Arthur Capper/Carrollsburg Revitalization

Torti Gallas conducted a planning and development options study for four (4) DC Housing Authority properties in the Navy Yard/Southeast and Capitol Hill areas of the City. The purpose of this study was to determine the level of distress, to compare these sites with the greater market area and to develop a Master Revitalization Plan. For one of these, the Arthur Capper/Carrollsburg community, this Master Plan was included as part of a successful HOPE VI Grant award.

The Arthur Capper/Carrollsburg site was isolated from the rest of the city and, specifically the Capitol Hill neighborhood, by the freeway and the Federal Government uses surrounding the area.  Additionally, the site was pressured by higher density development along the adjacent M Street corridor, which was triggered by the influx of new federal employees to the Navy Yard.  The design challenge was to create a revitalized, mixed-income/mixed-age/mixed-use neighborhood that would be an extension of the Capitol Hill neighborhood towards the Anacostia River.

The solution places higher density office, senior, and workforce housing uses along the commercially-oriented M Street and along the newly created Canal Park, located on the site of a former school bus parking lot.  Two new streets were cut through the larger “superblocks” in order to create a finer neighborhood block pattern. Townhouses are located in the middle portion of the site.  The three, four-story apartment buildings on the site serve as a transition between the higher and lower density portions of the site.  The LEED Certified Neighborhood Community Center is located centrally within walking distance of all edges of the community and contains aggressive supportive services that provide pathways out of poverty for the residents. The Community Center’s athletic fields are shared with the U.S. Marine Corps housing located immediately east of the public housing site.