About Southwest
Southwest is the southwestern quadrant of Washington, D.C.
and is located south of the National Mall and west of South Capitol Street. It is the smallest quadrant of the city. Southwest is small enough that it is frequently referred to as a neighborhood in and of itself.
However, it actually contains five separate neighborhoods.
Southwest is actually composed of four separate sections:
 the Southwest Federal Center, also called the Southwest Employment District, is the area between the National Mall and the Southeast/Southwest Freeway ( Interstate 395 ).
- Southwest Federal Center contains the Smithsonian Institution museums along the south side of the Mall—including the Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden, the National Museum of African Art, the Arthur M. Sackler Gallery, the National Air and Space Museum, the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum, and the National Museum of the American Indian —as well as the United States Botanical Gardens, L'Enfant Plaza and a large concentration of federal executive branch office buildings for departments as well the House office buildings;
- Southwest Federal Center is in Ward 2.
- the Southwest Waterfront, also called Near Southwest, is between I-395 and Fort Lesley J. McNair, one of the country's oldest army posts.
 Southwest Waterfront is a primarily residential neighborhood. It also is home to several Washington DC marinas, including the Washington Marina, The Capitol Yacht Club, the Gangplank Marina, and the James Creek Marina. - It is also home to the Maine Avenue Fish Market , Arena Stage , the Washington Marina, Fort McNair , and Hains Point ; East and West Potomac Park, a conjunction of two national parks between I-395 and the National Mall that contain the Tidal Basin, the Jefferson Memorial, and the Franklin Delano Roosevelt Memorial (West Potomac Park continues into Northwest and includes the Lincoln Memorial and World War II Memorial, both of which straddle the Southwest/Northwest boundary);
- Southwest Waterfront is in Ward 6, except for the unpopulated East and West Potomac Parks, which are in Ward 2.
- Buzzard Point, a largely undeveloped industrial area between South Capitol Street and Fort McNair.
- Buzzard Point is the home of the U.S. Coast Guard, which is headquartered in a building at the confluence of the Potomac and Anacostia Rivers.
- the area of Southwest that is south and east of the Anacostia River contains Bolling Air Force Base, together with the Naval District Washington, the Naval Research Laboratory , and the Blue Plains sewage treatment plant
- the Bellevue neighborhood occupies all of the Southwest land between South Capitol Street (to the east) and the Anacostia and Potomac rivers (to the west and north).
For the purpose of our community neighborhood website, Southwest refers to the area encompassing the Southwest Federal Center, Southwest Waterfront and Buzzard Point. Housing is predominantly brick structures with uniquely light colored facade to blend with nature having a "waterfront and earthtone" feeling. In an effort to keep with the watefront landscape, few structures are tall being located further from the actual waterfront, with most housing facilities 2-3 stories high. Streets are wonderfully sprinkled with pink and white Japanese cherry trees along with trees with purple flora.
(Reference materials drawn from Wikipedia)
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