“One overwhelming fact,” says Pat Lally of the National Trust for Historic Preservation. “On this side of the street, big. On the other, small.”

Lally is standing at 2nd and F streets N.E. Cranes pivot to the north, where the former Little Sisters of the Poor convent is being turned into 180-plus condominiums. But closer, looming and gleaming like a movie set, is the seven-story glass façade of the new Securities and Exchange Commission building.

“Right over there,” continues Lally “is NoMa (north of Massachusetts Avenue). It’s going to be the most intensive development. ... In square-foot terms, it will be more density than downtown Boston.”

And behind his back this rainy morning stand the two- and three-story row houses of this not-very-distinguished neighborhood. It’s just outside of the protective envelope of the Hill’s historic district.

In many ways, humble 2nd Street is the front line in a battle over how many New York-style office behemoths the Hill can stand.

A few years ago, 2nd was almost a country lane; tiny row houses on one side, the CSX railroad on the other. The only structure of note was the tile- roofed Railway Express building at 2nd and I streets. Now smart offices, it had been vacant for years.

But now 2nd Street is where massive downtown development meets the neighborhood. It’s where people talk of overlays, transition zones and planned unit development and where unpublicized real-estate deals are made for millions of dollars as international corporations take advantage of the neighborhood’s main assets: that it’s close to the Capitol and to Union Station, that it’s unprotected by historic-preservation legislation, that it’s a place where money rules.

Lally won’t confirm it, but locals say that some owners of humble two-story brick flat fronts were offered $1 million as the Louis Dreyfus Group completed the purchase of about 20 private homes between G and H streets and between 2nd and 3rd streets N.E. Dreyfus, which is an international construction and commodities conglomerate, developed Station Place, where the huge Kevin Roche-designed SEC building sits.

Now Dreyfus plans to complete the buildout of the Station Place site and across the street will build a single condominium building along the east side of 2nd Street, for which it will tear down all the old row houses it bought.

Most of the old houses would be protected if the area were within the Historic District, Lally says, a fact that has the local Advisory Neighborhood Commission, 6C, ringing alarm bells. But most observers believe there is no stopping the Dreyfus plan. The best that can be done is to strike a bargain with the developers, perhaps limiting the height of the new building, which could top seven stories.

One such bargain is an offer from the developer to survey all the rest of the properties along G Street clear to 11th Street N.E., an expensive process that is a necessity if an area is to considered for inclusion in the Historic District. Thus Dreyfus is willing to help locals get protection against future development if they just go along with the condominium plan.

One member of the Capitol Hill Restoration Society railed against the bargain, calling it “blood money.” Others see it as a way of saving up to 1,200 turn-of-the-century buildings, now outside of the Historic District. Much depends on the decisions of the D.C. Office of Planning, due out this month.

NATIONAL HARBOR
The battle for visitors

The battle between the city and the suburbs is headed in a new direction with the plans for National Harbor, the Prince George’s County development on the east bank of the Potomac River near the Wilson Bridge.

The project’s 70-year-old developer, Milton V. Peterson, plans to offer hotels, retail offices and waterfront apartments — all of it brand new, and all of it far from that suburbanites’ anathema — “D.C.”

The scheme, which seems aimed at grabbing market share from the logical customers of downtown hotels and the Washington Convention Center, is alarming city tourism experts, who fear that crowds of convention-goers would be siphoned off.

National Harbor’s website boasts the “largest combined hotel and convention center on the eastern seaboard,” even though the 703,000 square feet at Washington Convention Center dwarfs National Harbor’s 400,000-square-foot convention area. Last week, four more hotels announced plans to build there.

What is missing here? Petersen touts “minutes from the nation’s capitol,” yet the spelling is important. Without a Metro station or other existing mass transport, it may take “minutes” to get to the boundary of the “capital,” but getting to the “Capitol” from outside the Beltway (where the development is located) has become an hour-long adventure.

ANSWER TO COMMUTER TAX
London’s congestion charge

Stifled by Congress (and it must be said by the Constitution) from full voting rights, and stymied by suburban lawmakers who won’t allow a commuter tax to be levied on their constituents in Virginia and Maryland, what’s poor D.C. to do?

There is a new way to tax commuters — and in particular car commuters — who come each day, 300,000 strong, to earn their pay and take it away. It’s called the “congestion charge,” and it has worked in London for a year, reducing traffic in the center city, increasing revenues, lowering pollution and increasing use of public transportation.

Other cities using similar systems include Trondheim, Norway, and Singapore. Those considering the step include Durham, Edinburgh and Nottingham, all in the U.K.

London authorities have developed cameras at all entry points to central London that photograph license plates and electronically earmark those who have not paid a congestion fee of eight pounds per day (slightly less for weekly and monthly payers). Those who have tried to avoid the cameras report frustration and tickets — fines are quick and heavy (50 pounds), unless charges are paid by 10 p.m. on day of entry into the congestion zone.

Excepted are taxis, minicabs, emergency vehicles, hybrid and electric cars, motorcycles — and residents of the center city.

Could such a charge be effected in Washington? Perhaps to the central business district? The technology, after a year of successful operation in London and 99 million pounds in revenue, seems available. One important variation here would be to exempt all D.C. residents and charge only outside tag-holders — this would make the charge an equivalent to the commuter tax and would mitigate possible D.C. objections. And for suburbanites, the charge could be avoided by use of public transportation.

Metro

•Road rage on A Street N.E. over plans to install more security barriers near the Supreme Court to prevent terrorist bombers from driving close to the high court’s building. Local residents are not taking it lying down, and accusations of “arrogance” and other epithets are flying. More, much more, next week. ...

•Barry Watch: Is the former mayor’s clout failing? After staying adroitly on the fence during the Reservation 13 battle, Marion Barry, now Ward 8’s City Council representative, promised Howard University officials he’d get one of their own on the mayor’s new health panel. No such luck. The panel, chaired by Gregg Pane, will report on city health needs in July, without a Howard U. representative. ...

•The rake is out, and the shovel, too. It’s yard-waste time on the Hill, becoming more and more famous for its gorgeous gardens. The Department of Public Works will pick up all that stuff — leaves, branches, etc. — if: branches bundled at 4 feet, no rocks or bricks or dirt; no more than seven bags; no heavier than 60 pounds each. And put yard waste out on your second collection day. ...

•Famed Market Lunch, Tommy Glasgow’s unchanging oasis of great, simple food at Eastern Market, may be “refigured” under new plans for the market, as yet architecturally incomplete. Also disturbing: There’s apparently no way now to correct the exterior lighting of the market, which should be pointing at the building, not the street — a monumental mistake. ...

•Plant-loving Hill dwellers should head out to the grandest of the Hill’s secret gardens — the National Arboretum at Bladensburg Road and R Street N.E., where the Friends of the National Arboretum (FONA) hold an annual Garden Fair open to the public April 29 (April 28 is FONA members only). The arboretum sells plants you will find nowhere else and draws people to its magnificent azalea collection, planted in 1947, which is beginning to bloom. ...

•Don’t wait — nominations of worthy D.C. residents for inclusion in the Capitol’s Statuary Hall close this Friday. Two people will be nominated by the D.C. Commission on the Arts. Your input at www.dcarts.dc.gov.