Steve Burns
WMAL.com
WASHINGTON – (WMAL) When the Nationals take the field on this Opening Day 2018, the environment around them will be vastly different than on Opening Day 2008, ten years ago.
The area around the park is continuing its rapid transformation, from one filled with auto repair shops, strip clubs, and liquor stores, to a neighborhood filled with new apartments, shops, and restaurants.
The task ahead for Michael Stevens, President of the Capital Riverfront Business Improvement District, is shaping the character of that community.
“We do a lot of place management. We try to create a sense of community where none had existed before as a light industrial backyard. It’s also creating a sense of identity and place where none had existed before.”
Those dumps, incinerators, and sketchy business fronts have slowly but surely been replaced, but it wasn’t after some lean years, Stevens said.
“Nationals Park opened at the height of the Recession,” he said. “Development had slowed or stopped all over the city, so for the next three years it was really a slow go in terms of development.”
Three straight last-place finishes by the Nats didn’t help matters. But as the team started to heat up, so did the real estate market.
“2011, 2012, that’s when the neighborhood really started catching fire,” Stevens said. “It became a very popular residential neighborhood, and that started to be followed by retail and restaurants.”
The BID said 16 new restaurants have opened since Opening Day 2017, and eight more are expected over the course of 2018. The park will also be the center of the baseball world in July as it hosts the All-Star Game.
The growth of the area has surpassed even what Michaels had envisioned. He said about half of the planned development is now open, with much more still to come.
“When I first started working down here 11 years ago, I calculated we might have 12,000 residential units at build-out, and now we think it’s going to be 22,000,” Michaels said. “I think people finally understand the value of the Anacostia River as a waterfront. They understand our parks and how well we program them and entertain them.”
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