Street Closures Today

Speaking of closures, I wish they’d reopen the sidewalk on F Street in front of the Reynold Center/Portrait Gallery already. The construction is done, museum and atrium reopened, and that stretch of sidewalk has been closed for what, 7, 8 years now? Time to push the chain link fence back a few feet while they’re finishing up.

Mr. T – at least now much of the sight line is restored because the fence isn’t opaque like that wall was. I think it’s great to be able to see the Treasury building all the way down F Street.

I suspect that they will use the area behind the fence as the staging area for the reconstruction of the F Street steps of the museum. It’s a big project, so I don’t expect to get the use of that sidewalk back for quite a while.

That’s a shame, since there’s plenty of room there even if they pull the fence back 5-10 feet. They’ve removed the big trailers, which must have been the main stumbling block as they extended out almost to the curb line. I wouldn’t mind having pedestrian access reduced in order to prioritize swift construction time, but in this case it seems neither speed, nor neighborhood access has been a priority.