Washington, D.C./National Mall

The National Mall, a national park, is a famous 2-mile-long tree-lined, pedestrian-friendly boulevard in Washington, D.C. stretching from the Capitol Building in the east to the Lincoln Memorial and Potomac River on the west. The park is home to many museums of the Smithsonian Institution, some of the best free museums in the country, as well as many famous memorials and monuments. It's the #1 destination for visitors in the city, and receives 25 million visitors per year.

History
D.C.'s city planner, Pierre (Peter) Charles L'Enfant, planned the park as the cultural center of the city in the late 1700s, but it didn't take the form it is in today until the early 1900s.

In the 1840s, the Mall was mainly used to cultivate vegetables and dump trash. In 1846, after much heated debate, under President James K. Polk, Congress established the Smithsonian Institution with the funds donated by James Smithson 20 years earlier. In 1855, construction of the Smithsonian Castle was completed, setting the precedent for educational buildings on the Mall. However, it was hard to access due to the Washington City Canal, which ran along what is now Constitution Avenue. Meanwhile, in 1848, construction on the Washington Monument began.

The Baltimore and Ohio Railroad Station was constructed in 1855 on the site of what is now the National Gallery of Art. The noise from trains frequently disrupted sessions of Congress. In addition, around 30 people died per year crossing the surface-level train tracks. In 1881, President Garfield was assassinated at this station 4 months into his term.

The year 1900 marked the 100th anniversary of the founding of Washington and inspired calls for a redesign of the Mall in accordance with L'Enfant's original grand plan. In 1901, Congress created the McMillan Commission, which included Frederick Law Olmstead, a landscape architect that designed New York City's Central Park. After touring cities in Europe, the McMillan Commission made numerous recommendations to emphasize the importance of the Mall including landscaping the Mall into a grassy area lined with elm trees, building the Lincoln Memorial, Memorial Bridge, the reflecting pool, the Tidal Basin, and the Jefferson Memorial, and moving the train station off the Mall.

Many monuments and memorials were added later on including those for Franklin Delano Roosevelt and Martin Luther King, Jr., as well as recent wars: World War II, the Korean War, and the Vietnam War.

The Mall has served as the principal gathering space for the nation's most important civic events, especially major protests and inaugural events. The Mall, particularly the Lincoln Memorial, has had an important history in the civil rights movement: in the 1963 March on Washington, Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. gave his famous I Have a Dream speech.

Over the years, the Smithsonian expanded to include an extraordinary collection of free public museums, the majority of which are in the eastern one-mile stretch of the park. The public favorites are the National Air and Space Museum and the National Museum of Natural History, famed for their respective magnificent collections of U.S. spacecraft and complete dinosaur fossils. The expansion continues, with the National Museum of African American History and Culture having opened on the Mall in 2016.

By Metrorail
The Metrorail was designed to be extremely convenient to the Mall and is the best option to get there if it is too far to walk or bike from your accommodation.


 * The Smithsonian Metrorail station is serviced by the Blue, Orange and Silver Lines, much like other stations in Downtown. The exit is convenient to get to many of the museums of the Smithsonian Institution. Federal Center Southwest Metrorail station is also serviced by the same Lines and is closer to the easternmost museums.
 * The Archives/Navy Memorial Metrorail station in the East End on 7th Street NW and L'Enfant Plaza Metrorail stations are both 0.3 miles from the Mall.
 * The closest Metrorail stations to the Lincoln Memorial on the west side of the Mall are Foggy Bottom station in the West End (0.8 miles), Arlington Cemetery, just across the Arlington Memorial Bridge in Arlington (0.8 miles), and Smithsonian station (1.2 miles)

By bus
Routes #31 and #32, #36 all run northwest up Pennsylvania Ave to M St through Georgetown, and then up Wisconsin Ave all the way to neighborhoods in Upper Northwest. You can catch these buses as far south as Independence Ave west of the Capitol Building (after which they run up 7th St to Pennsylvania Ave).

Routes #52, #53, and #54 provide a quick service up 14th St through the Mall to nightlife hotspots in Shaw.

Routes S1, S2, & S4 operate service up 16th Street, through Dupont Circle and Columbia Heights all the way to Silver Spring. This bus is convenient if you want to catch the Sunday Drum Circle in Meridian Hill Park.

By bicycle
Capital Bikeshare, the D.C.-area's bike-share service, has stations all over the city and throughout the Mall area, making it one of the easiest ways to get to and around the Mall. Just find the station nearest your hotel, get a daily membership, bike down to the Mall, and dock your bike at one of the stations.

Once you are on the Mall, Capital Bikeshare is the best mix of speed and convenience for moving around the Mall — or for leaving the Mall to grab lunch in the East End, where the food is better than the food trucks on the Mall. Museum-going is a tiring affair, and biking can help conserve your energy and stay out of the sun.

By car
Driving in and around the Mall is a great recipe for a headache due to chronic traffic jams, unintuitive traffic patterns, and very limited parking. Driving towards a monument doesn't mean the road will lead you towards it - more likely, it will hurl you across the river into Virginia. If there is a special event going on, you can easily get stuck for hours. Parking garages throughout the West End and East End fill up early with office workers. Garage prices are steep. The 2,194 car garage at Union Station, costing $24/day, usually has space available. Double check the garage hours, so you can exit before the garage closes! Another nearby parking garage is at the Ronald Reagan Building, which is very close to several museums. The rates are generally $25 all day on weekdays and $17 on weekends. Open 24 hours.

On evenings and weekends during the winter, it is sometimes possible to find metered parking on the Mall, with two-hour limits, although it may take a while to find a space. There is no enforcement of the time limit on Sundays or Federal holidays, so if you are lucky enough to find a spot, you can stay as long as you wish. Pay close attention to the hourly limits marked on street signs. If you remain parked on Constitution Avenue during rush hours, your chance of receiving a ticket is 100%.

The main north-south routes are 7th St, 14th St, and 17th St, while Pennsylvania and Independence Ave are the main routes for east-west traffic. If coming from Arlington, the simplest routes are I-395 to 14th St, or the Arlington Memorial Bridge to Independence Ave.

By taxi or rideshare
Taxis and rideshares are easy to get all day and night, and can be an especially convenient option from Georgetown, Capitol Hill, or Arlington. Aside from peak tourist seasons such as during the National Cherry Blossom Festival, when traffic slows to a halt, these can be a nice way to take a load off your feet and quickly get from one end of the Mall to the other. Uber and Lyft drivers often have difficulty locating passengers who have input a destination such as "Natural History Museum" or "Lincoln Memorial". It is advisable to check your exact location on the map provided or the driver may be sent to the other side.

By circulator bus

 * National Mall Circulator Bus runs M-F 7AM-8PM, Sa Su 9AM-8PM. Its route begins at Union Station, travels along Louisiana Avenue and loops around the Mall via Madison Drive, Constitution Avenue, West Basin Drive, Ohio Drive and Jefferson Drive, with a stop at all of the major points of interest. Fare is $1 per trip for adults, $.50 for seniors and disabled people, and free for kids under 5.

By pedicab
Pedicab guides have been authorized by the National Park Service to provide transportation and tours around the National Mall. You might find a few available pedicab guides near the memorials on the National Mall. Pedicab guides also tour on Capitol Hill and through other areas of Washington, DC. Nightlife rides and culinary tours can also be arranged, throughout the year, not just during the peak spring and summer travel seasons. These guides are available by SMS text message, telephone appointments, and website messages. Tours are typically offered for an hourly fee. Many visitors find a pedicab tour or ride to be the highlight of their trip to Washington D.C. Local residents find them a memorable way to enjoy a day on the mall, or a night on the town. A few companies offer pedicab tours of Washington, DC such as DC Pedicab, Nonpartisan Pedicab, and Wheel The People Pedicab Tours For more information, see Washington D.C..

See
There's a lot to see on the Mall. You can walk the whole Mall on an afternoon to admire the sights and monuments, but note that it is bigger than it looks&mdash;over two miles end-to-end (3.2 km)&mdash;an illusion that is reinforced by the sheer size of the Capitol Building, Washington Monument, and Lincoln Memorial. What looks like a short stroll can quickly turn into a long, painful march in the sun on a humid D.C. summer day.

Moreover, you will want to budget some good time to visit the museums. Even a month's visit would not be enough to really devour all the Smithsonian's collections, so pick and choose according to your interests. The art galleries are fantastic, but bad for kids, who will on the other hand love the Natural History and Air and Space Museums (as will adults).

A great way to see a lot during a limited stay is to visit museums during the day and monuments at night. The museums usually close at 5:30 PM, so head to dinner after the visit, then take a long walk to visit the monuments in the dark when the air cools, and when the monuments are their most beautiful. It's a popular activity in the summer, so you won't be alone even after midnight.

Museums
The Smithsonian is a complex of 19 large museums, the majority of which are on the east end of the Mall, all of which are free, and are open every day except Christmas.

East–west along the north side:







East–west along the south side:







West section
East–west:







Do


The Mall is a public gathering space not just for protesters and pigeons, but also for locals and visitors alike who are more interested in a jog, a game of frisbee, or just a picnic out on a beautiful section of the nation's capital, in the company of monuments, history, and public art. Keep in mind, though, that a hot summer day, with the unbearable humidity, can be the worst time of the year for this&mdash;you will inevitably rush inside to the air conditioned sanctuary of the nearest museum.



Buy
The Mall is a great place to get souvenirs. All the museums have excellent gift shops and those owned by the Smithsonian are tax-free. The largest can be found in the National Museum of American History and the National Air and Space Museum. Of course, the cheaper option is to pick up your souvenirs from the street vendors along the Mall, although, as you would expect, the quality is a big step down from the museum shops.

Eat


The larger museums have cafeterias and cafes of varying prices and quality. However, your best bet on the mall is to eat at one of the food trucks - serving everything from burgers to vegetarian entrees - located at each end of the Mall. Walk around and look at which seems to be the most appetizing.

Your absolute worst bet are the little huts on the mall itself. Due to their monopoly on food over the outdoor part of the mall, they have absolutely atrocious prices and portions compared to even the Smithsonian restaurants and are much less tasty too, simply consisting of prepackaged food.

Alternatively, you can go north to the East End for chain fast casual restaurants or south to the Waterfront for some fresh-out-of-the-water crabs and other seafood.



Drink
The Mall is a national park and no booze is allowed except in very limited areas. If you want to find a bar, you have three options, head north to the East End, south to the Waterfront, or east to Capitol Hill. Of the three, the Pennsylvania Ave strip on Capitol Hill to the east has superior options to the touristy bars just north. It's within easy walking distance of the Capitol Building. If you are over by the Lincoln Memorial, you could try your luck northward to the West End, with bars near George Washington University.

You can also enjoy a beer at the cafe in the National Museum of the American Indian or a glass of wine or beer at the Sculpture Garden at the National Gallery. Beer and wine is also available from food concession kiosks located near the Natural History Museum, the Air and Space Museum, the Jefferson Memorial, and the Lincoln Memorial. You can only consume while seated at the tables provided.

If you are here on a summer day, bring water. The museums have plenty of water fountains, but you'll need water outside. The huge sandy park that is the Mall is fun for throwing around a football, or for letting the kids loose to chase pigeons, but all that sand and gravel reflects the awful D.C. summer humid heat. The street vendors stock water bottles in large supply, but charge a big markup&mdash;bringing a couple bottles from wherever you are staying is a good idea.

Sleep
People have camped out on the Mall or the Ellipse, waiting in line to get tickets for the annual White House Easter Egg Roll and other special events. Aside from that, there is neither camping nor accommodations on the Mall.

There are scores of hotels within walking distance to the Mall, at all price ranges, in the East End and West End, as well as a few in Capitol Hill. But given the great service to the Mall via Metrorail, it's reasonable to stay anywhere in the city or the close-in suburbs near a Metrorail station. Arlington, Virginia is particularly close.

Connect
Most of the National Mall, including inside of the museums, has free WiFi. The outdoor WiFi on the National Mall is very weak.

Stay safe
The National Mall is very heavily policed and very safe. Muggings have occurred at night and received major press coverage due to their sensational nature, but they are extremely rare. Use the most basic common sense and you're guaranteed a lovely evening late into the night. (Note, though, that the fountains are turned off at midnight, so it is better to see the sights beforehand.)

Most of the museums on the Mall require security screenings to enter.

Go next

 * Some of the city's best museums are not on the Mall! The East End is home to many more renowned museums, including the National Archives (where you'll find the U.S. Constitution), the National Portrait Gallery, and the National Building Museum. Head a few blocks south to find the International Spy Museum or the Museum of the Bible.
 * The three branches of the government are located just around, but not on, the Mall. The White House is just north of the Washington Monument in the West End; the must-see Capitol Building and the Supreme Court are just east on Capitol Hill.
 * The most famous war memorial in the area, Arlington National Cemetery is just across the Potomac River from the Lincoln Memorial, via the Arlington Memorial Bridge in Arlington. At the northern tip of the cemetery is the marvelous Iwo Jima Memorial; at the southern tip, the Pentagon.