NAGCR - Status of Ringing at the Old Post Office

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Ringing at the Old Post Office - Keep Calm, It Carries On!

Like others in the ringing community, Washington ringers were excited to hear earlier this month that the Federal Government’s General Services Administration (GSA) had selected an organization to redevelop the Old Post Office where the Congress Bells are housed. For some years we had monitored the ups and downs of GSA’s efforts to find a developer to turn the wonderful old building into a profitable enterprise.

Finally, last spring GSA issued a Request for Proposal (RFP). The bells and the Clock Tower where they are located were very minor items in the RFP. The bells were mentioned in the “Exhibits” section of the RFP, and the RFP specified that the developer must maintain “public access for the Clock Tower.” Proposals were submitted in July, and GSA announced the winning bidder, Trump Hotel Collection, on February 7th.

During the proposal period, WRS met with GSA and provided both our concerns about how the redevelopment would affect the bells and ringing and our view that improvements in public access to the tower coupled with some bell-related modifications could result in making the site a more significant public attraction. Since the selection, Katie Emmons, the WRS Ringing Master, has talked with GSA’s Project Manager for the redevelopment. He supports our involvement as plans for the Clock Tower development move forward, and we’re working with him to arrange a meeting of all the parties after things settle a bit.

While we have concerns about the effect the redevelopment will have on our ringing at the Old Post Office, we believe that it can be an opportunity to highlight the Congress Bells and change ringing. We appreciate the NAG and wider ringing community's interest and concern, and we'll try to keep NAG informed as things progress.

Something to note is that construction is not scheduled to start until spring of 2014, so we don’t expect to see changes in the ringing schedule at the Old Post Office for some time. So do come visit!

Katie Emmons