Email Decision-Makers

​Dear Members of the RFK Campus Development Project, 

I am writing today to express my dismay with the current proposed road cutting across the Oklahoma Avenue Lawn, leading to the proposed 5,500 car parking deck. As a member of the Kingman Park community and someone who depends on Oklahoma Lawn to provide daily green space for recreational and restorative activities, this proposal would destroy a valuable and important part of our neighborhood network.

Kids learn to bike on the Lawn. Neighbors catch up walking their dogs in the morning and evening. Commuters bike along the path to travel to work. Community members have birthday parties, picnics, and just lounge after a long run or an evening stroll.

Surely, the massive parking deck and this proposed 3- to 5-lane road can be relocated to be next to the Stadium and next to pre-existing roads. 

Please do not carve a new pseudo-highway through our neighborhood like 295 East of the River. Do not destroy a valuable community asset in a historically Black neighborhood that literally is a Historic District for being a historically Black neighborhood. I would hope, in 2026, we know better than that.

Don’t bulldoze the green space we use 365 days a year to accommodate motorists from out of town for 20 events a year. Please respect the residents who live here, use this space daily, and pay taxes that fund these redevelopment projects.

Additionally, our community has made clear our demand for a new Metro station at Benning Road NE, near the new Sportsplex. Teens will be using this complex, as well as many other residents who do not drive. Having a Metro here will connect the eastern part of campus and our Ward 5 neighbors in Carver-Langston, which have been very underserved by public transportation, particularly since the streetcar has been retired. We are concerned that the public transportation plans currently recommended for this development have limited connectivity and “minimum viable segments” that are too short to meaningfully function. The proposed BRT would run on the same lines as the Streetcar and does not connect to Stadium Armory. A new metro stop would provide better connectivity for Stadium patrons, current residents, and the thousands of new residents living in the new housing of the development proposed. Additionally, a new Metro infill station would be a better fit for the goals of Visualize 2050 - please plan for long-term benefit, not short-term appeasement of billionaires.

Our community protested the Metro stop in the nineties because it was designed as a Park and Ride; then, as now, our community was deeply opposed to bringing additional automobile traffic into our peaceful, green neighborhood. Please build a Metro stop at Benning Road, preserve Oklahoma Lawn, and protect Kingman Park’s heritage and future.

Thank you,

[Name]