Good Monday morning, Alexandria!
☀️ Today’s weather: Expect a sunny day with a high near 51 degrees and a moderate northeast wind at 6 mph. As night falls, the sky will remain clear, and temperatures will drop to a low of about 28 degrees, accompanied by a north wind at 6 mph.
There was a big piece of development news in Alexandria and, for the first time, it felt like it wasn’t about the Potomac Yard arena.
The Robinson Terminal North project has been a thorn in the side of the city’s ambition to have a contiguous waterfront. Now, that industrial block could see redevelopment as a site with public waterfront access.
Don Dinan, the cofounder of the Alexandria Aces summer collegiate baseball team, died after a period of declining health on Monday. He was 74.
A D.C. resident, Donald Robert Dinan spent decades as an international trade and intellectual property attorney. He was born in Nashua, New Hampshire, and was raised in Ellicott City, Maryland, and met his future wife Amy at Mt. St. Joseph High School in Baltimore. Dinan earned degrees from The Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania in 1971, Georgetown University Law Center in 1974, and the London School of Economics in 1975. In addition to being a practicing attorney, for 30 years he taught a course in international trade law at Georgetown University.
A suspected, non-fatal student overdose occurred at Alexandria City High School this morning — the second in less than a week.
According to the scanner, the overdose was reported around 10 a.m. Superintendent Melanie Kay-Wyatt said the suspected overdose occurred on the King Street campus.
Alexandria experienced a nearly 30% increase in Part 1 crime in 2023, and Mayor Justin Wilson says new initiatives will help stem the flow.
Part 1 crimes, or crimes against people, include homicide, rape, robbery, aggravated assault, burglary, larceny and auto theft. There were 4,410 total Part I incidents in 2023, an increase of 31% over the 3,361 incidents reported in 2022, according to the Alexandria Police Department Crime Dashboard.
The proposed Potomac Yard arena could hold up to 20,000 people and those attendees have to get to the arena somehow.
A presentation prepared by the Virginia Department of Transportation (VDOT), City of Alexandria and Monumental Sports & Entertainment provided a glimpse at plans to handle that traffic.
Good Friday morning, Alexandria!
🌤️ Today’s weather: The weather will transition from cloudy to mostly sunny, reaching a high of around 49 degrees. Expect a light northwest wind in the morning, which will become a north wind at 9 to 14 mph, with possible gusts up to 21 mph. Friday night will be mostly clear with a low of approximately 32 degrees, as the north wind continues at 8 to 11 mph.
Plans to narrow the George Washington Parkway and widen the Mount Vernon Trail cleared another hurdle this week.
The changes could be coming to the Mount Vernon Trail just south of Alexandria. The National Park Service issued a Finding of No Significant Impact for an Environmental Assessment (EA) evaluating the impacts of the proposed changes, according to a release.
If shopping is your “thing”, this weekend in Alexandria was made for you! The 20th Annual Alexandria Boutique Warehouse Sale returns on Saturday and Sunday to more than fifty independent boutiques throughout Old Town.
There’s going to be a party at Port City Brewing Company on Saturday, which is celebrating thirteen years of making great beer. Their 13th Anniversary Celebration, which includes live music, food trucks, specialty barrel-aged brews, and more, is from 12 p.m. to 6 p.m.!
Who doesn’t want a little bit of Willy Wonka in Alexandria?
This spring, Madame Coco’s Emporium And Everything Chocolate will open at 103 S. St. Asaph Street in the Old Town space that was the previous home to the Mint Condition consignment shop (now at 122 S. Royal Street). The creative force behind the project says that once it opens it will be a salon-styled chocolate shop for hanging out and getting Tarot card readings.
It’s a classic trope, from the epic of Gilgamesh to the Fast & Furious: two enemies or rivals have to team up and put their differences aside to tackle a bigger threat.
Like some of the best odd couple pairs, Republican Gov. Glenn Youngkin and the mostly Democratic City of Alexandria have had some pretty public feuds, but the Potomac Yard arena and connected Washington Metropolitan Area Transit Authority (WMATA) funding could make for strange bedfellows.
