Penrose Tracks March 2010Page 1

Penrose TracksMarch 2010 Newsletter of the Penrose Neighborhood Association Judy Morse, Editor

Penrose Calendar

Mar 16: (Tues) Penrose Neighborhood Assn. Monthly Meeting (7:30 pm)Apr 17: (Saturday) Arlington E-CARE Recycling Day at Thomas Jefferson Middle School parking lot (8:30 am – 2:30 pm)Apr 17: (Saturday) Penrose Neighborhood Assn. Spring Potluck (4:00 pm) (no regular Tuesday meeting in April)May 18: (Tues) Penrose Neighborhood Assn. Monthly Meeting (7:30 pm)Jun 15: (Tues) Penrose Neighborhood Assn. Monthly Meeting (7:30 pm)Jun 19: (tentative) 15th Annual Columbia Pike Blues Fes-tival, 900 block of S. Walter Reed Dr. (1:00–7:00 pm)Jul 17: (Saturday) Penrose Neighborhood Assn. Summer Potluck (4:00 pm) (no regular Tuesday meeting in July)Aug 17: (Tues) Penrose Neighborhood Assn. Monthly Meeting (7:30 pm)Sep 18: (Saturday) Penrose Neighborhood Assn. Fall Picnic at Penrose Park (starts at 4:00 pm)Sep 21: (Tues) Penrose Neighborhood Assn. Monthly Meeting (7:30 pm)

We meet at the Trinity Episcopal Church (Children’s Center en-trance) at the corner of S. Wayne St. and Columbia Pike.

Penrose Traffic News…Department of Human Services (DHS) programs will be moving into Penrose between June and September 2010 at Sequoia Plaza. Free parking will be provided. New bus stops will be added for ART 42 and 77, with extended operating hours for ART 77. Also, a new bus line will connect the DHS building to Rosslyn and Columbia Pike.

77 and 42 Bus Stop Changes: Arlington County Transit Services changed the 77 and 42 bus lines to add parallel stops on both sides of the street and shorten some of the walking time for riders.

The northbound ART 42 stop shifted up a little further up the hill to 5th Street South. Then we will have a joint ART 42 and ART 77 bus stop at the same location. Previously, ART 77 bus riders could only pick up the bus at 2nd Street or out at Walter Reed.

The southbound ART 77 added a stop on 6th Street South, just before the bus turns onto Walter Reed Drive.

Navy Coming to S. Courthouse Road Department of Navy is presenting at the Penrose Neighbor-hood Association meeting, Tuesday night, 7:30 pm, March 16, regarding their plans for the facility at 701 South Court-house Road, Arlington 22204. It is currently staffed with DISA, which will be moving to Maryland due to BRAC. They are not adding thousands upon thousands of new people, unlike the new buildings going in further south on I-395.

This facility is between Rt. 50 and Columbia Pike. Access points are from Washington Boulevard/2nd Street/Court-house Exit, Columbia Pike intersection with Courthouse Road S., 395 to Columbia Pike, plus a few more back roads. In theory, traffic should not see a major change. We’re swapping out people from one federal agency with another. But, come hear it straight from the source!

Questions to be addressed include: how many more people, move schedule, any heavy equipment, and more. Penrose Neighborhood Association President Stefanie Pryor has sub-mitted an initial list of questions, so if you have more, please feel free to email them to penrosepres@yahoo.com.

The floor will be opened up for questions limited to 30 sec-onds to allow maximum time for the speakers to respond and for the maximum number of questions. n

continued on page 3

Get Penrose news by email… Sign up for the free Penrose yahoo group listserv and keep up with neighborhood news at http://groups.yahoo.com/group/penrose/. Some recent topics include announcements for various county, neighborhood, and area meetings; garden-ing classes; contractor recommendations (plumbers, roofers, windows, handymen); notification of available snow shovel-ers; dealing with ice dams in your gutters; resume builders (aka pleas for volunteers); family network programs (teaching your kid how to drive, the Aachen/Arlington sister city pro-gram); traffic closures and pending construction; updates on a neighbor who was in Haiti at the time of the earthquake; and more!

Follow the prompts in the upper left of the screen to create an account. Yahoo groups requires a “@yahoo.com” address, which is free. You can set up your yahoo account to forward to your regular email address, so you don’t have to remember to check the yahoo account except once every six months to keep it active. You also can set notification levels to get every email posting separately or a digest so you receive just one email even if the board has been particularly active.

continued on page 4

Penrose Tracks March 2010 Page 2

2010 Will Be a Good Year…. for the local real estate market. Recent statistics from the Northern Virginia Association of Realtors (NVAR) show that housing is doing well with encouraging pending sales activity underway during a typically slow time of year. The number of homes sold in the Northern Virginia area last year increased by 26% with 998 homes sold in Jan. 09 and 1,349 sold in Dec 09. The average time of houses on the market decreased by 42%, with homes in Jan.09 taking 99 days to sell and homes in Dec. 09 taking 57 days.

There is still time to make the deadline

of 4/30/10 to be under contract and

use the home buyer tax credit! The extended tax credit includes $6,500 for repeat buyers and $8,000 for first time buyers. For conventional financing - the

conforming loan limit for Fannie Mae and

Freddie Mac is still at $729,750 through

the end of this year.

FHA Loan Changes Strapped for big down payment?

Consider FHA financing currently available up to $729,750 with only 3.5% down payment! FHA loans comprise a good percentage of transactions for many buyers and here are some changes to occur soon: 1) The upfront mortgage insurance premium (UFMIP) will increase to 2.25% from 1.75%. 2) Borrowers with credit scores below 580 will need at least a 10% down payment. 3) FHA will seek legislative authority to increase the annual premium (currently capped at .55%). Increasing the annual premium may allow FHA to reduce the upfront premium. 4) Seller concessions will be reduced to 3% from 6%.

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LOCKSMITHSERVICE CO.

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Phone (703) 521-4990Fax (703) 685-7241

Penrose Tracks March 2010Page 3

2010 Penrose Neighborhood Assn.

ContactsPresident:

Stefanie Pryor penrosepres@yahoo.com

Vice President: Andrew Moore

Treasurer: Bob Schaaf

Secretary: Mike Hynak

Newsletter Editor: Judy Morse

Newsletter Volunteers:

Margaret Alvord-StraubsLiz Whitehouse

Penrose Committees Need You!Want to live longer? Various studies have proven that people active with friends, family and their community do have bet-ter and longer lives! Join one of the association’s committees and make a difference.

Green Space Committee: Make Penrose more beautiful by maintaining and enhancing parks, curb nubs, and other odd green patches throughout the neighborhood.

Identity and Image Committee: Promote and market the Penrose neighborhood, write welcome materials for new resi-dents, post eye catching news at the 3 park kiosks, and plan social events for the community.

Neighborhood Conservation Committee: NC brought street lights, sidewalks, and the Penrose Park renovation. Keep the improvements coming via petitions with your neighbors and submissions to the NC! The Neighborhood Conservation Plan is due for an update soon, too.

County Services and Education Committee: See that coun-ty services meet Penrose’s needs and get the word out to resi-dents about services offered. Also, work to make our neigh-borhood schools top-notch.

Penrose also needs representation help with various outside organizations:

• Arlington Civic Federation • Columbia Pike Transit Initiative• Arlington County Board• Residential Program Center (Homeless Shelter)• Columbia Pike Implementation Team

Contact Penrose officers at penrosepres@yahoo.com to join any of these committees. Groups meet monthly, quarterly, or yearly, even daily if you want to beat the weeds while gardening! n

Arlington E-CARE Recycling DayOn Saturday, April 17th, Arlington County’s Department of Envi-ronmental Services is sponsoring an Environmental Collection and Recycling Event (E-CARE) at the Thomas Jefferson Middle School parking lot. In addition to collecting household hazardous materi-als, there will be opportunities to recycle bicycles ($10 donation re-quested), small metal items, clothing, linens, shoes, microwaves, air conditioners, eyeglasses and medical equipment. Compost bins will be available for $17 purchase. NOTE: Electronics will NOT be col-lected during this event due to space limitations.

The event will take place from 8:30am to 2:30pm. Bring an ID to verify Arlington residency. For further information see <http://www.arlingtonva.us/departments/EnvironmentalServices/EnvironmentalServicesEnvex.aspx> or call (703) 228-6832. n

Both northbound and southbound ART 77 will add stops by Penrose Park at 6th and Wayne.

Arlington is talking this summer about whether to extend service from 7pm to 9pm. During the quest for feedback via surveys, the newsletter, and conversations, folks were more passionate about timing of the bus than the bus stop locations. We have folks getting stuck when they have to work late. This also would allow someone to head to either Shirlington or Clarendon for an early dinner without worrying about the drive home. So, please be sure to send your comments in to the county. They have an easy website to use: <http://www.arlingtonva.us/web/contact.aspx>.

Washington Blvd./Columbia Pike Bridge: VDOT has been work-ing to award a design/build contract later this year on the Washington Boulevard/Columbia Pike intersection to replace the 70-year-old bridge Washington Boulevard bridge. Contract award is expected in 2010, with construction beginning possibly in 2011. Estimated cost is $59.5 million. <http://www.virginiadot.org/projects/northernvirginia/route_27-244_in-terchange.asp>.

Columbia Pike Transit Initiative: The Washington Metropolitan Area Transit Authority (WMATA), in conjunction with Arlington County, Fairfax County, and the Federal Transit Administration, is preparing an environmental document for proposed transit improvements in Ar-lington and Fairfax Counties. The project, known as the Columbia Pike Transit Initiative, would extend along Columbia Pike (Route 244) from the Skyline complex in Fairfax County to Pentagon City in Arlington. The environmental documentation continues the local Alternatives Analysis of 2005 and prepares the project for possible federal funding. <www.piketransit.com>. n

Traffic News…continued from page 1

PLUMBING, Inc.KINNETT

703-979-5000

Master PlumberMaster Gas Fitter

Licensed and Insured

408 S. Adams St.Arlington, VA 22204

Tommy Kinnett

Penrose Tracks March 2010 Page 4

Business is Booming in the Neighborhood!While snow was swirling around us during the double blizzards of 2010, some local establishments kept serving food and libations. LA Bar and Grill managed by local Sean DeLoatche was open for business and serving their popular food items such as burgers, ribs and “hog” wings. The Arlington Cinema and Drafthouse and the Old Arlington Grill kept folks with “cabin fever” entertained and fed. The 7-11 on 2nd Street South stayed open, providing many groceries, coffee, and other drinks. And the Lost Dog Café and Gourmet Pizza Deli was delivering their great sandwiches, specialty pizzas and drinks to the snowbound!

Hopefully there will be no more worries about snowstorms and missed school days until next winter. We should support the Columbia Pike establishments with our business because they chose to be located in our neighborhood, they provide employment during tough economic times and they stayed open to serve the community and generate some revenue when Arlington was almost shut-down because of the weather.

LA Bar and Grill. Check out their menu of freshly prepared American bar food and the calendar of regular food and event evenings such as Pub Trivia, Dart League, Acoustic Open Mic, Five Dollar Fridays, Karaoke and NFL Sunday. They are open for lunch on Wednesday, Saturday and Sunday. All other days they open at 3pm. Become a fan on Facebook and receive notices about live music and other events. Location: 2530 Columbia Pike (at the rear of the building). Phone: 703-685-1560. <www.thelabarandgrill.com>. By the way, the L.A. stands for “Lower Arlington.” And something important to many of our residents is that since December 1st, 2009 all restaurants in VA are smoke free.

The Lost Dog Café and Gourmet Pizza Deli – South Ar-lington. This café and pizza deli is home to great food, an exten-sive domestic and international beer offering and fantastic murals of dogs. Their unusual name comes from The Lost Dog and Cat Founda-tion which saves displaced and homeless dogs and cats from shelters until they are adopted. The South Arlington location is in the Halstead Building at 2920 Columbia Pike. Wes Clough, Jim Barnes, Mike Barnes and Mike Danner are owners and managers and are “family” of the original Arlington Lost Dog Café on N. Washington Boulevard. They are also not afraid of driving in snow to deliver food and drink and make their customers very happy! <http://www.lostdogcafe.com> Become a Facebook fan and receive their specials and fundraisers.

Brand new in the neighborhood…

Twisted Vines Bottleshop and Bistro is officially open! This new venture located at 2803 Columbia Pike is owned and operated by Sybil and Josh Robinson, residents of the Columbia Pike neighbor-hood. Sybil is the Manager, and Caroline Guelle, formerly of Grand Cru Restaurant in Ballston, is the chef. The Bistro and Bottleshop will hold wine tastings and lunch on Saturday and Sunday. Weekday Happy Hour specials on wines and/or bottled beers will held on Tuesday through Friday. On Mondays, Twisted Vines will be available by appointment for private events and tastings. Read their dinner and dessert menu online at <http://twisted-vines.com/>. And if you like what you try by the glass in the Bistro, you can purchase a bottle from the Bottleshop to take home with you. Location: 2803 Columbia Pike (free parking in the adjacent lot, entrance from Columbia Pike). Phone 571-482-8581.

MIGHTY MOWlawn mowing

and other jobs

Chris Straubs and Niall HerlehyFor rates call Chris cell: 703-975-4710 orhome: 703-892-5221 (please leave message)

May – September

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Become a Facebook fan of Twisted Vines to see interior photos and receive updates.

Also welcome P. Brennan’s Irish Pub in space that formerly housed the Arlington Hardware Store. They will be “a contemporary version of a traditional Irish Public House bringing true Irish Hospitality to the Pike.” Visit for lunch, dinner, brunch and late night menus of well known and loved traditional Irish food with a creative twist from the Executive Chef. The name of the Pub is in tribute to P (Little Pat) Brennan, a close friend of the owners, who lost his battle against a genetic disease in August 2008 and who was “a big character and fun-loving bartender who was passionate about his trade.” They hope to instill some of his fun loving personality into the Pub atmosphere. With the luck of the Irish (and Arlington inspections) it will be open by the end of March. The beer coolers are in place – what more could you ask for? Live entertain-ment? That too!

P. Brennan’s is located in the Halstead Building with the entrance at 2910 Columbia Pike near The Lost Dog Café and across from the Ar-lington Cinema and Drafthouse. Follow the countdown to opening at <www.pbrennans.com> as well as Facebook and Twitter. Slainte! n

Anyone in the neighborhood can post messages. Periodically, we get some spammers or worse attempting to access the list-serv, so as a new member your messages may be moderated for a little while until we confirm you are legitimate.

Yahoo groups’ rules do not allow advertising. So, if you have a great business, get your neighbor or past client to post their recommendation. We merely scratched the surface of busi-nesses, artists and musicians in our neighborhood for this newsletter. If you know of more, please notify us for the September 2010 newsletter. n

continued from page 1Get Penrose news by email…

Penrose Tracks March 2010Page 5

The Arts in Penrose…The Penrose neighborhood is home to some notable artists and musicians. We’re high-lighting just a few of them…Danni Dawson of Adams Street is an internationally ac-claimed painter, sculptor and teacher of pastel and oil figure and portrait painting at the Alexandria Art League. She also conducts summer workshops in her rose garden. Danni spe-cializes in portraiture, having painted over 300, and showcases some of her amazing still life paintings on her website. Her work has been featured in American Artist magazine. To view her artwork, especially her commissioned portrait of retired Supreme Court Justice Sandra Day O’Connor and a commis-sioned bronze sculpture of “St. Joseph, The Worker” for the St. Joseph’s Medical Center in MD, visit her website at <www.dannidawson.com>.

Michael Francis, spouse of Danni Dawson, is an interna-tionally known artist and teacher. Mike is a popular teacher of painting and drawing at the Alexandria Art League as well as local colleges and universities. He has won many national awards and fellowships for his beautiful and colorful land-scape, cityscape and still life paintings, drawings and prints. You can see a selection of his work at <www.michaelfrancis-studio.com>. Every summer Mike and Danni teach a 2-week painting workshop in Italy at the Montorno studio in north-western Tuscany. <www.montorno.com>.

Kathy Fliger of Cleveland Street was honored in February for donating her time, design, artwork and materials to paint the walls of Storybook Time, the children’s reading room of the Columbia Pike Branch Library. She painted a delightful forest scene with many animals including a lake with a swan. There will be an afternoon tea in the reading room on March 17th. Kathy accepts commissions for calligraphy, faux furniture fin-ishes, people and pet portraits and murals. Examples of her work can been seen in the restaurants Arugula (Washington, DC), 219 Restaurant and The Warehouse (both in Alexandria, VA) and Il Radicchio’s (Arlington, VA). She also did mural work in Barolo and Galileo, the former restaurants of Chef Ro-berto Donna. Kathy can be reached at 703-979-6340.

Look at beautiful and dramatic landscape photos of the world by our own Penrose newsletter editor Judy Morse of Adams Street at <www.judymorse.com>. Judy is a graphic artist, de-signer, and award-winning photographer, and volunteers her time and talent to help the neighborhood association. Thanks Judy!

Tierney Farrell of Veitch Street who is the ACE (Arlingto-nians for a Clean Environment) Penrose representative, has a photography website of people, animals and landscapes. See her work at <www.ladybugphoto.net>. Many of her feathered or furry subjects, objects, insects and humans are photo-graphed in our neighborhood.

Carol Moran of Edgewood Street is a quilter associated with Quilters Unlimited. Carol also plays the autoharp.

Sally Lloyd of Barton Street is certified master weaver. Sally taught weaving for Arlington County and founded and co-di-rected the Woodmont Weavers for almost 20 years.

Musical notes – Love Chicago blues and great soul music? Arlington-based band The Curbfeelers has them covered with guitars, key-board, percussion, brass and harp. Penrose locals Pete Con-nell and Sally Swan (both neighbors on S. 3rd Street) sing and are the lead and bass guitarists. They have played for the fall Penrose Picnic and at the Columbia Pike Blues Festival. Check out their 2 CDs with a lot of their originals: Hard Times; and Curb Appeal and the forthcoming third CD Grit and Groove. They frequently play private parties but you can hear them at JVs Restaurant in Falls Church on Saturday, April 3rd from 4:30-8pm and on Saturday, May 8th at 7pm at the Bang-kok Blues Restaurant, 926 W. Broad Street, Falls Church. Their website and contact info at <http://thecurbfeelers.com/>.

Jeff Severson of 3rd Street (yep he and Sally Swan are mar-ried) is a musician and a music producer. His well known com-pany called Jeff Severson Productions operates here in Penrose at Jeff ’s studio named Monkey Boy Studio <http://www.jeffsev-ersonproductions.com/>. Jeff is also one of the best finger-style guitarists in the nation <http://www.jeffplaysguitar.com/> and is a Nashville songwriter. He has produced 5 of his own guitar music CDs, 100 plus CDs of local and national artists; over 500 songs for songwriters and has written over 1000 songs and many scores. He has played at Jammin Java, The Birchmere, the Kennedy Center (in Hot Jazz), the Forum in LA (in Hot Jazz), the Cow Palace in San Francisco and US Air Arena as a member of the band “Four out of Five Doctors.” -Wow-

Chuck Moran of Edgewood Street is a vocalist and plays the bodhran (Irish drum) for the folk group The Irish Break-fast Band which is based in Alexandria, VA. The band is made up of a dozen or so members playing various instru-ments, performing traditional Irish jigs, reels and hornpipes. They have released two CDs: Sean’s Treasure and On High Cross Farm. Hear them play on St. Patrick’s Day (March 17th) at St. Elmo’s Coffee Pub from 8pm to 10pm in Del Ray at 2300 Mt. Vernon Avenue, Alexandria. n

Bicycle Sales & ServiceGiant Bicycles

Clothing • AccessoriesUsed Bicycles

PAPILLON CYCLES

2809 Columbia Pike, Arlington, VA 22204

Bailey Garfield (703) 920-9494

Penrose Tracks March 2010 Page 6

Name__________________________________________________________________________________

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For up-to-date information, visit Penrose on the web at:

http://www.on-the-pike.com/penrose

Subscribe to the Penrose email list at:http://groups.yahoo.com/group/penrose

o New o Renewal o $20 family o $10/one-adult householdo Additional support for Penrose Neighborhood $_______________

I would like to help my neighborhood by becoming involved in the following areas: o Newsletter production o Newsletter distribution o Committee _________________________ o Neighborhood conservation o Social/Picnic Organization o Other

Make checks payable to “Penrose Neighborhood Association”Mail to: Bob Schaaf, Treasurer, 309 S. Veitch St., Arlington, VA 22204

Penrose Neighborhood Association Membership FormYearly dues: $20/family or $10/one-adult household per calendar year

Penrose Tracks is published by the Penrose Neighborhood Association.

For editorial and original articles, please contact Stef Pryor by email at penrosepres@yahoo.com.

To advertise in the newsletter, contact Judy Morse at 703-521-0595 or by email at judymorse@mac.com.

If you’re in the dark…Tips from an Arlington Heights neighbor:

If you lose electricity, call Dominion Power at 1-888-667-3000 (toll free). It is important for Do-minion to know how many accounts are affected by an outage. Call even if you think or know a neighbor has already called. It is generally an au-tomated touch-tone reporting system, so here are a few tips:

• Have your account number handy

• Call from your home phone (landline) if you still have a conventional landline, because the utility links its account numbers to home phone numbers for automated reporting.

• If you no longer have a landline or it is dead because of wireless or other reason, and you call from a cell phone, have your account number handy, so you can enter that into the automated system.

• Dominion’s automated reporting system will usually describe if the outage is widespread, and it may give an estimated restoration es-timate. n