H Street (Washington, D.C.)
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The H Street Corridor is a commercial district at the heart of the Near Northeast neighborhood (also known as Old City, Capitol Hill North, and Cap Valley) in Northeast Washington, D.C. It was one of Washington's earliest and busiest commercial districts, but after World War II, the neighborhood went into decline.
H Street, NE, was the route of one of Washington's oldest streetcar lines, and ridership peaked at 3.3 million riders a month. H Street was also the location of the first Sears Roebuck store in Washington. Businesses in the corridor were severely damaged during the 1968 riots and the region has never fully recovered.
However, in the 2000s, H Street has begun to revitalize as a hip arts district. The Atlas Theater, a Moderne-style 1930s movie theater that has languished since the riots, has been refurbished as a dance studio and performance space, and is now the anchor of what many are referring to as the new Atlas district. H Street NE has also recently become home to the H Street Playhouse, a black-box theater; live music venues such as the Red and the Black and the Rock & Roll Hotel; and restaurants and bars, such as the Argonaut, Showbar Presents the Palace of Wonders, the Pug, and H Street Martini Lounge. More such establishments are planned for the future, transforming H Street from a blighted inner-city shell to a vital center of culture and nightlife.
In Northwest, H Street is the main street in Chinatown and one of the major east-west streets downtown. When Pennsylvania Avenue was closed to vehicular traffic in front of the White House, the crosstown traffic that had formerly used Pennsylvania Avenue was rerouted to H and I streets.
[edit] External links
- http://www.bakerprojects.com/hstreetne/pdf/1_H_St_2ContextHistory_lr.pdf
- H Street at the Great Streets website
- Frozen Tropics: A look at what's going on in Trinidad, on H Street and in the larger area north of Capitol Hill
- "Winds of Change Blow Uneasily on H Street", April 4, 2006, The Washington Post
- "Whose H Street Is It, Anyway?", April 4, 2006, The Washington Post
- "Turning Northeast's H Street into Main Street", February 9, 2006, The Washington Post
- "H Street NE, the Next Hot Spot" June 11, 2004, The Washington Post
