If it ain't broke, break it
Renovation of Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool another needless fiasco
WASHINGTON DC — The reflecting pool between the Washington Monument and Lincoln Memorial is mostly covered with tarps. Jackhammers shatter the tranquility of one of the United States’ most emblematic sites.
Clouds of dust obscure the vision and irritate the eyes of visitors who have come to Washington in advance of the country’s 250th birthday. The cacophony is relentless; reflection is difficult.
I just spent two days in our nation’s capital, visiting friends and making a pilgrimage to the Lincoln Memorial. While official Washington has a desultory feel, vibrant neighborhoods such as the relatively new Wharf district express the city’s vitality.
Coming into the city by train from New York, traveling with only a daypack, I disembarked at Union Station and walked the 1.5 miles to my hotel.
The next day I walked another 2 miles to the Lincoln Memorial. I wanted to work to reach the Lincoln statue and see what I’d find along the way.
Since my first visit to Washington DC, when I was a boy, I’d gravitated toward Lincoln, who tirelessly sought to unite our country.
The Lincoln Memorial felt like the seat of the nation’s soul, though I didn’t have the vocabulary to think in those terms as a kid.
A garden oasis
En route, I came upon the Smithsonian Gardens and met horticulturist Shelley Gaskins who was tending to the verdant enclosure.
She was eager to tell me about how Washington DC’s ban on gas-powered leaf-blowers has improved the quality of life in the city.
Before the switch to electric, Gaskins said, visitors complained about the noise and fumes from gas-powered equipment.
“When I’m using the electric mower what I hear is, ‘What’s that? It’s so quiet, that’s great, thank you.’ ”
While gas mowers remain legal in Washington DC (it’s only gas blowers that are illegal), the Smithsonian has gone all electric.
Using electric blowers, Gaskins said, she no longer needs to protect her ears and is relieved that she’s not breathing cancer-causing fumes.
With “electric blowers I could walk right up to some people and blow around them and I don’t interrupt their conversation,” she said. “It’s very nice to show people that we care about the environment.”
A contrast of remembrance
I walked toward the 555-foot-high Washington Monument, which was the tallest structure in the world from 1884 to 1899, when it was surpassed by France’s Eiffel Tower.
The towering monument never seemed like a fitting tribute to George Washington.
In 1847, architect Henry Robinson Searle, who had proposed a different tribute to the founding father, said “the mere obelisk appeared only as an enlarged plagiarism, in no way illustrating the memory of Washington personally.”
An empty pool
My earlier walks along the Reflecting Pool were enlivening and inspiring. This week the promenade along the empty vessel, enclosed by a black fence, was desultory.
The New York Times reported that day (May 27) that the company hired to renovate the pool didn’t have to bid for the job, and that its profit margin is stratospheric.
The contractor’s attempts to seal the pool are failing while the “American flag blue” paint is bubbling up. And workers haven’t been able to get the paint a consistent shade.
The Trump administration used the country’s impending birthday celebration to justify the no-bid contract on the 2,029-foot-long pool (about four-tenths of a mile).
According to the contract, the work was to be completed by May 22, but when I visited on May 27, it wasn’t close to finished.
Now Trump says it’ll be wrapped up by July 4, but it’s possible the sealing and painting won’t be completed by then. Or the contractor will do a slipshod job to finish in time but the result will be discolored and leaky.
Who’s paying for these millions in unnecessary spending? Taxpayers of course. The Interior Department is using more than $7 million in National Park entry fees to help pay for the president’s new pool.
Trump had said he’d hand-selected the firm, Atlantic Industrial Coatings, because it had worked on a pool at a golf club he owned in Virginia. He later backed away from that comment.
No competitive bids
Most appalling is that the government hired the company before settling on the cost. This type of contract is typically only used for emergency work, such as a collapsed bridge.
Predictably, Trump blasted the “Failing New York Times” for highlighting the cost and delays of the project.
While the Reflecting Pool, constructed in 1922-23, had has some issues – what century-old pool hasn’t? – this was a project that wasn’t essential.
Like the war in Iran and the destruction of the White House’s East Wing, it was an impulsive move by a president who wants his every desire fulfilled immediately.
If he wanted to do something productive, why not clean up the sculpture of Lincoln, which is covered in dirt and grime? That would have been a mission he could easily have accomplished.
My walk to the Lincoln Memorial reminded me of the pitfalls and potential of our country.
We’re deeply divided, but seeing parents bring their children to visit the seated statue of Lincoln, burdened with the weight of uniting a country, gave me hope.
We may never be able to eradicate the evil currents of racism and greed, but we can keep working to form a more perfect union.
Another apt and encouraging post, Michael. My husband, Donn, would tear up as he often quoted Abraham Lincoln. And now we remember: "With firmness in the right, as God gave us to see the right, let us strive on to finish the work we are in ... to do all which may achieve and cherish a just and lasting peace among ourselves, and with all nations."
Great piece and lovely to meet you and Jackie.