Reed-Cooke

Reed-Cooke is the name of a small neighborhood in Northwest Washington, D.C., and is situated within the boundaries of the larger and more prominent neighborhood of Adams Morgan, just north of the city's original L'Enfant-planned area. Its residents, and its local civic organization, the Reed-Cooke Neighborhood Association, generally consider it to be a distinct local neighborhood, although it is not on the city's list of formally recognized neighborhoods. For most official purposes, and to most Washingtonians, Reed-Cooke is a section of Adams Morgan.

Located just to the west of Meridian Hill Park, Reed-Cooke is bounded by 16th Street on the east, 18th Street on the west, Florida Avenue to the south, and Columbia Road to the north. This area takes its name from the two schools that sit within its borders: the H.D. Cooke Elementary School, and the Marie Reed Learning Center. Reed-Cooke began to develop its own identity in the 1980s as renewed citizen interest in the city was generally occurring, and the area's residents began to take a more active interest in the local neighborhood's future. This interest resulted in the creation of the "The Reed-Cooke Overlay District",^[1] a zoning area formed by the city in 1991 to help conserve the existing neighborhood's composition, and to manage new development. (The Overlay District also includes a small area south of Florida Avenue, down to U Street.) Since the year 2000, and within this zoning framework, a number of new mid-rise apartment houses and condo buildings have been constructed in the area.

The land of the neighborhood was once a part of the old Meridian Hill estate of Commodore David Porter, who created that noted estate in 1816.^[2] Following the end of the Civil War, Meridian Hill's land was sold and subdivided in 1867, creating one of Washington's early planned subdivisions. Initially this area grew slowly, with the Reed-Cooke portion of the tract subsequently being developed in large part just after 1900. The neighborhood today continues to be mainly composed of a mix of rowhouses and low- to mid-rise apartment buildings, in a variety of styles and sizes, from simple to elaborate.

Reed-Cooke is a part of the city's Ward One. And within D.C.'s Advisory Neighborhood Commission system, it is a part of ANC 1-C.

References

1. http://www.dcregs.dc.gov/Gateway/ChapterHome.aspx?ChapterNumber=11-14
2. Meridian Hill: A History, by Stephen McKevitt (History Press, 2014), p. 22.

Coordinates: 38°55′16″N 77°02′21″W / 38.9212°N 77.0391°W