Talk:Old Post Office (Washington, D.C.)

Requested move 17 September 2016

The following is a closed discussion of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. Editors desiring to contest the closing decision should consider a move review. No further edits should be made to this section.

The result of the move request was: Not moved. (non-admin closure) Dat Guy^Talk_Contribs 12:26, 6 October 2016 (UTC)

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Old Post Office Pavilion → Trump International Hotel Washington, D.C. – structure has been renamed and old name was only in use for a few decades, it is not historical enough to keep – Jamesluckard (talk) 23:22, 16 September 2016 (UTC) --Relisting. — JFG ^talk 22:50, 26 September 2016 (UTC)

This is a contested technical request (permalink). — Andy W. (talk · ctb) 04:34, 17 September 2016 (UTC)

• @Jamesluckard: I believe this is not an uncontroversial rename, and worthy of discussion. Performing a search still yields plenty of hits for the old name. — Andy W. (talk · ctb) 04:34, 17 September 2016 (UTC)
• Just a note that the post office name is quite historical (it's listed on the NRHP as Old Post Office and Clock Tower). I think the current name is the most commonly used one. APK whisper in my ear 05:21, 17 September 2016 (UTC)
• That's a fair point, but then it might be most logical to rename the page "Old Post Office (Washington, D.C.)" or something. The specific name "Old Post Office Pavilion" refers to its redevelopment as a mall, which failed and eventually resulted in the conversion to a hotel. "Old Post Office (Washington, D.C.)" would probably be the most useful and widely used name for the building, APK. User talk:Jamesluckard 07:07, 17 September 2016 (UTC)
• Similar historic buildings in the United States converted to hotels:

• United States Courthouse Building and Downtown Postal Station (Tampa, Florida) is now Le Méridien Tampa.
• The Federal Reserve Bank of Boston building is now Langham Hotel Boston.
• The New Orleans Cotton Exchange Building is now AC Hotel New Orleans Bourbon / French Quarter Area.
• The United Artists/Texaco Building in Los Angeles is now Ace Hotel Los Angeles.
• Lamb's Theatre in New York is now The Chatwal, a Luxury Collection Hotel.

There doesn't seem to be a standard procedure in these cases.216.15.16.226 (talk) 17:52, 19 September 2016 (UTC)

• Rename to Old Post Office and Clock Tower (Washington, D.C.). Has an article because it's an historic building listed on the U.S. National Register of Historic Places, not because a new hotel has been opened in it. And this is what the NRHP calls it. Needs the parenthetical qualifier, however, as it's too generic otherwise. -- Necrothesp (talk) 15:21, 20 September 2016 (UTC)
• Oppose. Keep at current title. The current title satisfies both WP:COMMONNAME, WP:CONCISE, and WP:NATURALDIS. Clearly plenty of sources do call it the Old Post Office Pavilion, even if that was a failed mall proposal, and I don't think any of the proposed alternative titles are an improvement.  — Amakuru (talk) 14:41, 26 September 2016 (UTC)
• Oppose - Much exists in the structure other than the hotel. The hotel is not guaranteed to be there for 100 years, like the building. (Caveat: I worked extensively on this article, so I have a bias.) - Tim1965 (talk) 15:47, 26 September 2016 (UTC)
• Oppose Article is about the building, not the current tenant. Q ^{T C} 01:45, 27 September 2016 (UTC)
• Oppose, though I feel progress on this decision would be best done out of an election cycle which seems to cause us to assume other motives. 66.147.2.222 (talk) 20:21, 27 September 2016 (UTC)
• Oppose - Its known on the historic registers as the Old Post Office, and that the name it should have for the entry. Bangabandhu (talk) 20:44, 28 September 2016 (UTC)
• Support Put "also known as Old Post Office Pavilion" in the first sentence. Trump International Hotel Washington D.C. is it's official name and it's purpose is a hotel owned by Trump now. See Willis Tower and Sears Tower as an example of how it should be done. ShadowDragon343 (talk) 17:12, 29 September 2016 (UTC)
• Oppose - Keep current title or change to "Old Post Office and Clock Tower." This building has been of historical significance to DC residents, especially those whose families have been in the district for more than a generation. (Bias here: DC roots going back 5 generations) The Trump organization is new to DC. Its tenancy is not the source of the building's significance, though perhaps in time, the Trump hotel may enhance it. Better to have an entirely separate article for the hotel, but with links to the current article on the Old Post Office. 98.166.134.96 (talk) 21:09, 29 September 2016 (UTC)

• Move to something else. It is no longer the Old Post Office Pavilion but the notability of the structure goes beyond Trump's hotel (and the clock tower is not part of the hotel). Old Post Office (Washington, D.C.) or Old Post Office and Clock Tower (Washington, D.C.) would work. —  AjaxSmack  22:49, 30 September 2016 (UTC)
• Oppose. The article is about the historical building which has not been renamed; the hotel is merely one of the establishments located in the building. There is at least one more, a small visitors’ office run by the National Park Service); the NPS expects to reopen its operation in the building and take tourists to the clock tower’s 270-foot high observation deck by elevator after renovations of the building are completed in late 2016. The building is not owned by the tenant, Trump Old Post Office LLC, it’s federal property and a Category II Landmark. I also agree with AjaxSmack and Necrothesp that it may be a good idea to remove "pavilion" from the title and add "and Clock Tower" instead, but I don't know what would be the proper way and time to propose that. Space4Time3Continuum2x (talk) 14:04, 1 October 2016 (UTC)

{{subst:RMbot}}

Correction needed

Under section 7.4, the article states "with Trump using his personal funds to pay for the redevelopment"

This is erroneous. The renovation was financed via a loan from Deutsche Bank, as shown here:

https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/2813432-UCC-170-Million.html#document/p1/a291486 — Preceding unsigned comment added by 100.16.212.92 (talk) 00:29, 23 October 2016 (UTC)

• True enough. Unfortunately, the press didn't do its job investigating at the time (as far as I can tell), so the article reflects what was reported at the time. It's been reported fairly recently, though, in at least two reliable sources WaPo and MotherJones; I'll add it to the article soon unless someone else does it first. Space4Time3Continuum2x (talk) 06:47, 24 October 2016 (UTC)

Tried to move this to new section, didn't work. Maybe someone can help? Space4Time3Continuum2x (talk) 06:55, 24 October 2016 (UTC)

Fixed (I hope). Space4Time3Continuum2x (talk) 06:04, 25 October 2016 (UTC) Space4Time3Continuum2x (talk) 06:06, 25 October 2016 (UTC)

up-date needed

"Construction was scheduled to start in 2014, perhaps as early as the first three months of the year.[130][132][134][140] The new Trump International Hotel is scheduled to open in the second half of 2016.[134][136][137][141]

With the lease signed, Ivanka Trump said construction would begin immediately after the building was turned over to The Trump Organization.[133]" - It has already opened. wtop.com/real-estate/2016/10/photos-inside-trumps-luxury-dc-hotel/ Kdammers (talk) 20:21, 27 October 2016 (UTC)

Erroneous title - no building is named "Old Post Office Pavilion"

The National Park service still manages what it calls "old post office tower".

The old post office Pavilion has become a notable hotel, which is what this article should be about. Or else split and create separate pages - one for the hotel page and another for the defunct post office.

Quit the erroneous or partisan editing and keep it strictly objective and NPOV. Readers aren't supposed to be misled while searching for the hotel in wikipedia, as nowadays increasingly the hotel is being mentioned by more and more sources without additional mentioning of its former post office background, which therefore will mislead readers and unnecessarily force them to do multiple searches in (for example) google before connecting the dot and arriving at this page. Loginnigol (talk) 17:25, 20 November 2016 (UTC)

You may want to launch a new move request. Please note the discussion above from September which resulted in keeping the current name. However in the meantime the hotel has been inaugurated so a new discussion is warranted. — JFG ^talk 18:15, 20 November 2016 (UTC)

nytimes.com 25 August 2017

Trump Hotel at Night: Lobbyists, Cabinet Members, $60 Steaks

I'm no native speaker and woukd be glad if someone would use this source in the article. --Neun-x (talk) 20:46, 25 August 2017 (UTC)

Page move

@Corker1:You moved the page without prior discussion but didn't archive the talk page of "Old Post Office Pavilion" which included last year's discussion whose result was to not move. In that discussion (which was about moving to the hotel's name) alternative names were also discussed; I assume it is archived somewhere but I have no idea how to get it back. The building isn't just "historically known as the Old Post Office and Clock Tower", so why not use that instead of the current name? Space4Time3Continuum2x (talk) 08:31, 10 December 2017 (UTC)

@Space4Time3Continuum2x: The talk page of "Old Post Office Pavilion" was archived on the Wayback Machine on 15 February 2017 at Talk:Old Post Office Pavilion. The archived talk page shows that an editor made a request on 17 September 2016 to move the name to "Trump International Hotel Washington D.C.". There were more opposing comments than supporting comments regarding the move. There were seven comments opposing the move, two comments proposing a move to a different name, and one supporting comment. On 6 October 2016 a decision was made to not move the page.

One of the comments proposed that the page be moved to "Old Post Office and Clock Tower" because the National Register of Historic Places (NHRP) uses that name as an identifier. However, the page was not moved to that name. I concur with not moving the page to that name because the name is not and never was in common use. While perhaps useful for the purposes of the NHRP to distinguish the building from other "Old Post Office" buildings within the United States, the name "Old Post Office and Clock Tower" is too unwieldy to be in common use.

The name "Old Post Office Pavilion" is now obsolete, as the building no longer contains a "Pavilion" that resembles the one that existed before most of the building was converted to a hotel. The building was commonly identified as the "Old Post Office Building" before and during the time that Wikipedia identified the building as a "Pavilion". I therefore consider that the page should bear the name of "Old Past Office Building (Washington, D.C.)" at this time.

To accommodate the need to also identify a part of the building as the "Trump International Hotel Washington D.C.", I created a new section with that title when I moved the page to "Old Post Office Building (Washington, D.C.)". If anyone has a different suggestion for a new page name, please comment below. Corker1 (talk) 15:12, 11 December 2017 (UTC)

@Corker1: @Space4Time3Continuum2x: I have restored the article to its old title for now, and I've moved this conversation to the original talk page, which is the one you're discussing above. Given the above requested move discussion, and general disagreement about the exact naming, as well as the fact that the talk page got split, I think it's best to start an RM for this, as suggested by JFG above. Thanks  — Amakuru (talk) 15:42, 11 December 2017 (UTC)

Thanks, Amakuru and Corker1. I'm not particularly attached to or fond of "Pavilion" wich was probably a misnomer from the start and now is obsolete since the food court is gone. I also tended toward "Old Post Office and Clock Tower" during the discussion last year but didn't know when and how to propose another move; it isn't that much longer than building . The GSA seems to refer to the structure as the "Old Post Office Building" with an upper case B while all other sources I have found use a lower case b or just refer to it as the Old Post Office. Space4Time3Continuum2x (talk) 19:33, 11 December 2017 (UTC)

@Amakuru: Thanks for restoring order; I still would support a new page move discussion. My personal preference would be simply "Old Post Office (Washington D.C.)" in the same vein as a bunch of articles named Old Post Office (somewhere). Anybody may open a WP:move request by following the process outlined there. — JFG ^talk 20:15, 11 December 2017 (UTC)

Requested move 12 December 2017

The following is a closed discussion of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. Editors desiring to contest the closing decision should consider a move review. No further edits should be made to this section.

The result of the move request was: moved to Old Post Office (Washington, D.C.). See obvious support to rename this article, and also see support for this title choice. Since this is not the proposed title, and it may or may not be the best choice for this article, there is no prejudice toward another requested move if editors decide on a better name. Happy New Year to All! (closed by page mover)  Paine Ellsworth  ^put'r there  15:38, 30 December 2017 (UTC)

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Old Post Office Pavilion → Old Post Office Building (Washington, D.C.) – The existing page name ("Old Post Office Pavilion") is obsolete, because the building no longer contains a pavilion (construction of the Trump International Hotel Washington D.C. removed the food court and associated retail establishments). While the National Register of Historic Places identifies the building as the "Old Post Office Building and Clock Tower", this name is unwieldy and has never been in common use. A 17 September 2016 request to rename and move the page to "Trump International Hotel Washington, D.C." has been rejected. My prior page move to "Old Post Office Building (Washington, D.C.)" has been reverted, with a recommendation to initiate a new page move request (see discussion above). I therefore request this page move and renaming. Corker1 (talk) 05:15, 12 December 2017 (UTC) --Relisting.  — Amakuru (talk) 15:40, 22 December 2017 (UTC)

• Support. It is no longer the Old Post Office Pavilion. The GSA agrees. —  AjaxSmack  00:59, 13 December 2017 (UTC) Per discussion below, I also support Old Post Office (Washington, D.C.) A look at pages starting with "Old Post Office" shows many entries without the "Building". But if the "Building" is to be retained, it should be with a capital B per sources. —  AjaxSmack  01:00, 20 December 2017 (UTC)

• Support per nom. -- Necrothesp (talk) 16:04, 13 December 2017 (UTC)

• Support per prior discussion, and for consistency with many such refurbished Old Post Offices. — JFG ^talk 11:40, 16 December 2017 (UTC)
• Support, with this caveat: Old Post Office building, building with lower case b. Per Wikipedia’s guidelines on title formats and capitalization of words in titles, we should be using sentence case for the article title (if you want to call me names, please call me meticulous or precise :). According to the GSA Architectural Description, the name of the building is "Old Post Office". The name used to be carved in stone on the middle arch of the main entrance, but the GSA approved moving it to an inscription above the door (see photograph).

According to this how-to, the Talk page is moved automatically which wasn’t the case the last time (and was my main beef with the move). I guess that means that the move, if that is the consensus, has to be done by an admin or page-mover? Space4Time3Continuum2x (talk) 14:57, 16 December 2017 (UTC) Space4Time3Continuum2x (talk) 17:02, 20 December 2017 (UTC) Changing my vote to Oppose (see Discussion, below). Space4Time3Continuum2x (talk) 17:02, 20 December 2017 (UTC)

Discussion

@Space4Time3Continuum2x: Thanks for the support. Please note, however, that the GSA Architectural Description that you cited specifically identifies the structure in its first sentence as the "Old Post Office Building", with the first letter of each word capitalized. Corker1 (talk) 04:00, 17 December 2017 (UTC)

@Corker1: Please click the "Architectural Description" tab after opening the link. I just noticed that despite the seemingly direct link to the tab, it actually opens the "Overview" page. In the National Register of Historic Places it's called it the "Old Post Office and Clock Tower", BTW, no Building in the name, either. NPS says "Old Post Office", so does GSA's search mask by city and building name or number; note that the building following the "Old Post Office, Washington, DC" is listed as "Operations Building". Space4Time3Continuum2x (talk) 10:34, 17 December 2017 (UTC) Another GSA source: GSA Electronic Reading Room. Space4Time3Continuum2x (talk) 11:15, 17 December 2017 (UTC)

@Space4Time3Continuum2x: GSA's website uses a number of different terms when identifying the building. However, the Old Post Office Building Redevelopment Act of 2008 (Public Law 110-359) states:

"SEC. 2. OLD POST OFFICE BUILDING DEFINED.

In this Act, the term "Old Post Office Building" means the land, including any improvements thereon and specifically including the Pavilion Annex, that is located at 1100 Pennsylvania Avenue, NW., in the District of Columbia, and under the jurisdiction, custody, and control of the General Services Administration."

The term "Old Post Office Building" (with the first letter of each word capitalized) appears in several places within the Act. Therefore, "Old Post Office Building" is the official name for the structure. It is probably not a coincidence that GSA's website for the structure uses that term in the first sentence of its "Overview" page. Corker1 (talk) 19:43, 17 December 2017 (UTC)

I've debated with myself whether to continue this discussion (essentially whether to use a lower or upper case "b"), but what the hey. Seems to me that just the fact that Congress needed to define a term for the building complex (land, improvements thereon, "... and specifically including the Pavilion Annex ...") indicates that Old Post Office Building isn't its name. Here's a paragraph from Sec. 3 of the same act:

(4) On December 28, 2000, the General Services Administration, pursuant to Public Law 105–277, submitted to the Committee on Transportation and Infrastructure of the House of Representatives and the Committees on Appropriations and Environment and Public Works of the Senate a plan for the comprehensive redevelopment of the Old Post Office. Space4Time3Continuum2x (talk) 07:43, 18 December 2017 (UTC)

Public Law 105-277 (Omnibus Consolidated and Emergency Supplemental Appropriations Act, 1999) states on page 112 STAT. 2681-503: "That none of the funds appropriated from this Act shall be available to convert the Old Post Office at 1100 Pennsylvania Avenue in Northwest Washington, D.C., from office use to any other use until a comprehensive plan, which shall include street-level retail use, has been approved by the Senate Committee on Appropriations, ....". The sentence apparently did not contain the word "Building" because the sentence referenced only the structure's office use, which started when the structure contained a post office.

Regardless of the above, Public Law 110-359 contains the term "Old Post Office Building" in its title and defines the term to provide specificity. As a result, the official name of the land and its improvements (including the former offices and Pavilion Annex) is now "Old Post Office Building". Corker1 (talk) 14:49, 19 December 2017 (UTC)

Simplify and call it just Old Post Office (Washington, D.C.)? — JFG ^talk 12:03, 18 December 2017 (UTC)

It's not an old post office. It's an old post office building. Corker1 (talk) 03:53, 19 December 2017 (UTC)

Most "old post office buildings" are named "Old Post Office (some place)" in our articles.[1] Sources on the Washington DC building show several variants, I'm only suggesting to pick the simplest one, per WP:CONCISE. — JFG ^talk 00:26, 20 December 2017 (UTC)

This move request hasn’t generated much interest, and I don't see the need for rushing into anything. Let's discuss before proceeding with the move request. My first choice last year was and still is the official NRHP designation, Old Post Office and Clock Tower. I think it’s important to use the full name because the clock tower in its own right is the second-tallest building in D.C. (or third-tallest structure, if you count the Washington Monument). It's not just a landmark, but one that is literally "sticking out" from the crowd. What are the arguments against using it? I’ve looked at Wikipedia’s Old Post Office list. While there are quite a few Old Post Office (somewhere), there are also numerous combinations of Old Post Office and (something else) (somewhere), several of them longer than my proposed title. Comparing OPO D.C. with OPO Key West:

Old Post Office and Customshouse (Key West, Florida)

Old Post Office and Clock Tower (Washington, D.C.) Space4Time3Continuum2x (talk) 17:02, 20 December 2017 (UTC)

Also, this one in D.C.:

Customhouse and Post Office (Washington, D.C.) Space4Time3Continuum2x (talk) 17:13, 20 December 2017 (UTC)

Question: What does the template "no redirect|xxx" do? Will someone looking for "Old Post Office Pavilion" find it in its new home? I, for one, don't want to delete the old page or the old talk page, I just want to rename it. Space4Time3Continuum2x (talk) 17:47, 20 December 2017 (UTC)

The automatic "no redirect|xxx" template for the proposed title links directly to the redirect page if the proposed title is a redirect. That makes it easy for a closer to click there and begin to effect the page rename (if the close decision is to move the page as proposed). Hope this helps.  Paine Ellsworth  ^put'r there  03:00, 30 December 2017 (UTC)

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The above discussion is preserved as an archive of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on this talk page or in a move review. No further edits should be made to this section.

"D.C., Maryland may proceed with lawsuit alleging Trump violated emoluments clauses"

washingtonpost.com March 28 2018

I (a longtime European Wikipedian (but no native English speaker)

• estimate that this is or will be encyclopedically relevant
• hope that a fellow wikipedian will use / quote this source in the article.

--Neun-x (talk) 20:54, 28 March 2018 (UTC)

Trump Organization asking the Trump administration for rent decrease, add?

The Trump Organization asked the Trump administration for rent relief on the (federally owned building) Trump International Hotel Washington because of the coronavirus pandemic. The Trump Organization inquired with the General Services Administration about changing the nearly $268,000 per month lease payments on the 60-year lease the company signed in 2013.

• https://www.nytimes.com/2020/04/21/business/trump-hotel-rent-payment-coronavirus.html

X1\ (talk) 02:06, 29 April 2020 (UTC)

taxpayer $33,154 (emoluments), maximum rate, plus more; add?

The Secret Service paid more than $33,000 to rent rooms at Trump’s Washington hotel for 137 nights in a row so it could guard Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin while he stayed in a luxury suite. The Secret Service also rented the room next to Mnuchin’s at taxpayer expense so they could screen Mnuchin’s visitors and deliveries. For that room, the Trump International Hotel charged the Secret Service at the maximum possible rate for federal agencies in 2017: $242 per night. The total bill for both rooms was $33,154. Mnuchin paid for his own room, but his decision to stay at a Trump property produced two revenue streams for Trump’s company. "The Secretary was not aware of what the U.S. Secret Service paid for the adjoining room," a spokesperson for Mnuchin said.

• https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/secret-service-paid-trumps-dc-hotel-more-than-33000-for-lodging-to-guard-treasury-secretary/2020/04/30/cd38e864-8987-11ea-ac8a-fe9b8088e101_story.html

X1\ (talk) 07:25, 5 May 2020 (UTC)