By Lyndsey Layton
Washington Post Staff Writer
Monday, May 29, 2006; A01
They were once Washington's slums -- crude buildings tucked into alleys across the city where the poor lived in such squalor that Eleanor Roosevelt railed against them and Congress made them illegal.
Generations later, those tenements have central air conditioning, stainless steel appliances, assessed values as high as $500,000 and owners who say alley living is a creative solution to the housing crunch in the nation's capital.
"We're trying to create a safe, healthy, nurturing environment," said David Bernhardt, 34, a carpenter-turned-developer who transformed a derelict brick building in an alley behind H Street NE into a two-story home for himself and his two children.
The 3,000-square-foot building between Seventh and Eighth streets was a shooting gallery for heroin addicts before Bernhardt bought it in June for $243,000 and spent $75,000 to revamp it into a funky three-bedroom space with a wood-burning stove, polished pine floors with radiant heat and an aviary.
He still has to shoo away the people who want to urinate in his alley, but that is happening with less frequency. "There was a woman who was in the alley, and she asked me which way I was going," said Bernhardt, who hoses down the alley each day. "I said: 'I'm not going. I'm here.' And she said she was just looking for a little privacy. I said, 'Well, not here. This is my home.' "
In a transforming city, one of the more ironic changes has been the elevation of the humble alleyway abode. As the real estate market has heated up in Washington over the past several years, scores of new owners have bought the vacant or derelict eyesores and rehabilitated them.
"The alleys are the place to go," said Steven Cummings, who is moving his photography studio to an alley building next to Bernhardt's. "Everything is so high now. You can really create a nice place in an alley. All it takes is vision -- and nerve."
It is unclear how many people live in alley structures, said Karyn-Siobhan Robinson, a spokeswoman for the D.C. Department of Consumer and Regulatory Affairs. Most of those left after the city demolished thousands of them are in neighborhoods around Logan and Dupont circles, Capitol Hill and Georgetown.
Critics say the laws have not kept pace with the changes. Zoning laws prohibit anyone from living in an alley that is less than 30 feet wide, although there are exceptions, Robinson said.
Kyle Kreutzberg, a 47-year-old filmmaker, took an abandoned carriage house in an alley in LeDroit Park and turned it from blight to delight.
He cleared out a lot overflowing with garbage and created a patio lush with greenery, restored the brick and installed iron scrollwork, new gutters and lamps, and flower boxes. He created living space inside, but the city will permit it to be used only as artists' studios. He has been waiting five months for a certificate of occupancy, he said.
"People have been living here forever, using it for drugs and prostitution, and the city had nothing to say," Kreutzberg said. "But as soon as a taxpayer wants to put some money into it, to make an investment, there are all sorts of problems and hurdles. The bureaucracy is blind to the very obvious -- that this is about restoring humanity to the back alleys. It's about magic in the heart of the community."
The history of Washington's alley dwellings stretches to before the Civil War, when cheap shacks were built in alleys to be rented to workers. After the war, brick dwellings replaced the shacks. They became cramped, miserable places where disease spread easily. By the start of the 20th century, most alley dwellers were poor African Americans.
Social reformers, including two first ladies -- Ellen Wilson and later Eleanor Roosevelt -- pushed to raze the dwellings. The city knocked down or condemned about 1,000, according to "Alley Life in Washington," by James Borchert. In 1934, Congress passed a law banning people from living in the alleys. But World War II and a housing shortage shelved its enforcement.
Alleys in Washington have long been used by businesses -- car repair shops are common. Three years ago, Adele and Bruce Robey moved into a 750-square-foot alley building surrounded by auto shops.
"We could have spent $300,000 for one of the new condos that was this big," said Adele Robey, forming an invisible postage stamp with her hands. "When we saw this, we immediately signed a contract."
The Robeys live on Linden Court, an alley behind H Street NE. They purchased their home for $110,000 and spent $90,000 on renovations. The house next door recently sold for about $300,000.
Like many of the city's alley dwellings, the Robeys' house was probably home to a freed slave after the Civil War, Bruce Robey said.
The space is tight -- the width is slightly more than 10 feet, and there's no room for a dining table -- and there are few windows, but the house was exactly what the empty nesters were seeking when their daughter graduated from high school and they decided to sell their Capitol Hill home.
The Robeys own the nearby H Street Playhouse, and living in the alley behind it means a 30-yard commute. They also have a home in West Virginia, where they spend part of the week. "It's perfect for when we come to town," Bruce Robey said.
The only drawback has been trying to get some city services. When they first moved in, Bruce Robey would flag down the District trash truck on a nearby street and cajole it into the alley. Those sorts of problems motivated Mark Nevitt and Steve Pinkus to form the District Alley Dwellers Alliance last year. They successfully lobbied the city to rebrick Brown's Court on Capitol Hill.
Nevitt was drawn to an alley dwelling after completing a tour of duty with the Navy in Iraq. Far from the busy streets, all noise is muted. The quiet is an amenity many alley dwellers cite, along with less dust, that compensates for having no views beyond a brick wall.
Michael Berman, a painter who converted a cinder-block building in a Capitol Hill alley into studios for artists, said the city should encourage alley living.
Berman, 36, and several partners want to turn a vacant lot in the alley into spaces where artists can live and work. But the city rejected the plan, saying residential use is prohibited.
"That makes no sense to me," Berman said. "It made sense in the '20s and '30s, when there were health and safety issues. But they really need to be upgraded. They don't make sense."
Ellen McCarthy, the District's director of planning, said she is willing to reexamine the policies regarding alley dwellings.
"What was problematic in terms of unhealthy conditions and lack of light and air may not be so unhealthy now because we have air conditioning and indoor plumbing," she said.
"On the other hand, there are issues of privacy and peaceful enjoyment of property by the other owners on the alley, who wouldn't have been expecting such an intense use as a residence. Before we could support a new zoning regulation that would apply citywide, we'd have to think through those issues."