Rethink College Park

This is a great little film from StreetFilms detailing Seattle’s South Lake Union Streetcar. Since there really is not anything new to report on the Purple Line front take a peek at this movie and just picture what it could mean for College Park.

This system surpassed ridership projections in its first year. I’m sure the Purple Line will have the same result.

Come on, get out of your gas guzzler, strap on a helmet, pump up those dry rotted tires on your huffy and Bike into work tomorrow.  All the cool kids are doing it! There will be Free T-shirts and goodies at the College Park Pit Stop located at City Hall. (6:30am to 8:30am) Contact Elisa Vitale at 301.277.3445 or evitale@collegeparkmd.gov for more information.

For more pit stops and event information, visit www.waba.org/events/btwd/index.php

The building at the far right is University View III

The Diamondback reports that the City Council gave a thumbs up to View III. The completion of the University View trifecta will begin at the end of next summer.  This will bring an additional 992 beds and 19,000 square feet of retail space.  By my estimate all three building provide in the neighborhood of 2600 beds for students just steps away from the main entrance to campus.

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"BooYaa! Game over its $1 Bud night at the Fe!"

Stevie Fanchise might actually become a franshise. The Diamondback reports that the one-time Maryland Basketball star could trade dunking the “rock” to dunking buffalo wings to become a partner with current ‘Fe owners. 

The long-time Terp hangout will undergo extensive renovations this summer.

In the meantime, Srour said Santa Fe will be closing May 24 for renovations and hopes to open up the ground floor by the beginning of the fall semester but is unsure if construction will be completed.

“Santa Fe needs a nice facelift,” he said. “It’s a building that’s many years old.”

Srour said he wants to make Santa Fe more like the 9:30 club in Washington.”We are going to promote more of a band venue,” he said.

Srour said the bar in the center of the building will be removed and he plans to finally acquiesce to city demands and install a sprinkler system.

“We’re going to be changing the name and changing everything,” he said, adding the bar’s upper level will be turned into a “more trendy lounge [area].”

There have been other rumors of former Terp stars becoming investors in the past such Danny White and Shawne Merriman with no results. So we’ll see what pans out here.

Tonight we completed some behind-the-scenes updates to Rethink College Park, including an update to the blog software. In addition to the upgrade, with the help from former contributor Eric Fidler and friend of the site Pat O’Brien (Thank you!), we were able to resurrect all of the comments lost to a database error in October 2008. So all comments from July 2006 to the present are now working properly — some 1,732 in all.

We also deleted some spam “subscriber” accounts, so if you notice your usual login for commenting isn’t working you’ll have to sign up again. Our apologies.

To get more involved in the website contact Clay Gump at clay.gump at gmail.com. The group recently resumed regular meetings in College Park, and we are looking for new contributors.

Here is a Interesting 3 minute film from The Congress for the New Urbanism (CNU) that was its 2009 contest winner. It is entertaining and more than a little thought provoking. I don’t think anyone would argue that College Park suffers from excess sprawl, however, we could still benefit from providing more services that are within a 5 minute walk.

The DIAMONDBACK reported back in November that the Washington Post is closing its College Park printing plant sometime before June 2010. This will result in a $272,000 loss in tax revenue for the city. What does this have to do with the new Kindle DX? Probably nothing. But it does show how newspapers are struggling right now trying to figure out their rightful place in the digital world.

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94th Aero Squadron is now closed due to water damage sustained back in February.

For those of you that do not know the 94th has been in College Park for many years. It is located at 5240 Paint Branch Pkwy (see map below the break) and it filled a need in the area for a “table cloth” style place to eat. The 94th is officially on property owned by the M-NCPPC and has a long term lease agreement. The restaurant itself if run by a company called Specialty Restaurants Corporation based out of Anaheim CA.

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