Making a List, Checking it Twice
Readers of a certain age will remember the halcyon days of the early 2010s, when a startup digital media company called Buzzfeed popularized something known as the “listicle.” Bored students and work procrastinators suddenly had access to an endless stream of pointless articles about random subjects that were formatted as lists. This was a genius business model because it could support infinite variations, all profoundly stupid, allowing readers to scroll peacefully for hours without any unpleasant brain cell activation. It was a winning formula that gave us classic internet content such as “22 Celebrities That Look Nothing Alike,” “20 Slightly Incorrect Names for Food,” and of course “15 Hedgehogs With Things That Look Like Hedgehogs,” the pinnacle of the form and a true exemplar of Pulitzer-caliber journalism.
Yet despite Buzzfeed’s role in bringing the modern listicle to prominence, lists have deep roots in human history. From the Ten Commandments (“10 Ways to Piss Off a Monotheistic Deity”) and the United States Constitution (“7 Articles for Structuring a Government, Plus 27 Amendments That Would Have Blown Ben Franklin’s Mind!”) to the format of this very newsletter (“5 Subjects of Local Discourse Guaranteed to Make You Scream Into a Pillow”), people have always turned to lists as a helpful way to sort and categorize information. Nowadays, with Buzzfeed’s cultural cachet diminished and the Constitution rendered basically optional by Samuel Alito, the biggest remaining reason to make lists is apparently to put the independent city of Alexandria, Virginia (pop. 158,309) on every single one of them.
You’ve probably seen a few such lists making the rounds lately. Their typical format, which ranks anywhere from five to two hundred of the “most [insert adjective here] cities,” is designed to earn maximum coverage in local news outlets across the country. The sites that produce them are an eclectic bunch–photobook companies, online financial planning platforms, the AARP–but their lists typically have one thing in common: us.
These latter-day listicles are assembled by national publications, so they offer us a glimpse at how we’re perceived by the wider world outside Alexandria—a place we’re known to visit only under duress. Naturally, our status as a tourist destination plays heavily into our image. Travel mags in particular can’t get enough of us: Condé Nast Traveler readers named us their 3rd favorite city in the U.S. this year, and Travel + Leisure subscribers ranked us ninth. It will not surprise you to learn that both of these articles include obligatory mentions of bricks. Our brand is strong! Other recent surveys have landed us on not one but two holiday-themed lists (America’s 10 Favorite Christmassy Towns and 5 Small Towns That Will Bring Your Hallmark Christmas Movie Dreams to Life), indicating that our proficiency with string lights, like our preference for historically accurate building materials, is not going unnoticed. Meanwhile, CN Traveler readers named us the 10th friendliest city in the country, a poll that must have been conducted before all the comments about spanking.
These survey-generated lists all portray us in a charming light, as do other rankings based on scientific data. We’re the 6th safest city according to SmartAsset, and we’re one of WalletHub’s most diverse cities (though we’ve fallen in the rankings compared to a couple years ago). We used to consistently top Amazon’s list of most well-read communities before they stopped compiling it, and we were their most romantic city in 2016 due to our profligate consumption of “romance-related music, books, and sexual wellness products”—information that suddenly explains the need for the Wrap Up, Alexandria campaign.
But only one recent list has incorporated the subjective opinions of actual Alexandrians, and the picture it paints isn’t as rosy. Last month LawnStarter, a lawn care website that has inexplicably made ranking cities according to various non-landscaping-adjacent metrics an integral component of its business (they also named us this year’s 3rd best city for dog lovers, which tracks, and the 3rd most relaxed city, which… doesn’t) published a list of 2023’s “dirtiest cities in America” that named Alexandria the most polluted city in Virginia. The thing is, objectively, we’re not very polluted at all—the air emissions, water quality violations, and greenhouse gas data that went into the rankings showed that we were one of the cleanest cities evaluated nationwide. But the list also incorporated the results of a survey in which Port City respondents expressed the second-highest dissatisfaction about pollution of anyone in the entire country. This confirms what we’ve long suspected: Alexandrians are divorced from reality and the split was not amicable.
But this result also says something else: that there seems to be a mismatch between how the rest of the world sees us (festive, amiable, romantic) and how we tend to see ourselves (dirty, ugh, gross). This tendency has been evident in other city surveys as well as in public debates about city policy where there’s often a heavy focus on the negative—we’re too crowded, traffic sucks, there’s no parking.
Look, we’re not perfect. No city is! And there are certainly meaningful distinctions between the views of tourists and those of the people who live and work here, who are responsible for making decisions about the city’s future. All we’re saying is that it might not be a bad thing to take a step back on occasion and try to look at ourselves the way travel magazine survey filler-outers do. It’s easy to get caught up in the drama and the day-to-day gripes and the “failed city” rhetoric and forget that everybody else in America is out there making the heart-eye emoji face at us because we’re just so dang awesome.
All these city rankings—like the Buzzfeed listicles that came before them—are fundamentally silly, but there’s something in them that we can choose to take seriously. This holiday season, while we’re taking the time to relax and reflect—and while we find ourselves at yet another controversial inflection point as a community (yes, we’ll eventually get around to talking about the arena)—let’s give ourselves the gift of internalizing some of the love and appreciation the rest of the country feels for us. We can feel those things and still want to make this an even better place to live, to help it change and adapt and grow. Because if you read the surveys, what the rest of the world appreciates about us isn’t just our bricks, it’s also our vibrant and dynamic community and the way we honor our past while always moving forward. That, more than anything, is why Alexandria will always be number one on our list.
Things You May Have Missed Because You Have a Life
If you’d like to write to Santa now’s your chance, because much like certain members of our city council, Jolly Ol’ St. Nick understands that if you really want to reach someone there will never be a better way than through the United goddamn States goddamn Postal Service.
Ice & Lights: The Winter Village at Cameron Run is back for another year of feeling weird about wandering around a water park at night in the middle of December. They’ve released a new “augmented reality app that allows for fun photo opportunities that you can only get in the park,” like giving yourself a virtual skinned knee from slipping on wet concrete or adding a digital background of kids screaming at their parents to buy them Dippin’ Dots.
A child competing on Masterchef Junior has grandparents who live in Alexandria! Look, we’re reaching, okay. Sorry. It’s a slow news week except for stories about that one thing (you know the thing).
Local Discourse Power Rankings
#JustinWilsonsAlexandria (Last week: 1). Last week we joked that Justin had an entire year to add to his legacy. We really, really, really did not expect him to “hold my beer” us and do it in one week. We are begging the mayor to pace himself, for the sake of the word count strains on local newsletter authors, please sir, spend a quiet day inside with a book.
Zoning (Last week: 3). Remember when this was the thing everybody was mad about? You sweet, sweet summer children.
Campaign Dreams (Last week: NR). Intrigue abounds in the nascent mayoral contest, as ALXnow reported today on a mysterious phantom endorsement for Amy Jackson by the Northern Virginia Association of Realtors. It’s a classic he said, she said mix-up! She said they endorsed her. They said we absolutely the fuck did not. What a wacky situation we have on our hands here folks! Guess there’s no way we’ll ever get to the bottom of this one.
Is Our Children Learning (Last week: 5). ACPS has faced its share of challenges in recent years. Staffing shortages, bus disruptions, safety concerns, public messaging that often closely mimics Ron Burgundy reading from the teleprompter, you name it. Notably absent from this list of hardships, however, was dissatisfaction with the district’s logo. And sure, was the old logo outdated? We guess so. It had these weird silhouette figures draped all over the letters in ACPS like it was the Charlie’s Angels opening credit sequence. But deciding to put money, time, and public engagement into the development of a new logo in the face of all those other issues is some real “read the room” energy. ANYWAY, the new logos were unveiled this week much to the near universal bemusement of the local internet commentariat. One of them is mostly fine—it’s a chonky pencil with the Masonic Temple in it, sure ok, whatever. But the other one is some consultant fever dream of abstract shapes and concepts that needs to come with a telephone-book-thick interpretation guide—apparently showing a person, a school house and shaded pieces that make the whole student, WHAT?? We’re serious, click that link and look at that thing and tell us you can see a person OR a school house OR a whole student. It looks more like the face of the cop from the Village People than any of those three things (go ahead, look at it, you know you see it too now that we’ve said it).
You Idiots Are Doing This Road Wrong (Last week: NR). This week our government continued its ruthless crusade to
improve the quality and safety of local transportationRUIN ALL THE ROADS. First they dared to put out a survey asking what amenities people would like to have at new bus stops, forgetting the key fact pointed out by many commenters at the Duke Street in Motion hearing that bus riders don’t actually exist. Then they proposed to expand “no right on red” restrictions on Duke, once again provoking ALXnow commenters into admitting that they regularly do vehicular crimes and have no intention of stopping. As for the city’s bogus study claiming that all recent crashes on Duke involving pedestrians resulted in “injury” or “death”... why can’t they just implement our previous suggestion to put all pedestrians in carnival game sumo suits? Or even better, just issue every Alexandrian their own personal airbag vest.
Alexandria’s Hottest Club Is… A Tent Next to the Potomac Yard Metro Station
Yesterday morning the city opened the hottest and most popular spot we’ve ever seen. This. Club. Has. Everything. Tall governors. Highly-caffeinated mayors. Exhausted economic development leaders. Senators that should never be allowed near a can of tuna fish. And of course, selfie takers up and down the ballot.
It also has a pair of professional sports teams because that’s a thing Alexandria has now, we guess! In an announcement that rocked local listservs Nextdoor the DC metro region, Ted Leonsis (oh yeah, this club also has billionaires) announced that Monumental Sports—owners of the Wizards, Capitals, Mystics, and e-sports teams [Editor’s note: sure, ok]—will move their NBA and NHL teams as well as their corporate headquarters to a new campus directly adjacent to the Potomac Yard metro station. The proposed development came with artistic renderings of the envisioned arena alongside a new pedestrianized plaza and performing arts center that will also anchor this comprehensive new placemaking effort.
The announcement was very much as expected. Lots of excitement from state and local leaders, lots of excitement from the team owner, lots of excitement from the landowner. And without a doubt, this is exciting! No matter whether this turns out good, bad, or otherwise—it is undeniably exciting. Alexandria was at the center of regional and national news for most of the day yesterday, and for once not just because we had some famous criminal sequestered in our federal courthouse.
Comprehensive details on the project are only just beginning to trickle out, but the broad strokes shared yesterday during both the morning’s announcement as well as the mayor’s marathon DRCA Q&A session in the evening (Alexandria’s Hottest Club Is Also… A Civic Association’s Zoom Chat) have a new state-chartered stadium authority issuing something in the order of $1.4 billion in bonds to acquire the land and build the arena, with the commonwealth contributing an additional $150 million to $200 million toward transportation projects (read: un-fucking Route 1). The deal calls for Monumental to invest around $400m up front, and the city is primarily investing (around $50m) in the new performing arts center. The entertainment district is envisioned to catalyze additional development in the 7 million adjoining square feet of land, ultimately leading to a The Wharf-like destination right here in the Port City (The Port? The Yard? Target Yards? We’re workshopping it). No word yet on how many of the future new dining options plan to serve pizza.
Many reactions focused on how fast this all felt, and how integrity-lacking it was to catch people off guard and not include their opinions and feedback. But it’s really important to note that this is all very much entirely in line with the existing plan for Potomac Yard that has been publicly available on the the city’s website for a very, very long time. You can read that here if you’d like—and you should, because it’s genuinely interesting! Reviewing this thorough (and quite honestly, excessively) lengthy plan helps bring into focus what a truly remarkable opportunity this project really is for the city, and how it likely speeds up by a decade or more long hoped-for plans for this neighborhood.
And listen—back slaps and fist-pumps in a tent next to the Potomac Yard metro station do not a successful project make. This wasn’t the end of anything, this was barely even square one. There’s a whole ton of work still to come for Alexandria—for all of us—to realize the best and highest version of this deal. Concerns about traffic congestion and ongoing city obligations related to safety and sanitation are not unfounded, and we need to work hard from the outset to thoughtfully address and mitigate those. Most of what will really benefit the city will come in the second phase of things and beyond, so we need to make sure those phases actually happen and we don’t just stop the first night a [does math] 43-year old Ovi lights the red light in the new House That Ted Built.
What should come next is listening and learning, finding out all of the details in the deal, and understanding the process points we’re going to have to go through between now and the end. We should engage, voice concerns, and trust that good-faith efforts will be made to address those concerns and champion our needs. Most importantly, let’s recognize how absolutely fucking wild this is—and leave ourselves open to the full positive potential of what could happen next.
Speaking of Ted’s House
Keeping with the theme of the opening essay and inspired in part by this on-point joke from the Shallot, here’s ten free suggestions for sponsor names and nicknames for our new arena:
Dominion Energy Arena (The Blackout)
Five Guys Center (The Burger Barn)
Democratic National Committee Arena (The Dome in Disarray)
Jet’s Pizza Palestra (Mount Jetna)
ALXtra Arena (The House That Takes Built)
Tex-Mex & Italian & Event Center Center (The Inside Joke)
Ting Arena (The Trench)
Chinquapin Arena (The Bulldozer)
PetSmart Centre (The Dog Park)
Sportsball Palace Presented by Amazon (HQ3)
What did we miss—tell us in the comments!
The Alexandria Times Quote of the Week
From an article about the closure of OK Cleaners on Commonwealth Ave:
“The sudden shutdown has sparked concerns among residents, with some questioning if the recent ‘Zoning for Housing/Housing for All’ initiative is a contributing factor.”
For those playing along at home, Zoning for Housing has now been cited as the proximate cause for: a dry cleaner closing, the fire chief retiring, the Capitals coming to town, increasing property values, decreasing property values, and general malaise and ill will. We look forward to future editorials blaming it for conflict in the Middle East, rising sea levels, the latest Mercury retrograde, and Joe Biden’s low polling numbers.
One Awesome Thing in ALX
Last week we wrote about Carpenter’s Shelter, and we’re returning to them again this week in part because we wanted to highlight the Stuff the Bus! partnership between DASH Bus and Carpenter’s Shelter. This donation drive for household essentials and winter clothing wraps up tomorrow, so you’ve still got a chance to get out there and help Stuff the Bus!
Are we actually doing this segment because it’s incredibly, incredibly fun to say Stuff the Bus (go ahead, try it: Stuff the Bus)—we sure are. But we’re also doing it because it’s genuinely awesome to see different organizations in the city collaborate like this, and for DASH (which just set their all-time record-high ridership month in October with 480,000 boardings) to be finding ways to give-back and make an impact beyond their core mission.
If you’d like to contribute, be sure to take your donations to City Hall/Market Square tomorrow (Friday, December 15) 3 pm to 7 pm and enjoy the visceral pleasure of stuffing those much-needed items into the bus, along with the pleasure of doing some good and making a difference in a neighbor’s life this holiday season.
(Stuff the Bus!!)
You can follow Becky @beckyhammer.bsky.social and Jesse @oconnell.bsky.social on Bluesky, or you can e-mail us anytime at alxtranewsletter@gmail.com.
11) the Glebe Center at Glebe and Glebe (nickname: the Glebe)
That intro 👌🏽