Redwood watch continues on Bethesda Lane

Redwood Restaurant and Bar was closed again last night on Bethesda Lane, after being closed two previous days due to a burst water pipe. A wet-dry vac could be seen inside the dining room last night.

There is a schedule posted on the Redwood website showing the hours they will be open each day through January 7. No explanation is given, and they were actually not open on January 3 and 4, contrary to the hours shown for those evenings. According to the schedule, they will be open regular hours today and tonight, so we'll have to see what happens.

Wet-dry vac box

Water main breaks continue, causing icy roadways in downtown Bethesda (Video+Photos)

There is good news and bad news on the water main breaks in downtown Bethesda. First, the good news: The WSSC has finally gotten to that steady water main leak on Bradley Boulevard near Wisconsin Avenue.

Westbound Bradley Boulevard near
Strathmore Street was slick with ice

WSSC crew working on the Bradley Boulevard
water main break last night

The bad news: there were at least two other water main breaks active last night, an existing one on Cordell Avenue, and a new one on Wisconsin Avenue near the Marriott headquarters construction site. While fresh running water continued to flow from the leaks, standing water rapidly froze in the parking lanes on both roads.

Cordell Avenue between
Old Georgetown Road and
Norfolk Avenue

Ice in the parking lane

But the ice didn't dissuade some
from still using the parking spaces

Wisconsin Avenue - very dangerous

A cone is not enough to prevent a
major spinout here, which could
cause a car to jump the curb
and strike pedestrians

Unshoveled sidewalk at 7900 Wisconsin a hazard for Bethesda pedestrians

The sidewalk in front of the construction site at 7900 Wisconsin Avenue presented a slip risk to pedestrians as late as last night. Sidewalks along Wisconsin on either side of the site were shoveled, making the stretch in front of 7900 stand out. Accumulation was low, but with the hard freeze, could easily cause someone to fall between now and Monday. The property owner is technically in compliance with the sidewalk shoveling law if the snow is removed by the 24th hour after snow stopped falling Thursday, however.

Urban Country to move Friday at Bethesda Row

Urban Country Designs will make its short move one door up to 7121 Arlington Road at Bethesda Row tomorrow, Friday, January 5, 2017. The upscale furniture store is taking over the vacant City Sports space, and its current location will become Amazon Books in a few months.

They're having a clearance sale that includes floor samples, which had to be moved over to the former lululemon store at 4856 Bethesda Avenue during the big move. Furniture prices are up to 75% off, so head over there (next to the Apple Store) to browse until Friday.

Barnes & Noble reopens, Redwood closed again last night (Photos)

Barnes & Noble reopened as scheduled yesterday morning, following what the store termed a "heat outage." B&N is still scheduled to close on January 11, and a closing sale is underway. Meanwhile, Redwood was not able to reopen yesterday, following a burst pipe on Monday. They will try again today, according to an employee.

Up Top Acres to open rooftop farm at Pike & Rose

Up Top Acres, the urban farming company that brought a rooftop farm to Bethesda Row, will bring an even larger one to Federal Realty's Pike & Rose development this April. The 17000 SF farm will grow greens, root vegetables, herbs, tomatoes, peppers and more. 

Produce grown at the Farm at Pike & Rose will be distributed through a Farm Membership Program, where Up Top customers will sign up to become members, and receive a weekly share of produce. Additional produce will be sold to nearby restaurants.

Training Ground to hold grand opening this Saturday, Jan. 6, in Bethesda

Training Ground, a new fitness concept located at 4940 Hampden Lane, Suite 200 in downtown Bethesda, will hold its Grand Opening this coming Saturday, January 6, 2018 from 1:00-3:00 PM.  Click here for free tickets.

The first 50 attendees will receive a free gift bag. Inside the bag will be snacks from Amazi, Noshbar and Territory Foods. Bag winners will also be entitled to a free personal training consultation at Training Ground, and a free physical therapy consultation from Cohen Health & Performance.

Everyone will enjoy free food and mimosas from Bethesda Row eateries Sweetgreen and Modern Market as they tour the facility. Training Ground's selling point is that they provide the large, modern space and world-class fitness equipment, but the various training options are provided by the independent personal trainers who use the facility as a shared workspace.

Photos courtesy Training Ground

Bethesda water main breaks keep WSSC crews busy (Video + Photos)

The polar vortex continues to plague Bethesda - and the WSSC. Crews from the utility responded to water main breaks around downtown Bethesda last night, as temperatures remained well below freezing for another consecutive day. At least one restaurant had to shut down last night, after a pipe burst in their building.

One break was right in front of Caddies and Alatri Bros. on Cordell Avenue. Two readers reported an ongoing water flow on Bradley Boulevard near Wisconsin Avenue; neither reported seeing a response from WSSC there yet as of last evening.

Burst pipe closes Redwood for tonight at Bethesda Row

Redwood will be closed tonight due to a burst water pipe. The restaurant on Bethesda Lane is cleaning up, and using fans to dry out the space. They hope to reopen tomorrow (Wednesday) or Thursday.

Bethesda Bagels to temporarily close for renovations January 14

There's more bad news for bagel lovers besides the ice age currently hitting Bethesda. Bethesda Bagels at 4819 Bethesda Avenue will temporarily close on January 14 for renovations, according to a sign posted at the restaurant this weekend. The renovations are expected to take six weeks, so come up with a backup plan now.

Montgomery County murders spike 31% in 2017

Long considered a low-crime jurisdiction, Montgomery County experienced a 31% increase in homicides last year.  Surprisingly, the Washington Post chose to run a "fake news" headline Sunday. A front-page splash read, "Killings fell in D.C. area in 2017." Only those who bothered to read the article on the inside pages would learn that murders actually increased in Montgomery County in 2017.

It appears the Post used the misleading headline to protect the soft-on-crime Montgomery County Council, who have proven impotent to stop the surge of violent crime in the County. While murders spiked in Montgomery, Fairfax had no increase, D.C. had fewer, and Prince William County's homicide rate plunged from 22 to 4. Increasing crime has so embarrassed Montgomery County elected officials, they have resorted to violating the County's open data law, by sabotaging the crime datasets.

A month-long crime data outage last summer only ended after I publicized the illegal blackout. Then block numbers were removed, making the data nearly useless for lengthy roads. Next, they restored block numbers, but disabled the sorting function of the date columns, so that you can only access random crimes from 2016 no matter which option you select for starting or ending date. Finally, as of this morning, I can no longer use the mouse to slide the columns right or left, only the keypad on my keyboard.

Ironically, the jurisdictions whose homicide rates declined last year provide more and more-accessible crime data to their residents than Montgomery County. We need new elected leadership that can stop the trend of rising homicides, not one that resorts to childish tactics like blocking crime data from the public. Sad!

MoCo exec candidate David Blair sets up campaign headquarters in North Bethesda (Photos)

David Blair, a Democratic candidate for Montgomery County Executive, has established a campaign headquarters in the ground floor of The Sterling, at 11700 Old Georgetown Road near the White Flint Metro station and across from Pike & Rose. With the primary election just over six months away, there was some activity inside the office even on New Year's Eve this past weekend.

The office has a high-visibility location along the heavily-traveled Rockville Pike corridor, where commuters stuck in traffic will have ample time to notice the Blair headquarters. Blair entered the race in November.

Founder and former CEO of Catalyst Health Solutions, and a lifelong resident of Montgomery County, Blair brings considerable personal wealth to the table. He is a minority partner in Monumental Sports and Entertainment, and along with his wife, recently opened Badlands Playspace in Rockville. Blair will be a strong contender for support within the business community. He has identified education, economic development and transportation as his key issues.

Blair was a co-founder of Empower Montgomery, a tax-exempt non-profit organization that advocates for open primaries that allow independents to vote for state and local office nominating contests, easing voter restrictions, expanding early and absentee voting, and engaging communities with low rates of voter participation. He has stepped aside from that role to run, leaving co-founders Charles Nulsen III, the president of Washington Property Company, and Chris Bruch, president and COO of The Donohoe Companies, to lead the organization, which has announced plans to be active in this year's County elections.

The Democratic executive race, into which yet more candidates may enter, is still developing. There are several lanes to victory. Blair and Bill Frick will compete in the "outsider" lane, despite Frick's longstanding time in the House of Delegates; Frick can honestly claim to have had no role in the disastrous County Council term that will end this November. Both are arguing for a more business-friendly atmosphere, in a county currently notorious nationwide as hostile to business.

Roger Berliner, Rose Krasnow and George Leventhal are jousting for support from the currently-ruling Montgomery County political cartel, a slim faction of the local Democratic party fueled by developer donations. All three played a major role in disastrous sector plans such as Westbard, which directly led to voters decisively approving term limits in November 2016.

Marc Elrich, despite a perplexing "Yes" vote on the Westbard plan, enters the race as the most popular Democrat in Montgomery County, as confirmed by his vote total in 2014. He brings strong support from labor, true progressives, civic associations and residents concerned about the impact of urbanization on existing neighborhoods, roads and schools. Washington Post columnist Robert McCartney predicted this past weekend that Elrich will be the winner in June and November.

The Democratic winner - as it stands for the moment - will take on Republican Robin Ficker, who has vocally opposed the tax hikes and development decisions that so angered residents into their term limit vote in 2016.

Digital signboard, parking arm added to new Bethesda police station

The final pieces continue to be added to the new 2nd District Montgomery County police station on Rugby Avenue in downtown Bethesda. These include an official Montgomery County government sign on the front facade, which appears to have a digital message board on it. A parking access arm has also been installed in the driveway leading to the parking garage in the rear. Anti-vehicle bollards  have been erected at the front entrance to the station. Accent lighting is in place along the side of the building, as well.