For home buyers on a budget, a nice, quiet neighborhood in Northeast D.C.
Albert Hill said one of the most pleasant aspects of living in Lamond Riggs, in the far Northeast section of the District, is pulling up a chair on the front porch of his three-bedroom single-family home and watching the ongoing array of sporting events across the street at a playground.
“On Saturday, I watched two baseball games!” said Hill, 78, a retired route salesman for Wonder Bread, where he worked when its local bakery was on Seventh Street NW near Howard University.
He also likes the closeness to shopping centers in Maryland. “We get our medicines at Giant, three blocks away in Hyattsville. I’m here to stay.”
His wife, Alice, 73, a retired postal employee, said the couple bought their single-family house in 1976 for $50,000, and could command $350,000 for it today.
“It’s a nice, quiet neighborhood,” she said.
Lamond Riggs bubbles with a vibrant assortment of businesses, most within easy walking distance for residents. Within the shadow of the post office are an auto body shop, a union hall for graphic industry workers, a kidney care center, microbreweries and three schools. A short drive down Kansas Avenue leads to Fort Slocum Park.
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Downtown Takoma Park, with its coffee shops, international cuisine and reputation for social activism, lies just to the northeast.
Sankar Sitaraman moved to the neighborhood in 2012 from Columbia Heights.
Share this articleShare“We couldn’t afford certain areas,” he recalled. “Here, there were a lot of houses we could afford. It’s a very nice neighborhood,” said Sitaraman, who teaches math at Howard. “Most people here are hard-working and striving.”
Not “smooshed together”: Lamond Riggs lays claim to several trailblazing events in the District, according to the community association’s website. It organized the city’s first cultural enrichment program, at Bertie Backus Middle School. It also set up an athletic association that led to the creation of youth football teams. The community lacked a brick-and-mortar library, depending on a Bookmobile that visited weekly. It wasn’t until the late 1950s that discussions were held about building a permanent library.
On North Capitol Street, close to where the street signs transition from a Northeast to Northwest designation, Nick DiCrosta stood at the front door of his duplex in white athletic socks. The 34-year-old father of a small child said he and his wife, Liz, were attracted to Lamond Riggs for its diversity, deciding on a renovated house for which they paid slightly more than $464,000. “We can see the changes happening. But it doesn’t feel Uber-friendly like Shaw or U Street. It’s much more of a community feel.”
DiCrosta said the commute to his job at the National Institutes of Health in Bethesda makes for a long day. “Unfortunately, I have to do the entire way around the Red Line. It takes an hour and 15 minutes. I’m hoping they’ll get their act together and build the Purple Line,” which will connect Bethesda and New Carrollton. Liz DiCrosta said she drops off their daughter at day care before making the 25-minute drive to her teaching job at Janney Elementary in Upper Northwest. “We’re not smooshed together like rowhouses,” she said. “We have a front yard and a back yard.”
Living there: Lamond Riggs is bounded by the Metro tracks on the west, Galloway Street NE on the south, Eastern Avenue NE on the east and northeast and Underwood Place NE/NW on the north.
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In the past 12 months, 92 houses were sold in Riggs Park/Lamond, said Tanya Slade, an agent with Long and Foster in the Brookland section of Northeast, ranging from a two-bedroom, semidetached brick home for $249,000 to a detached brick property for $760,000. Ten houses are on the market, ranging from a semidetached house for $399,000 to a renovated detached dwelling for $899,000. There are 12 houses under contract, Slade added.
Schools: LaSalle-Backus Education Campus and Calvin Coolidge High. There are also several public charter schools.
Transit: The community is served by Metrobus and Metrorail on the Green Line from Prince George’s Plaza, Hyattsville and West Hyattsville, and served on the Red Line from Takoma and Fort Totten.
Crime: In the past 12 months, there were eight reported robberies, eight burglaries, five stolen autos, 15 thefts from autos and two assaults in the Lamond Riggs area, according to the D.C. police.
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