Events DC: March 2012 Calendar of Events

Event: DC United v. Kansas City (season opener)                                                 Attendance:  10,000 – 15,000           

Location: RFK Stadium       

Event Date and Time: 03/10/2012 – 03/10/2012 @ 7:30PM 

Event Description: Tickets range from $23-$52. For tickets or more information, please visit. www.dcunited.com.

Event: 2012 SunTrust Rock-n-Roll Marathon Health & Fitness Expo Nation’s Capital Marathon

Attendance: 40,000

Location: Entire RFK Campus and DC Armory

Event Date and Time: 03/15/2012 – 03/17/2012 @ 10:00AM – 7:00PM

Event Description: During the race weekend over 70 exhibitors will offer free samples, showcase the latest in running gear, sports apparel, health & nutritional information and much more. Runners and the general public can pick up some last-minute race essentials before race day. All runners must visit the expo to pick up their race number, swag bag and t-shirt. The Health & Fitness Expo is open to the public. Admission is free.  For complete information, visit http://runrocknroll.competitor.com/usa

  

Event: Rock ‘n’ RollMarathon Finish Line Festival and Post Race Concert

Attendance: 40,000

Location: RFK Stadium Festival Grounds

Event Date and Time: 03/17/2012 – 03/17/2012 @ 8:00AM – 2:00PM      

Event Description: After crossing the finish line, runners and their family/friends can enjoy a free post-race concert.

 

 Event: DC Rollergirls

Attendance: 1,500 – 2,000

Location: DC Armory

Event Date and Time: 03/18/2012 – 03/18/2012 @ 4:00pm

Event Description: The DC Rollergirls are the National Capital Region’s only women’s flat-track roller derby league. 

FIRST BOUT 4:00 PM:
DC All-Stars vs. TBD

SECOND BOUT 5:45 PM:
Cherry Blossom Bombshells vs. Scare Force One

Doors open at 3 p.m. and the action begins at 4 p.m. Tickets are $12 for adults, $6 for kids ages 6-11 and free for kids 5 and under.  Tickets are available at the door or for advance purchase online.

 

Event: ShamrockFest ‘12

Attendance: 27,000

Location: Lots 6, 7, 8

Event Date and Time: 03/24/2012 – 03/24/2012 @ 1:00PM – 9:00PM

Event Description: ShamrockFest returns to the RFK Stadium Festival Grounds with 50 bands and DJs on 10 stages. Gates open at 12:30 p.m. The non-stop music begins at 1 p.m. and includes a headline performance by popular Irish rock band Dropkick Murphys.  ’Fest activities also include a carnival-style amusement area, huge tented activity areas and food and craft vendors.  Open to leprechauns of all ages, the nation’s hottest St. Patty’s day festival is a can’t-miss party on the March calendar. Tickets are available at www.shamrockfest.com.

  

Event: DC United v. FC Dallas

Attendance: 10,000 – 15,000

Location: RFK Stadium

Event Date and Time: 03/30/2012 – 03/30/2012 @ 7:30pm

Event Description: Major League Soccer Game

Ticket prices range from $23-$52.  For tickets or more information, please visit www.dcunited.com

 

 

Suntrust Rock ‘n’ Roll Marathon Information

Rock ‘n’Roll USA RoadClosures

Please save the date for the SunTrust Rock ‘n’ Roll USA Marathon & CareFirst Rock ‘n’ Roll USA Half Marathon on Saturday, March 17. 

The race will start near RFK Stadium at C and 19^th Streets NE and complete a tour of many of our Capital’s most majestic sights before returning to finish on East Capitol Street at Armory Mall. Visit our website to view the course map, download road closure times, and explore the course with our interactive road closure map.  More information on access lanes, alternate routes and no parking zones will be available in the coming weeks.

If you are affiliated with a community group or business near the course, please share this information with your neighbors and/or employees.

You’re invited to get involved with this exciting event!  Spectators are encouraged to line the route to cheer thousands of runners and walkers towards the finish line. Volunteer opportunities are available at the pre-race Expo, Thursday-Friday, March 15-16 at the DC Armory, and on race day, Saturday, March 17, along the course and in the start and finish line areas.  Please sign up online.

Thank you,

Community Relations Department
SunTrust Rock ‘n’ Roll USA Marathon & CareFirst Rock ‘n’ Roll USA Half Marathon
Saturday, March 17, 2012
http://runrocknroll.competitor.com/usa/road-closures

RFK Skateboard Park

Below is an article about RFK Skateboard Park posted on TBD All Over Washington. As most of you may know….we have been waiting for the Skateboard to open to the community. At the last stakeholder meeting in January, the Event DC staff stated that the Skate Park will open this Spring. Lets keep our fingers crossed!

Take care,

Lisa White

The Maloof Money Cup, which hosts pro-am skateboarding contests in the U.S. and abroad, offers a pretty sweet deal to its host cities: Give us a place to hold our event, and we’ll build a world-class skate park for your community to enjoy in perpetuity. D.C. took them up on their offer, and last year a 15,000-square-foot park, inspired by a certain skater hangout–cum–Occupy camp, was constructed in the parking lot of RFK Stadium. It was completed in time for the competition, which took place over a steaming Labor Day weekend and was, apparently, a success.

Then the park closed, and it’s been that way ever since.

There were whispers, mere weeks after the Maloof Money Cup, that the park was going to be torn down. Dave McKenna addressed those rumors in City Paper; Teri Washington, a spokeswoman for Events DC, which controls RFK and its grounds, told him that “the skate park is being landscaped and then opening up to the public next month.”

That was in October. So I emailedWashingtonseveral questions, and received this response:

The skate park is absolutely not being torn down. The park is scheduled to open this spring. Following the Maloof Money Cup, modifications to the grounds needed to be made before being opened for public use. As the date approaches, we will have announce when the park will be open.

In a follow-up conversation, she said that although the park itself was finished in time, the surrounding grounds weren’t. And the landscaping to which she refers is not, say, planting bushes and trees, but rather leveling and paving the lot’s surface. (D.C. is spending around $200,000 on site work, according to Washington, and also pays for maintenance. Maloof only funded the park itself, which, if the one they built in New York is any indication, cost around $1 million.)

Still, that site work probably shouldn’t take five months — unless you consider that the work requires permits from D.C., which is rarely a speedy process. Now Events DC is hoping to open the park this spring, butWashingtonis cautious enough not to name a specific month.

Meanwhile, the skateboarding community waits. “We get skate kids all day, and they’re always asking, ‘When is it going to open?,’” says Tom Lim, co-manager of Palace 5ive, a skate shop on 14th Street NW. “They don’t understand.” Many of them are content to grind at the Shaw Skate Park, which was renovated last year, but others are doing what skaters have done since the ’70s, when the Z-Boys sneaked into backyards and dropped into empty swimming pools.

“I know a lot of kids just break into it anyway,” Lim says about the park at RFK. “They just hop the fence.”

UPDATE: Asked about the cost of building the skate park, Tim McFerran, president of the Maloof Money Cup, emailed me that “it was expensive and think when it’s all said and done with the grass and excavation it will cost about a million dollars.” As for if or when Maloof is returning to D.C. — they signed a multi-year agreement last year — he said “future Maloof events will be announced next month.”

What If……Multi-Purpose Youth Sports Complex at the RFK Stadium?

  

Below is an article is from the East of the River Editorial Section. This editorial discusses the possibly of Multi-Purpose Youth Complex in the Kingman Park Community at RFK Stadium. How do you feel about this proposal? Leave a comment and voice your opinion.

Lisa White, ANC Commissioner SMD 7D01 Kingman Park

Imagine an 80-acre complex of green space, multiple sports fields and other facilities, biking/walking/running trails, a new covered pavilion area for the DC Farmer’s Market, an amphitheater space for outdoor performances, and Solar Community Gardens to promote green power — easily accessible from three wards in Washington DC. A coalition of youth sports, environmental, and community organizations, from both sides of the Anacostia River, are proposing just such a concept. Currently called the Capitol Riverside Youth Sports Park(or CRYSP), the concept is to convert a large portion of the northern parking area at the RFK Stadium site to a youth sports park, including multi-use athletic fields and substantial green space. An initial vision for this concept can be found at http://www.capitolriverside.org; where community input is being solicited, and volunteers can sign up to help move this vision forward. CRYSP can provide a “coming together” point for three city wards – Wards 5, 6 and 7. Replacing the desolate wasteland of the RFK parking lot that currently serves as a DMZ that separates these wards, CRYSP could provide a true “gateway,” uniting young people (and their families) along theAnacostiaRiver, perhaps even heading towards Mayor Gray’s “One City” goal.

Converting a large portion of the RFK Stadium site to youth sports facilities will help meet a critical underserved need for DC youth sports programs. The number of DC children ages three through eighteen engaging in organized sports has exploded over the past decade, with the need for athletic fields that can accommodate the surging demand. Citywide, 5,700 kids are registered to play soccer; more than 3,400 are registered to play football; and thousands are playing baseball, softball, lacrosse, ultimate Frisbee, field hockey and other outdoor sports. As the number of younger players engaging in organized sports continues to grow, youth sports programs serving DC youth will continue to be challenged in providing safe, accessible, and high-quality outdoor spaces for DC youth to use for sports and recreation, along with helping in the fight against childhood obesity.

 This conversion also can create considerable environmental benefits to the Anacostia watershed. Over 52 percent of the RFK stadium site is covered with concrete and asphalt. Run-off from this area drains into the Anacostia River run treated, providing a major source of storm water runoff into the river. Replacing a large portion of this area by sports fields can dramatically reduce this run-off, while Solar Community Gardens can create jobs and promote renewable energy.

Finally, the above-grade Metro line in this area is a major constraint to many redevelopment options in this area; however, its existence is not an impediment to a facility such as CYRSP.

The concept is consistent with the 2006 National Capitol Planning Commission recommendations for the RFK stadium site. The Capital Space initiative (www.capitalspace.gov) identified a particular lack of ball fields, recreational facilities, and open space in the Northeast quadrant of the city, leading to its recommendation, among other things, that DC “…develop multi-use sports complexes that can accommodate a range of sports uses, but also include new athletic fields.” This situation provided the basis for a NCPC recommendation that the RFK Stadium site fill such pressing recreation needs. Moreover, the NCPC notes that permeable recreational surfaces such as athletic fields should be concentrated along the water’s edge to reduce environmental impacts.

This conversion can take place relatively quickly, and provide such immediate benefits pending development, and eventual implementation, of a more comprehensive plan for redevelopment of the RFK stadium site. As currently envisioned, the concept is fully compatible with other potential future uses of the complex for professional sports teams, such as DC United or the Redskins. And combining this with incorporation of additional recreational space associated with the DC General/Reservation 13 redevelopment would further leverage these benefits.

This concept was submitted as an idea under the Sustainable DC initiative run by the Mayor’s Office – and it received more votes than any other idea. We need to encourage the Mayor that this creates a win-win-win situation for DC Wards 5, 6, and 7, as well as the entire District.

Alphonso Coles, Ward 7 Resident and Ward 6 Men’s/Fatherhood Program

Dennis Chestnut, Executive Director, Groundwork Anacostia River DC

Michael Godec, Vice President, Sports on the Hill

RFK Community Outreach Meeting

 

RFK Community Outreach Meeting

Monday, January 9th, 2012

7:00 p.m.

RFK Stadium – Media Room

4th Floor

During this meeting, we will discuss upcoming RFK/Armory events, the 2012 quarterly stakeholders meeting schedule, opening of the RFK Skate Park, and other community matters.

Events DC: Calendar of Events January 2012

Event: Community Stakeholder Meeting Date: 1/9/2012 Time: 7pm Location: RFK Community Room

Event Summary: Community andEventDCdiscussion about activities and events held on the RFK/DC Armory grounds.

Event: Youth Rally and Mass for Life 2012   Attendance: 10,000 Date: 01/23/2012 Location: DC Armory

Event Summary: Youth Rally and Catholic Mass hosted by the Archdiocese of Washington, DC. This is a ticketed event, open to the public. Tickets are free but must be requested through the local diocese.

Doors open at 7:00 AM and event concludes at 11:30 AM.

Event: DC Rollergirls  Attendance: 1,500 – 2,000 Date: 01/28/2012 Location: DC Armory

Event Summary: The DC Rollergirls are the National Capital Region’s only women’s flat-track roller derby league.

FIRST BOUT 4PM:Cherry Blossom Bombshells vs. Majority Whips

SECOND BOUT 5:45 PM: DC DemonCats vs. Scare Force One

NOTE:  Doors open at 3 p.m. and the action begins at 4 p.m. Tickets are $12 for adults, $6 for kids ages 6-11 and free for kids 5 and under.  Tickets are available at the door or for advance purchase online.

Sustainable DC Working Group Kick-off Meeting

Please join Mayor Vincent Gray on Tuesday, November 29th from 6:00 to 8:30 pm at the Walter E. Washington Convention Center as we present the progress from the “Start in September” outreach, and establish working groups to develop recommendations to make Washington, DC the greenest, healthiest, most inclusive and livable city in the nation!

We will begin the meeting together as a group to hear from Mayor Gray, review input to date, and map out the Sustainable DC planning process. We will then break out into nine topical working groups: the built environment, climate, energy, food, nature, transportation, waste, water, and the green economy.

We invite you to actively participate in one (or more) of these working groups, which will delve into the details of these topics over the course of four to six meetings from December through February. At the mid-point and again at the end of the working group process, all participants will come together to share ideas and address the critical connections among these working group topics.

Something Better for RFK Parking Lots?….Really?

Below is an article from the City Paper by Lydia DePillis.

Interesting that all of this is being planned without the Kingman Park Community imput. Why???

Lisa White, ANC Commissioner Kingman Park Community

 

Something Better for RFK Parking Lots?

Posted by Lydia DePillis on Nov. 29, 2011 at 7:29 am

 

The plan. (http://www.capitolriverside.org/)

On Saturday night, the Fall Massive electronic music festival on the parking lot south of RFK Stadium roared throughout the surrounding neighborhood of Hill East—and the neighborhood roared back, forcing them to turn down the volume way earlier in the night than planned.

A small victory for residents, perhaps. But they know it’ll probably just happen again. This is where the city’s special events arm tends to dump noisy shows and competitions that may generate revenue but not much else. Many residents still remember when the city signed a ten-year contract in 2002 for a Grand Prix track on two of RFK’s parking lots, and had to back off the plan when residents discovered no environmental analysis had been done before 200 race cars were welcomed three days a year.

Just yesterday, though, a new proposal cropped up for the north parking lots: Rip out the concrete and lay down grass for kids to play on. A group calling itself the Friends of the Capitol Riverside Youth Sports Park just launched a website with a sketch of what the new park could look like. Actually, it’s not a new idea at all; the National Capital Planning Commission proposed it five years ago as part of a planning study for all the areas around RFK. But it gained traction through the Mayor’s SustainableDC initiative crowdsourcing website thingy, receiving more votes than any other proposal (there’s a meeting tonight where the idea will likely come up again).

There are broader ambitions for Hill East, of course, including a new mixed-use neighborhood that’s been extensively discussed but probably won’t get rolling in earnest until developments like the Southwest Waterfront and McMillan are out of the ground. Focusing on one piece of it could be more feasible, and build the case for more capital-intensive development on the west side of the stadium—not to mention get existing contamination out the ground and stop chemicals from running off into the river in the mean time.

Events DC: RFK & DC Armory Events for Nov. 2011

 

Event: La Feria de la Familia

Date: 11/13/2011

Attendance: 20,000+

Location: DC Armory

Event Summary: La Feria de la Familia is an exciting, interactive family and community event, organized by Telemundo Washington, DC as the premier Hispanic Family Expo in the D.C. area. La Feria de la Familia is designed to showcase the diverse range of products and services available to the Hispanic community through retail, automotive, health and nutrition, career, finance, lifestyle and entertainment vendors – among others.

 

Event: Test Drive CAMP

Date: 11/16/2011 – 11/17/2011

Attendance: 200

Location: Lot 7

Event Summary: Private Event (safety demo)

 

Event: Avicii

Date: 11/18/2011

Attendance: 9000

Location: DC Armory

Event Summary: DJ/Electronic/Dance Concert Ages 18+Only

 

Event: Armin Van Buuren

Date: 11/19/2011

Attendance: 9000

Location: DC Armory

Event Summary: DJ/Electronic/Dance Concert Ages 18+Only

 

Event: MASSIVE

Date: 11/26/2011

Attendance: 15,000

Location: Lot 8 (Tented)

Event Summary: DJ/Electronic/Dance Concert Ages 18+Only

 

Is this the future of RFK Stadium?

 

D.C. officials visit NFL Bucs’ facility to help bring home Redskins?

By Deborah Simmons

Published on November 1, 2011, 10:16AM

What were Mayor Vincent C. Gray, and D.C. Council members Jack Evans and Michael Brown doing at National Airport on Friday? The trio was headed south to get a behind-the-scenes look of the Tampa Bay Buccaneers’ headquarters and practice facilities. And why, might fans ask, do D.C. officials have the slightest bit of curiosity about the Bucs, who are not on the ‘Skins regular-season schedule. Well, the Bucs’ facilities — among the largest in the NFL with three full-length grass practice fields perched on 33 acres of land — and Washington is economically and socially jealous.

In other words, city officials appear to be finally getting their ducks in a row to lure the Washington Redskins back to, well, Washington. As things now stand, the Redskins’ practice in Virginia and play in Maryland — an oxymoronic situation that late owner Jack Cooke Kent created 15 years ago, when he and Maryland officials inked a deal to build a new home for his franchise in Prince George’s County but kept its headquarters closer to his home in Virginia. Mr. Cooke’s decisions have haunted his beloved team ever since (and their record proves it.) Washington “deserves the Redskins” and the “Redskins deserve Washington,” a source told me.

“We’re still in the early planning stages,” said the source. “It will take six months to demolish the buildings currently on the site of Reservation 13 and three or so years to build the new facilities.” Reservation 13 straddles the Anacostia River, is adjacent to the underutilized RFK Stadium and provides easy access to major north-south and east-west arteries. A new state-of-the- art D.C. training field would certainly prove more suitable than facilities in Ashburn, where a planned bubble-encased structure will have to to suffice for the Redskins’ indoor facilities. The ‘Skins certainly need a new training site. Prior to the ground-breaking this year on the “bubble” in Ashburn, inclement weather, such as snow, ice and lightning storms, would force the ‘Skins to temporarily set up shop in an airport hangar or gymnasium, which are hardly becoming a professional football team.

Now, I hear you. I hear you. The ‘Skins FedEx record ain’t what it used to be, especially after NFL fans silenced the aluminum bleachers at RFK. I agree, but it’s time for a do-over and some tough offense. Officials in Prince George’s and the state of Maryland aren’t trying to let the Redskins go quietly into the night, as the Colts did in 1984, when then-owner Robert Irsay shipped the team to Indianapolis during a snowstorm in the dead of night. Indeed, Maryland officials have already launched a $25,000 feasibility study to determine whether and how they will exercise a provision in its agreement that gives the county the right of first refusal should the Redskins decide to relocate the team’s headquarters and practice facility. It’s encouraging to know D.C. officials have their eyes on the prize, too. All that’s missing is a serious shout out from the Washington business community. May the high-spirited Mr. Cooke commence the competition.

• Deborah Simmons can be reached at dsimmons@washington times.com.