An Alley Can Look Like This?

Columns

by Prince Of Petworth February 5, 2008 at 10:48 pm 13 Comments

IMG_6692, originally uploaded by Prince of Petworth.

Holy cow, you could eat off of this alley. I suppose there are no houses facing this alley but this is one damn clean alley. Check out my alley after the jump.

Actually I found another amazingly clean alley that does have houses that back out into it. So what’s the deal?

Christina

Wow, those are impressive — are all of those alleys in Petworth?

Sometimes I want to go out with a huge bag and clean my own alley. But I know that it’s basically no use; people put their garbage out there for DPW to pick up, and they don’t give a damn if it’s alll nice and tidy in bags, spilling over onto the ground for vermin and the wind to take away, or what. And then there is the illegal dumping. Good times.
Prince Of Petworth

Those are the lovely alleys of Mt. Pleasant.
TheNeighbor

After the big community alley clean up last year in my alley, what, the alley stayed clean for a week? If the neither the neighbors or neighborhood care, it will look like nobody cares. Hence the trashy looking alley in the photo.

When I lived elsewhere in this country homeowners/renters were responsible for 3 feet off the back of their house into the alley. (clean-up, grass/weed removal, etc.) If you didn’t take care of your portion you were fined. Plus the garbage men gave a shit too, not like the can kicking, trash dropping, lid breaking dudes the work here.
Chris

I have seen the city re-do several alleys like this around Dupont and Logan (i.e., see the alley between Whole Foods and Logan Hardware). How does the District decide which alleys get re-done with bricks???
oliveskinnednica

PoP –

Go to the DC Government’s Website at http://dc.gov/registration/login.asp?appid=3&target=http%3A%2F%2Fsrc%2Edc%2Egov%2Fccc%2FcccValidateUserDefault%2Easp

Then click on “Make a New Service Request”
Then click on “Alley Cleaning” or “Alley Repair”.

Fill in the info as detailed as you can and hopefully they will come and repair the alley. There are 2 other neighbors whose houses border that alley that have put in requests.
Matt

I’m confused…what would they be repairing?
iammrben

Very cool — my wife and I used to live off of the alley in the top photo. Very clean, indeed, and beautiful in the summer when the trees bloom around it.

It’s actually more attractive than PoP’s photo depicts — it splits in two at the end and one spur leads to a dead end which overlooks Rock Creek Park and the Cathedral, and the other spur wends its way to 18th Street.

Incidentally, it also runs behind one of PoP’s houses of the day: http://www.princeofpetworth.com/?p=1068
Mark

Well, now I know how to get my alley that clean. I’ll just ask everyone on the alley to donate the services of their valet or footman for, say, an hour or two per week, to pick up twigs and thrash any hooligans they find.

Seriously, did you know that the district will clean graffiti for you? There’s a request form on the web site:
http://www.dpw.dc.gov/dpw/cwp/view,A,1202,Q,634252,dpwNav,%7C31202%7C,.asp
bogfrog

I have had the city clean graffiti as Mark mentioned — the job was finished within 2 days of my request. Wow!

Saturday afternoon, I was out sweeping glass from the alley, and I met a gentleman who was also sweeping the alley. He said that he sweeps it nearly every day, but especially after the trash pickup days. I was so thrilled to meet someone like that!
oliveskinnednica

Matt –

Although they haven’t fulfilled the many requests, repair of an alley would include fixing any depressions in the bricks, potholes, repaving if necessary, etc.

Cleaning would just include picking up strewn trash and sweeping the alley.
JnDC

Yeah, and I made several alley repair requests about 6 months ago and they have never been addressed. The time-line for their alley cleaning alone is almost 2 weeks or more and inevitably by the time they do clean it, you might as well submit another for 2 weeks in the future when it will look the same again. Frustrating…
DCer

creepy.

stop stalking me.
Pingback: Prince Of Petworth » Blog Archive » Dear PoP - Alley Resurfacing on 600 blk of Princeton Place, Quebec, and RCC Road, Thanks Mr. Mayor()

Subscribe to our mailing list