WASHINGTON, D.C., USA — If you looked back at Navy Yard 50 years ago, you wouldn’t recognize it.
“It was largely industrial,” Brian Kenner Deputy Mayor of DC’s Planning and Economic Development Department said. “It was underserved didn’t have a lot of residential didn’t have a lot of neighborhood amenities.”
Kenner will tell you, over the last decade, Navy Yard has grown up. Construction crews swarm the streets amid high rises with businesses planted on sidewalks.
It seemed to start with opening in 2008 of the crown jewel of Navy Yard-Nationals’ Park.
“That’s what the city did to provide sort of an economic development engine to anchor the neighborhood,” Kenner said.
“You can probably ask any business owner down there and business immediately goes up once you’ve got baseball season in play.”