Living in Petworth, Washington DC

Grant Circle's small park anchors a grid of brick rowhouses a few blocks north of Petworth's commercial corridor, most of them built in the 1910s and 20s during the neighborhood's first wave of streetcar-driven development. Upshur Street's storefronts have filled in steadily with restaurants and small shops over the past decade, giving the neighborhood a walkable commercial spine of its own. The Petworth Community Market sets up on 9th Street between Georgia Avenue and Upshur most Saturday mornings from spring through fall, a neighborhood institution since 2010. The Georgia Avenue-Petworth Metro station anchors the neighborhood's southern end, putting the Green and Yellow Lines within reach of most addresses.

Petworth's blocks farther from Georgia Avenue and the Metro station can mean a longer walk than the neighborhood's compact reputation suggests, and its restaurant and retail corridor is still thinner than Columbia Heights' just to the south.

A few blocks separate Grant Circle's quiet and Upshur Street's growing restaurant row, and Petworth's appeal comes from how easily residents move between the two without leaving the neighborhood.