Woodley Park Neighborhood

The earliest settlers in what is now the Woodley Park area were wagon and carriage pioneers who traveled dirt roads in search of good land.

By the mid-to-late 1800’s, Woodley Lane had become the main route for travelers. The only businesses in the area until the 20th century were the grist and lumber mills in Rock Creek Valley. In 1875, Mrs. A.E. Kervand divided her property, which was centrally located at the heart of today’s Woodley Park, into 18 lots. She named the project “Woodley” after Philip Barton Key’s estate. The subdivision was planned to mimic the city’s successful suburbs such as Mount Pleasant and LeDroit Park, but didn’t garner buyer interest due to the lack of transportation in the area at the time.

By 1878, the land had been subdivided again, this time into 31 lots, but Woodley Lane was still a dirt road lacking public transport and prospective buyers held back. By 1888, real estate investors Thomas Waggaman and John Ridout had acquired Kervand’s land. The partners renamed the subdivision “Woodley Park” and offered lots drawn to showcase the varied topography. Key to the plan was their charter of a Rock Creek Railway streetcar line that would travel along Columbia and Woodley Roads into Woodley Park.

Unfortunately, Waggaman and Ridout lacked foresight and Capitol Hill planning intel when purchasing the development, because that very year Congress passed an “Act to Regulate the Subdivision of Land Within the District of Columbia.” The Act extended L’Enfant’s street grid to areas outside the original city boundaries. New subdivisions in Washington County were required to follow the city’s established alignment of orthogonal streets and diagonal boulevards. Subdivisions like Woodley Park that were designed with curving streets were faced with the possibility of total street redesign and the potential for condemnations of property to conform to these requirements. This halted new development in Woodley Park.