A Step Toward More Fun: Ending the Restaurant Cap

Cleveland Park commercial strip 1986

Over ten years ago there was a lively debate in the Cleveland Park neighborhood about whether additional eating and drinking establishments in the area should be viewed as a welcome amenity or a threat. It wasn’t idle speculation. Cleveland Park, along with several other neighborhoods through DC, including Woodley Park and the Cathedral Commons area, are restricted by zoning regulations as to how much street frontage they can occupy – no more than 25%. That issue came to head again last night at ANC 3C’s March meeting.

First, let’s rewind to where this story begins, in 1989, and the zoning case that down-zoned Cleveland Park and Woodley Park. The arguments for capping restaurants and bars, which were suggested by the Office of Planning based on a model used in San Francisco at the time, were to ensure a diverse neighborhood-serving retail inventory and limit the area from an influx of restaurant and bar patrons that would park on the streets and create a nuisance. Back then, Cleveland Park was one of the few destinations in DC that suburban customers would venture into.

When put in place in 1989, Cleveland Park’s restaurants and bars accounted for 14% of the street frontage, and Woodley Park was already over the limit at 33%. Years passed without issue until DC, at the behest of the Cleveland Park Citizens Association, established clearer rules about enforcement in the mid 2000s.

In 2007, there was a successful fight to prevent a Cosi restaurant from replacing the defunct Blockbuster Video store in the Park & Shop. The episode spurred on community members like Herb Caudill to question the cap. He wrote a great GGW article, which was preceded by a discussion about the issue on the Cleveland Park listserv in October 2012. No action was ever taken to alter the cap at that time.

Since then, Cleveland Park has lost some great restaurants. Palena, which had to create a rouse of opening a street front market next to its original location to expand into the space next door because of the restaurant cap, closed in 2014. Ripple, which pulled the same maneuver to get around the restaurant cap of adding a street front market next to its location in order to put dining tables in the adjacent space, closed its doors in 2017.

With Palena converting to non-restaurant use after a six-year vacancy, Orange Theory taking over the Uptown Taphouse/4Ps space, and Dino’s converting to a 7-Eleven, Cleveland Park has been below the 25% cap for the past several years.

In 2016, the Deputy Mayor for Planning and Economic Development (DMPED), commissioned a market analysis for the Cleveland Park commercial area. The report, written by Jon Stover & Associates, outlined several findings and strategies to strengthen the business climate. The recommendations were 180-degree shift from the posture that implemented the regulations in 1989: encourage restaurants and bars as business that can flourish here and attract people from outside the neighborhood in order to breathe new life into the commercial area.

In our post-pandemic world, with steateries adding fun and keeping businesses alive, and online commerce an ever growing part of our lives, the future of local retail is centered on neighborhood services and businesses that can offer an in-person experience. Some of those experiences are gyms and salons, which Cleveland Park has aplenty. It also includes retail shops that have events, like Femme Fatale and All Fired Up, and of course, the social engagement of the restaurant and bar. When asked recently about the restaurant cap, Jon Stover, the author of the market analysis, commented that he, “would love to see that cap removed.” Adding, “Retail is struggling in much of the city and the amount of occupied retail space continues to right size and decline on a per capita basis. And office demand is at an all-time low, of course. The type of commercial land use with the most demand continues to be that of a more 'experiential' nature especially food and beverage.” Put in other words, do we really want to reserve space for more vape shops and nail salons?

Chevy Chase is going through a rezoning process and becoming a Neighborhood Mixed Use Zone, similar to Cleveland Park. In the draft zoning text, the Office of Planning did not subject Chevy Chase to a restaurant cap. Let’s hope when the draft rezoning plan for Cleveland Park and Woodley Park that emerges from the Office of Planning next month, they will have similar recommendation on getting rid of this use restriction.

This brings us to present day. I’d like to review the process of how this issue got to be before the ANC on March 20, 2023, because the most criticism of removing the cap was about process, of course.

Just after last Thanksgiving, then Commissioner-elect Tammy Gordon convened a meeting with other new Commissioners-elect, representatives of Cleveland Park Main Street, Cleveland Park Community Association, Cleveland Park Historical Society and Cleveland Park Smart Growth and several interested residents. It was a conversation about pitching Cleveland park to businesses. I raised the issue of the cap, and its lack of relevance, and suggested we take action to make sure it would not be an impediment to new business. The last thing we would want would be to attract entrepreneurial interest only to be confronted with a costly barrier to entry. In the follow up email from that meeting, I encourage all of the groups to social this with their constituents.

In early January I compiled a history of the restaurant cap and other zoning regulations that impacted restaurant use and circulated with the group. I met with CP Main Street in January to discuss the issue and we talked about doing an informational meeting for the businesses. But when I mentioned the topic was going to be discussed at the March Planning, Zoning, Housing & Economic Development Committee meeting, it was agreed that businesses can get information there.

The Cleveland Park Smart Growth community, probably the largest community group in the area, had a robust discussion about the cap on its listserv, and social media platforms from January onward.

At the first ANC 3C Planning, Zoning, Housing & Economic Development Committee meeting on February 6th, I brought this topic up and asked that it be given time to discuss at the March committee meeting. Not to miss the opportunity, the Committee then discussed it in February. At the March PZHED meeting on March 6th we discussed it in more detail and had the Office of Planning and their retail consultant share information. The topic was noticed when the announcement/agenda went out to the listservs.

Once there was an actual resolution on March 13th, Liza Collery, a resident of Newark St, encouraged folks on the Cleveland Park listserv to check it out and weigh in. Crickets.

At the ANC 3C meeting last night (March 20th) we learned that despite knowing about the issue for months, neither the Cleveland Park Community Association nor the Cleveland Park Historical Society (Commissioner Nash is its Vice President) took any action to inform their members/constituents. Chair Pagats noted that prior to Sunday, the commission had heard from 34 residents over the prior week, 33 of which supported removing the cap. She also said that in the 24 hours before the meeting she received 11 email in opposition. One of the commenters mentioned that she only responded when Commissioner Nash sent out an email to friends on Sunday, the day before the meeting.

There was ample time for people to both learn more about the issue and speak up. Many did. Instead of engaging, the other community leaders slow walked the issue, maybe in hopes that it would go away. They should have been engaging their members on this issue a while ago.

We also heard non-process opposition to removing the cap, including the opening of Star Wars and the “traffic” issues that it caused as evidence of why we shouldn’t want Cleveland Park to attract too many outsiders. Right. No blockbuster movie openings. But, oh, save the Uptown! Good grief.

Let’s be clear: Cleveland Park can be more fun. In the end, it will be a struggle to put Cleveland Park on the radar for interesting restaurateurs. But with folks like Commissioner Gordon on the beat, I remain hopeful. Removing the restaurant cap, which would require a hearing before the Zoning Commission, is a proactive first step to shooting up that flare that says “Cleveland Park is Open for Business!”

Thanks for everyone engaging in this discussion over the last several months, for emailing ANC 3C, and speaking out at last night’s ANC 3C meeting! And thanks to Commissioners Pagats and Gordon for leading on this issue. Both the resolution to remove the restaurant cap in Cleveland Park and the one to remove the cap in Woodley Park passed by 6-1 votes. On to the Zoning Commission!