Promoting his new book, “The Assault on Reason,” former Vice President Al Gore will be talking to a crowd of nearly 1,500 at The George Washington University’s Lisner Auditorium at 7 p.m. tonight.

Billed as an effort “to explain how the public sphere itself has evolved into a place hostile to reason,” the book is a departure from Gore’s more green-minded works of late, such as “Earth in the Balance: Ecology and the Human Spirit” and “An Inconvenient Truth.” In “The Assault on Reason,” the former vice president “analyzes the current administration’s reliance on the politics of fear, secrecy, and cronyism … to explain how the public sphere itself has evolved into a place hostile to reason.”

However, those without a ticket will have to wait for another event to see the ex-presidential candidate; the event sold out in two and a half weeks, said Mike Giarratano, event manager for Politics & Prose Bookstore, which is one of the event’s sponsors.

Legislation Would Create a Southeast BID

Southeast Capitol Hill businesses may soon get more promotion and service for their up-and-coming neighborhood after Ward 6 Councilman Tommy Wells (D) and Ward 2 Councilman Jack Evans (D) introduced legislation to create a Capitol Riverfront Business Improvement District.

The BID would provide street cleaning, neighborhood marketing and safety patrols for a 100-block area surrounding the new Washington Nationals baseball stadium in return for an extra tax from property owners. Several developers created a plan and solicited property owners’ approval for the BID, hoping it will change the public’s perception of an area that was once full of abandoned buildings and several nightclubs.

A Capitol Hill BID already exists but doesn’t include the area for the potential Capitol Riverfront BID, which would be bordered by Interstate 395, the Anacostia River, 15th Street Southeast, South Capitol Street and the Frederick Douglass Bridge.

Summer Brings a New Traffic Pattern to Hill

Commutes for Capitol Hill staff may get a little more difficult this summer once Constitution Avenue Northeast traffic becomes permanently two-way; it currently moves one-way westbound during morning rush hour.

Ward 6 Councilman Tommy Wells (D) pushed for the D.C. Department of Transportation to quickly make the change after a Capitol Hill Traffic Study recommendation.

“Constitution Avenue, NE is supposed to be a residential street on Capitol Hill, not a commuter throughway,” Wells said in a statement. “I want to continue shifting the emphasis away from finding ways to make commuters’ drive[s] easier, and focus on protecting and calming residential streets for pedestrians and residents.”

DDOT’s goal is to make the change on or around July 1. It will affect traffic between Third and 14th streets Northeast.

— Bryce Bauer, Emily Yehle and Daniel Heim