page_title: Neighborhoods of Alexandria, Virginia
section_title: Del Ray
hierarchical_section_title: Neighborhoods of Alexandria, Virginia / Del Ray
caption_attribution_description: English: Town of Potomac, Roughly bounded by Commonwealth Ave., US 1, E. Bellefonte Ave. and Ashby Ave. in Alexandria, Virginia. This is an image of a place or building that is listed on the National Register of Historic Places in the United States of America. Its reference number is 92001186
context_page_description: Alexandria, Virginia, an independent city in the Commonwealth of Virginia, is located along the western bank of the Potomac River. The city of approximately 151,000 is about six miles south of downtown Washington, D.C..
  Several outlying neighborhoods and cities outside the limits of Alexandria, in neighboring Arlington and Fairfax Counties, are sometimes grouped as part of Alexandria as well, as they have Alexandria mailing addresses despite not being inside the city limits.
context_section_description: The area to the northwest of Old Town, much of which was once in the separate town of Potomac, is today known as Del Ray. The "Del Ray" name originally belonged to one of several subdivisions (including Hume, Mount Ida, and Saint Elmo's) that are considered part of modern Del Ray. Del Ray is defined by its local citizens association as the area bounded on the south by Braddock Road, on the west by Russell Road, on the north by East Glebe and West Glebe Roads, on the east by U.S. Route 1, and on the southeast by the CSX rail tracks between Route 1 and Braddock Road.
  The historic communities of Del Ray and St. Elmo's originated in early 1894, when developer Charles Wood organized them on a grid pattern of streets running north–south and east–west. Wood had purchased the 254 acres (103 ha) comprising Del Ray for $38,900, while the 39 acres (16 ha) of St. Elmo were purchased for $15,314. Del Ray originally contained six east–west streets and five north–south. All were identical in width, except Mt. Vernon Avenue, which was approximately twenty feet wider. St. Elmo's, a smaller tract, was laid out in a similar pattern, but with only four east–west streets and one running north–south. Between the two neighborhoods was the St. Asaph Racetrack, a once-controversial gambling establishment that shut down after a 1904 raid; the location of the racetrack caused some deviation from a pure-grid street pattern, which remains to this day.
  By 1900, Del Ray contained approximately 130 people, and St. Elmo's 55. In 1908, the tracts of Del Ray, St. Elmo's, Mt. Ida, and Hume were incorporated into the town of Potomac, which by 1910 had a population of 599; by 1920 it contained 1,000; by 1928 it had 2,355 residents. Now more than 20,000 people live in Del Ray.
  The community, while still diverse, has experienced substantial gentrification since the development of the nearby Potomac Yard Shopping Center in the mid-1990s. Del Ray draws tens of thousands of people from around the Washington, D.C. region during its annual Art on the Avenue main street festival the first Saturday in October.
  Southern Del Ray is served by the Braddock Road Metro station, while the planned Potomac Yard station would serve more northern portions of the area. The Metroway, a bus rapid transit system connecting the Braddock Road Metro station with Crystal City station in Arlington with stops along the Potomac Yard/Route 1 corridor adjoining Del Ray, opened in 2014 and has seen much use since.
  Mount Vernon Community School, grades K-5, and George Washington Middle School, grades 6-8, are located in Del Ray. Both are part of the Alexandria City Public Schools system. 
  Del Ray was the site of the 2017 Congressional baseball shooting, during which a gunman opened fire on a baseball field where the Republican Party team was practicing for the annual Congressional Baseball Game, injuring five people including U.S. Representative Steve Scalise.
caption: Restaurant in Del Ray, 2013
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