National Mall

Millions will cram shoulder to shoulder to watch Barack Obama take the oath of office this month as the nation's 44th president, another indelible snapshot of American democracy in full display on the National Mall. But beyond the reach of the camera's lens, the historic promenade that stretches from the Lincoln Memorial to the U.S. Capitol -- the place often called America's Front Yard -- is itself a monument to neglect. Patches of the once-lush lawn have been trampled to dust.

America's frontyard may get its first face lift in more than three decades. Today, the U.S. House Appropriations Committee is scheduled to consider approving as much as $100 million in matching funds for repairs, maintenance and new staff for the National Mall, an area that attracts 25 million visitors a year. "The problem is, the Mall is just loved to death," said Chip Akridge, 61, chairman of the Trust for the National Mall, a nonprofit group that raises money for the park. The 700-acre National Mall extends from the U.S. Capitol to the Potomac River and is home to the Lincoln Memorial, the Washington Monument and more than a dozen other memorials and museums.

Severe weather brought a tornado warning to the city's suburbs, prompting authorities to evacuate the thousands gathered at the National Mall for holiday festivities. After the National Weather Service issued the all-clear a few hours later, officers alerted visitors who had taken shelter in nearby government buildings and museums that they could return to the Mall.

In the first major antiwar demonstration in the nation's capital since January, several thousand protesters marched from the White House to the Capitol on Saturday, carrying signs and chanting slogans demanding an end to the Iraq war and the impeachment of President Bush. A smaller group conducted a counter-demonstration to support the president and the war, leading to some heated confrontations.

At night, the National Mall has an allure all its own, from the glow of the floodlit dome of the Capitol to the lights of the Washington Monument and Lincoln Memorial dancing off the Reflecting Pool. The air is clearer, the atmosphere quieter, the feeling more personal than during the day, when tourists crowd the famous landmarks.

U.S. Park Police announced five arrests Friday in connection with a recent series of armed robberies and sexual assaults of nighttime visitors to the National Mall, the capital city's leading tourist attraction. The Park Police, which patrols the Mall, said the suspects were local teenagers and young adults, one of whom pleaded guilty to three counts of robbery and first-degree sexual abuse in the rape of a 17-year-old girl at gunpoint.

AT a regularly scheduled monthly meeting in the dead of summer, Washington's National Capital Planning Commission pulled out its biggest, baddest rubber stamp. In front of commissioners was a cockamamie plan to construct a museum adjacent to the Lincoln Memorial, underground beneath a parcel now occupied by a pair of bucolic softball fields. After hearing testimony from three citizens, all opposed, the NCPC gave a speedy thumbs-up to this latest incursion on the National Mall.

The National Mall, home to monuments and museums, has seen better days. The sidewalks are cracked, tourists have complained. The bathrooms are unpleasant. The security fences are just plain ugly. Parking is hard to find. And the footsteps of 25 million visitors each year erode the grassy expanses between the Capitol and the Lincoln Memorial. There have been a few nips and tucks over the years, but the Mall hasn't had a major face-lift in more than a century.

Icons of the civil rights movement and those who benefited from their struggles came together Monday to dedicate the site of a memorial to the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr., the first on the National Mall to honor an African American. "On this ground, a monument will rise that preserves his legacy for the ages," President Bush told the crowd of several thousand, largely African American, who witnessed the ceremonial groundbreaking for the memorial, which is expected to be completed in 2008.

The cascade of extraordinary scenes will officially begin Tuesday, with the nation's first inauguration of an African American president on the steps of the U.S. Capitol, in a city south of the Mason-Dixon Line, as the oath of office is sworn on Abraham Lincoln's bible. It will pick up speed with the first family taking up residence in the White House, a home rebuilt by slave labor after being torched in the War of 1812.