DC is a fantastic city. Its coming up, reversing a long back-sliding history. It has weathered British sacking, Civil War encampments, a heavy-handed Eisenhower-era sweep-up, and plunging fortunes after Dr King’s assassination. Things are looking up today, and the design laid out by L’Enfant (1791) and later updated by McMillan (1901) have stood up remarkably well (2012). Here are ten things to love about the city today:

1. A waterfront site. No great city is without a waterway, at once a purifying force, a byway for trade, and a recreational retreat. Although Washington’s original vision for the capital as a canal city never materialized, its nesting at and springing from Greenleaf’s point – at the convergence of the Potomac and Anacostia rivers – completes it by providing a natural boundary and giving rise to embankments, bridges, boat docks, a fishmarket and other enlivening waterfront features.
2. The architectural record. As one of the country’s older cities Washington has a fantastic architectural record – its a veritable classroom for the alert. From Georgian to Federal, Baroque to Victorian and now the more modern forms (think IM Pei and Daly) as well as historic neighborhoods and footprints, walking around DC can give you a sore neck! Wrought-iron sleeping porches, Beaux-arts and neo-classical construction, colonnaded galleries, delightful mansards, sweeping stairs and stoops – so much to relish.
3. Distinct neighborhoods. If you can afford it, there probably isn’t a better city in America for its compact, long-standing neighborhoods. From quarters with soul food and barbershops to others with bodegas and chicken barbecue, some boasting slow-drip coffee and organic groceries and still others with collonaded homes that feel like the burbs. These distinct neighborhoods, often defined by central parks or public transport hubs, give rise to farmers markets, block parties, other distinctive activities that make DC’s communities so much fun to explore.
4. Pedestrian promenades. This is a walker’s city. There are long, flat and straight pathways lined with trees where families stroll, walkers intersect, lovers linger. Intimate streets turn golden in the fall, carpeted in fallen ginko leaves. Bridges span deep-set roadways, book-ended by dozing lions. Some will take you to the river front and others through a series of neighborhoods – all of them facilitate ease of movement by foot.
5. Public art. The trove is one of our greatest single legacies – permanent collections to temporary shows, outdoor sculpture from masters to experimental work from artists working today. Among my favorites are Titian paintings, Rodin sculptures, Monet cutouts, Calder mobiles, and Rivers, Rauschenberg, and Motherwell scattered throughout.
6. Public architecture. An artifact of democratic ideals over the centuries, the city offers many period examples of building design that embody the idealism our nation’s founding principles and provide grandeur to the people and projects that have sprung from them – from museums to libraries, public offices to memorials.
7. Broad boulevards. The major corridors in and out of the city create spectacularly long views, often of the major monuments and civic architecture. In certain areas these radials converge at the Districts numerous “circles,” which create a wonderful constellation of parks across the city. Most recently, many of these primary corridors have been amended to include uni- and bi-directional bicycle lanes, giving a big boost to civic and environmentally sensible urban transportation.
8. Greenspace. Noted as home to the country’s largest urban national park, Washington is a city with healthy canopy as well as park-like features that draw people and animals together. Its not unusual to see a deer along the old railroad bed along the Potomac or to imagine Rachel Carson bent in study among the trees and inclines of Rock Creek Park.
9. Internationalism. As our nation’s capital the city in incomparably diverse. The diplomatic, finance, and academic presences alone contribute to a sense of something beyond your everyday American scene. These in turn have, over the years, attracted immigrant communities that have thrived, producing – per square mile – one of the most diverse restaurant offerings in the country.
10. Intimate streets. Part of what makes a city great is the ability, despite a known press of life and growth, to also achieve retreat, to step off the moving sidewalk and rest a while. And that is what the small streets that intersect DC’s larger boulevards can offer. A stroll beneath a full canopy, a detour among quiet galleries and coffee shops. Corridors where bricks are still laid as sidewalks and neighbors gather on their stoops.