The District Department of Transportation (DDOT) will begin a two-year construction project at the intersection of 14th Street with Pennsylvania and Potomac Avenues SE starting Jan. 27.
The end goal is to improve traffic safety by replacing the complicated intersection, which has multiple markings and crosswalks that confuse s and endanger pedestrians.
The intersection will be replaced with a traffic circle or ellipse. Three 12-foot lanes of traffic on Pennsylvania Avenue SE will travel around the ellipse, with all street approaches controlled by signal. The neighborhood park in the middle of the ellipse adds about 34,000 square feet of green public space and will be laid out as a public park that is expected to be managed by the National Park Service (NPS).
Once the circle is complete, the protected bicycle lanes along Pennsylvania Avenue SE will be extended from the east side of 14th Street SE to the Anacostia River.
Improvement to the intersection were mentioned in multiple studies nearly twenty years ago, but this project was initiated by an environmental assessment released in 2017.
Concepts were drafted in that year. DDOT presented three possible alternatives to Advisory Neighborhood Commission (ANC) 6B, where the project is located. The intersection was reimagined around a triangle park, similar to the Southwest side of Eastern Market Metro Plaza; a rectangle park, drawing on Seward Square; and an ellipse park, based on Dupont Circle.
In a letter written to DDOT June 2017, ANC 6B ed the ellipse park plan first, the rectangle park second –and the triangle park not at all.
In 2019, DDOT began detailed designs, submitting materials to the Commission on Fine Arts (CFA) in 2020 to get approval for the ellipse design. The pandemic intervened and that process was not concluded until after the pandemic. Ward 6 Councilmember Charles Allen (D) pushed for funding for the project to be included in the FY2024 budget. Initial construction was expected to begin last fall.
Now, DDOT has announced that construction of the new traffic circle is expected to begin Jan 27, 2025 and end Dec. 28, 2026, although Commissioner Karen Hughes (6B09), who represents an adjacent SMD, cautioned that “there might be some overage on that time.”
Commissioners encouraged residents who may have challenges with the construction to connect the ANC. Commissioner Hughes said that DDOT has been really forward-leaning, reaching out and collaborating now that the project has started.
Learn more and follow the project: https://penn-potomac-intersection-dcgis.hub.arcgis.com/
