise. Sadly, brick and mortar locations like our Thursday nights at Timberlake’s were one of the last refuges of the full-price book sale.

Still it’s hard to read this article from the Washington Post without feeling a bit nostalgic. Alicia Greene, who I usually dealt with for getting copies of political books for sale at author nights is mentioned in the article. She was good at her job, and I do hope the next chapter (no pun intended) is a step up for her. And, of course, walking by the space on 19th St. will inevitably yield memories of searching through the bins, and days of my youth frolicking in Dupont Circle.

The math is not in the favor of brick and mortar book stores. I, for one, buy most of my books at rates that can’t support a physical store, half of cover price or less. As far as buying CD’s and DVD’s goes, it’s hard to justify spending $29.95 on a movie that I can buy on iTunes for $10.

Prof Turley is without doubt one of the most admired legal eagles in our fair city, the People’s Republic of DC. In this case, though, I’m hoping he has mischaracterized the relationship between Obama and Cass Sunstein, aka Mr. Samantha Powers. As far as I can tell, Sunstein is a creepy dude.

This quote from Sunstein has been going around lately. You may have seen it:

Prosecuting government officials risks a “cycle” of criminalizing public service, [Sunstein] argued, and Democrats should avoid replicating retributive efforts like the impeachment of President Clinton — or even the “slight appearance” of it.

It’s kind of ironic that Sunstein wrote a book called Republic.com 2.0. If he had read the slightly older Republic.com 1.0, he would have recognized that Justice is a fundamental attribute of the ideal city. Ideal, of course, in the Platonic sense. The idea that the Executive branch should not be accountable for crimes, high or low is so offensive to our notion of justice that I find it hard to believe that a Harvard Law professor would broach the subject. Well, Harvard, maybe. They can be kind of weird.

As one of Turley’s commenters asks:

Sunstein is a lawyer? Where’d he get his degree? Costco?

Look, Sunstein: there is public service, and there is crime. They are not the same thing. It’s apples and oranges. Public service simply cannot be “criminalized.” A person holding public office who uses that office to commit crimes is not in public service but in self service.

I’ll note that Sunstein doesn’t refer to himself as a “close advisor” to Obama, as Glenn Greenwald had put it: (Salon)

You’re sounding a bit like Barack Obama. He was your colleague for a while, right?

Yes, 10 years. And I’m an informal, occasional advisor to him.

I’ll tell you what I like about Obama, which is connected with the book. He really doesn’t like to surround himself only with like-minded others. He really is someone who has never lived and wouldn’t live in an echo chamber.

While I’d prefer “he thinks I’m an idiot” to “informal, occasional advisor” at least it’s something.