by Marlene Berlin I got a late start. I’d been reading the latest Christian Science Monitor, which gives you the scoop on the good news that is happening around the world, and then the Washington Post, where I learned Walmart will not build two stores that were to anchor two shopping centers east of the […]
Soapstone Trail gets more TLC but needs more trash cleanup
This Saturday and Monday, volunteers led by the Rock Creek Conservancy will gather in Soapstone Valley and other Rock Creek parks to work on improving them. You can join them. The Soapstone Trail also got some attention last Saturday, on January 9th. About a dozen volunteers with the Potomac Appalachian Trail Club worked on the […]
Volunteers sought for Soapstone, Melvin Hazen and Peirce Mill cleanups MLK weekend
Martin Luther King, Jr. once said, “Life’s most persistent and urgent question is: ‘What are you doing for others?’” Each year, Americans across the country answer that question by coming together on the King holiday to serve their neighbors and communities. This Saturday, January 16th and Monday, January 18th, you can join your neighbors and […]
Wilson High students learn – and teach us – about Soapstone Creek
by Steve Dryden Wilson High School is probably the only educational institution in Washington, DC with a federally-protected nature sanctuary on its campus. Hidden under layers of vines at the bottom of a deep ravine between the Wilson Aquatic Center and Albemarle Street is a small remnant of a major tributary of Rock Creek. Called […]
You can help ANC 3F’s new Trails Committee watch over Soapstone and Melvin Hazen
by Pat Jakopchek ANC 3F07 commissioner Each weekday, over 37,000 cars travel through our neighborhood along Connecticut Avenue. Their riders head to one of the countless commitments of their modern lives. All the while, some of our community’s biggest gems sit just a few hundred feet from the edges of that thoroughfare. Contrary to what […]
How DC Water repaired a 1908 sewer pipe in Soapstone Valley
by David Jonas Bardin and Marjorie L. Share Hikers did not notice. Nor did nearby homeowners, and it seemed an accident, almost, that anyone did. The amount of sewage seeping from the ground near Soapstone Creek – beyond where the east end of Audubon Terrace meets the Soapstone Valley Trail – was small and intermittent. […]
High E. coli levels in Soapstone Creek prompt DC Water warning
by Marlene Berlin This sign posted at the Soapstone Valley trailhead on Albemarle Street (though not on Broad Branch) over the weekend raised a lot of questions in the community and a lot of concerns. DC Water said Sunday that it had to do with a sewer leak, but that it would have more definitive […]
Where (and how) the stormwater flows into Soapstone
by David Jonas Bardin Have you ever wondered which storm sewers drain into Soapstone Creek – and where from? This District Department of the Environment (DDOE) map shows five areas – totaling 404 acres – from which rain is collected by storm sewers and flows to outfalls in Soapstone Valley. Red marks five sewershed boundaries. […]