Image by Bankbryan
If you have to drive to work, living in Capitol Hill is your best bet. According to this article, a one-hour commute cuts your social life by 10 percent. Luckily my driving commute to work is less than ten minutes, so my commute is as easy as they come.
At times I feel like, living in Capitol Hill South, the District’s highways, freeways and routes are my playground. When I need to go to Georgetown, no problem, go through four or so short lights and merge onto I-395 then take Maine Avenue. When I drive to the National Harbor, it’s a straight ride; just take the Southwest Freeway off of 11th Street or keep straight on Pennsylvania Ave for about 5 minutes and merge onto I-295.
Aside from where you can go, there are times, you just need a change in scenery. The Capitol Hill area is good for people who love the District but also need a break from it.
This is a pretty lousy way to promote our neighborhood. It’s easy to leave it? If you commute somewhere and need the beltway, there it is? Recommending people drive everywhere isn’t my idea of what’s best for the city anyway, and definitely not what I consider a “perk” of living on the Hill.
Disagree, Bryant. That’s actually one of the reasons why I love the Hill.
I have never understood people who stay in the city every single weekend. I love the neighborhood and the city, but there’s so much else out there that it’s nice to have easy highway access to get out of town (not to mention accessibility to the airports).
I always ask people who live here and don’t have cars how they do spur of the moment road trips, or go camping, or go to Costco, or go hiking in the Shenandoah for the day, or go to the Outer Banks and they always tell me that either they don’t do those things really or that they have to plan ahead and rent a car or zip car or hitch a ride. Sorry, none of those are acceptable alternatives to just throwing your crap in your car and being on the road in 10 minutes. I mean, my friends in Petworth and Mt. Pleasant have to factor in an additional 20 minutes to even get to the highway when we go on trips!
But, people are different. Some people are perfectly happy living a car-free existence. Others aren’t. So what is a perk to some, isn’t to others. That’s okay. We don’t all have to live the same way.
Things we take for granted: higher risk of spontaneous abortion for those living near a freeway.
“Pregnant women who are African-American or nonsmokers are more likely to have miscarriages if they live near heavy traffic, according to a new state study.
Researchers examining health-care data on nearly 5,000 pregnant women in California found that African-Americans were about three times more likely to miscarry if they lived within a half-block of a freeway or busy boulevard than if they resided near lighter traffic. Among nonsmokers, living near busy roads increased their odds of miscarriage about 50 percent.”
http://oehha.ca.gov/public_info/press/traffic120809.html
This study found this effect for roads with average annual daily traffic counts > 15,199.
I-395 has AADT of 78,000-110,700 as it passes through Capitol Hill. I-295 has AADT of 72,000 to 111,000.
http://ddot.dc.gov/DC/DDOT/About+DDOT/Maps/Traffic+Volume+Maps/Archive+of+Traffic+Volume+Maps/Traffic+Volume+Map+2009
My earlier comment is still shown as “awaiting moderation.” I’m not sure if I have fun afoul of the comment policy or if the moderator is just busy with other things. Let me try again. . .
Quick and easy freeway access is not all positive.
A 2009 study in Environmental Health Perspectives found that African-Americans were about three times more likely to miscarry if they lived within a half-block of a freeway or busy boulevard than if they resided near lighter traffic. Among nonsmokers, living near busy roads increased their odds of miscarriage about 50 percent. Other studies have found that air pollution is associated with poor birth outcomes, including low birth weight , small-for-gestational-age, and preterm birth.
Increased risk of miscarriage was found for women living near roads with an average annual daily traffic volume (AADT) of 15,200 or greater. I-395 has AADT of 78,000-110,700 as it passes through Capitol Hill. I-295 has AADT of 72,000-111,000. Even C Street NE, the street I live on, sees upwards of 20,000 commuter and commercial vehicles entering the neighborhood each weekday.
As the father of a child who was delivered 2 months early and weighing only 2.5 pounds, this issue is of particular concern to me. Capitol Hill is livable and walkable in spite of commuter and convenience traffic, not because of it. We don’t all have to live the same way, but we should recognize when our choices have the potential to harm others.
I would add easy access to Rte 50 to your list, for escapes to the beach.
@CR – anything with a link immediately goes into moderation. Sometimes it takes us a bit to get to those things since we’ve got jobs and whatnot 🙂
Being “livable & walkable” is only one of the reasons I love the Hill. Easy access to a variety of highways is another. Access to multiple bus routes is another. The list goes on.
My choice to drive on easily accessible highways has zero to do with the study you sited. If they were planning on adding another highway, then you might have a point. But since it was there before I – and most likely, you – were here, I’m not sure how my decision to use said highway in any way harms others.
@Bryan, for me it’s not about it being easy to leave the neighborhood, it’s about being so close to other parts of the city and region. I wish we had everything we needed in our neighborhood but there are things I need to leave for. And being able to get there so quickly means I can come back just as quickly 🙂
The California studies are significant because of the ubiquity of high volume freeways and major heavily trafficked arteries which bisect most of SoCal (and Northern, and Central for that matter). Many more people live in close proximity to high volume traffic areas. As congested as DC is, I don’t think it even compares to LA Southland.
The size of the 495 Beltway, I-270, or I-95, for example, would probably be considered low volume roads in comparison to the major freeways in SoCal.
Relative to DC, I like the convenience of our access to major roads. Going crosstown to NW is a headache much of the time, but there are so many convenient ways to bypass from CH. More importantly, I equally like our access to other transit options, including multiple Metro lines, major bus lines, Circulator, bike lanes, etc.
The highways are one part of what makes this neighborhood rich in transportation options. Highway, metro, busses, and the ability to bike or for some even ride to work.
I’ve lived in the city all of my adult life, but only consistently worked in the city for about two of those years. Easy access to the highway makes a shorter commute, which does a heck of a lot for my quality of life.
When I lived on the Hill, highway access made visiting Metro-inaccessible friends and relatives a breeze. It’s one of the reasons I chose the Hill over other neighborhoods. The urbanist ideal would have the SE Freeway either removed or buried, but I don’t see the billions that would take just lying around.
I current work at the Navy Yard, so my commute from Capitol Hill is a breeze. However, I’m well aware that if I ever switch jobs I’ll probably have to go out to Reston or something, since engineering jobs are not plentiful inside the boundaries of DC. The proximity to highways was one of the many reasons I chose to live here. It’s also handy for trips up north to visit my family, and for going to my bi-weekly classes at GMU.
I had to reverse-commute from downtown DC to Rockville and Belvoir for years. Sure beats the heck out of heaving from the suburbs INTO town in the morning.
I love the proximity of I395/295 to my residence on the Hill. It makes getting around the region so much easier, most evident in the the 20-25 min. I save just getting out of town. While I love living in a walkable, trasit-friendly location, I’m not so obtuse as to discount the obvious ease that the interstate provides. For example, I can get to the Target in Potomac Yard in half the time it would take me to go to the one in Columbia Heights. In fact, since moving to the Hil I find myself doing many more activities in VA than I did in the past because it is so quick and easy. My world has been expanded by the interstate access, and not being a transportation ascetic, I welcome that.