Montgomery County Development News

[bamboo stick]

Originally Posted by StevenW

Whoa! Really? I didn't realize that. Thanks. How tall is this tower? It looks to be over 300 ft. Is it impressive-looking in the skyline?

It's actually got about 12 stories left to build, and is nowhere near topped-out as it's only about half finished. It will be 289 feet tall, contain 26 floors, and will be the tallest in the County. It's the same one we were talking about in this thread a little while ago, when someone mentioned that it seemed as though it was rising very slowly. It is actually about 4 1/2 miles from downtown Bethesda (rather than the 2 1/2 referenced by Dank City) and the twin Chevy Chase Bank towers. It is 2 miles outside the Beltway, across Rockville Pike from White Flint Mall.

North Bethesda is the marketing name, though the neighborhood is actually partially in Kensington, and has been called White Flint for most of us who have lived here for years and years, before any of this North Bethesda mumbo jumbo came along. Evidence of that fact is that the area is served by the White Flint Metro Station (near this building), and the White Flint Sector Plan at the Planning Department. It's the same ploy as calling part of Gaithersburg "North Potomac" or downtown Wheaton part of Silver Spring. It's all marketing. Unfortunately it's begun to stick since everyone who moves there likes to reference "Bethesda" in their address, though it is nowhere near. Downtown Silver Spring is closer to downtown Bethesda than White Flint.

[StevenW]

Awesome. Thanks.

[Dank City]

Originally Posted by bamboo stick

It's actually got about 12 stories left to build, and is nowhere near topped-out as it's only about half finished. It will be 289 feet tall, contain 26 floors, and will be the tallest in the County. It's the same one we were talking about in this thread a little while ago, when someone mentioned that it seemed as though it was rising very slowly. It is actually about 4 1/2 miles from downtown Bethesda (rather than the 2 1/2 referenced by Dank City) and the twin Chevy Chase Bank towers. It is 2 miles outside the Beltway, across Rockville Pike from White Flint Mall.

I read that it will be 289ft to the top of the highest residential floor, but there will be an additional 2-4 mechanical floors on top of that adding to the 289ft figure and totalling between 26-28 floors.

[Dank City]

The would-be developers of Monty, LLC will head back before the Montgomery County Planning Board on Thursday, July 2nd to finally shore up their final site plan for The Monty – a high-rise residential project on a 1.12-acre lot in Bethesda that currently hosts several vacant storefronts from 4915-4917 Fairmont Avenue and 4914-4918 St. Elmo Avenue in the Woodmont Triangle.

Since its initial approval in May 2007, the 17-story residential development has grown (via an update to the developer's plans this past March) from 133 apartments to include "a maximum of 200 units" for a total of 210,188 square feet of new Bethesda real estate. Described by Planning Board staff as “an attractive urban infill redevelopment project,” the project is still planned to subsidize 30 moderately priced dwelling units, 7,700 square feet of ground floor retail and 211 underground garage spaces.

One of the Monty’s more interesting flourishes will be the 5,480 square feet of (mandatory) public use space. A so-called “pedestrian promenade” on the building’s south side will include art installation, composed of a chain link backdrop and live bamboo, by artist Dan Steinhilber and the landscape architects of Parker Rodriguez. Once complete, the piece will “provide an animated experience as a person moves through the space” for a quasi-hallucinogenic stroll that would seem more Burning Man than Bethesda (and make it a sure-fire destination for area Zendik pamphleteers. Eew.)

Since the first of this year, both the County’s Transportation and Environmental Planning divisions have both lent their final approval to the re-jiggered development scheme, as have Planning Board staff. Though the developer has not stipulated a final timeline for construction, once complete, it will stand directly across from the site of another Woodmont Triangle high-rise, the also delayed 4900 Fairmont development. The project has been approved in the past, but just might possibly happen this time.

[Dank City]

If the JBG Companies keeps it up at this pace, they may want to consider renaming it "JBGville." The prolific DC area developer received approval from the Montgomery County Planning Board last week to pursue a second phase of development at their Fishers Place at Twinbrook Metro - an office park that has already delivered four office buildings to Rockville’s Twinbrook area - but that is merely prologue to the Disney-sized, mixed-use complex going up across the street: Twinbrook Station, or "2.2 million square feet on the redline," as the developer calls it.

The first approved addition for Fishers Place, at 12709 Twinbrook Parkway, will be a four-story, 72,330 square foot, run-of-the-mill office building built in two phases designed around a central courtyard with underground parking. The second and final office addition, at 5615 Fishers Lane, will include 111,000 square feet of office and a micro-retail space, intended for federal tenants, as it "designed to conform to the GSA Force Protection guidelines.”

"The existing buildings in Fishers Place are occupied primarily by government tenants (NIH/FDA), as well as with biosciences-related private sector companies. Potential tenants have expressed interest in the two newly approved buildings, but we’re not in a position to comment further at this time," said Matt Blocher, a Senior Vice President at JBG. "[But the] two buildings most recently approved will complete that campus."

At a community hearing held concerning the dual buildings last July, the County failed to receive a single complaint from neighboring residents. That normally would be considered neighborly relations by the developer (or dumb luck), but for the fact that there aren’t that many neighbors to complain.

That’s because, once completed by 2017, Fishers Place will join the sprawl of JBG’s greater Twinbrook Station across the parkway – a redevelopment project in partnership with the Washington Metropolitan Area Transit Authority (WMATA) that will see 26 acres of Twinbrook Metro parking lots transformed into 325,000 square feet of office space, 220,000 square feet of retail and 1,595 apartments and condominiums, 15% of which will be affordable housing. After breaking ground in November of 2007, the project last year earned a LEED gold certification by the US Green Building Council’s Neighborhood Development program. Last time we heard of this much development going up around a subway line, it was called Tokyo.

"The first phase, which is currently under construction, will have 279 apartments and approximately 15,500 square feet of retail ready to open by early to mid-2010," said Blocher.

Among the laundry list of contributors to the JBG/WMATA “smart growth” co-development are the architects Torti Gallas and Partners, DNC, David M. Schwarz, Grimm + Parker, The Preston Partnership, EDAW, Johnson Bernat Associates, Wells + Associates, and MV+A with construction by Harkins Builders. If Rockville Pike is unofficially known as “the world’s longest strip mall,” it looks like Twinbrook Parkway might soon claim the moniker of “world’s largest lump sum community.” Leisure World better watch its back.

[Dank City]

A Bethesda medical facility for soldiers with critical brain injuries and their families is under construction after being stalled by a funding shortage at the start of the year.

Work on the National Intrepid Center of Excellence, located on the National Naval Medical Center campus, began last month and is roughly 10 percent complete, according to officials. The center is expected to be operational in June 2010, although the formal opening ceremony for the center could come a few months afterwards. It was previously scheduled to open next February.

As part of the treatment process for wounded soldiers, the Intrepid Center will feature motion capture and neural technology, a driving simulator and a sleep laboratory, along with other diagnostic and therapy tools.

The facility will treat and house 250 to 500 wounded soldiers, along with their families, who will live in quarters attached to the center and have access to educational opportunities to learn how to deal with traumatic brain injury. There is also a "Central Park" portion of the Intrepid Center that will function as an open space for patients and their families.

After experiencing funding shortages in January, plans for the Intrepid Center were scaled back, bringing the cost for the center from $75 million to $60 million, according to Bill White, executive director of the Intrepid Fallen Heroes Fund that is building the center. He said both the fund and the construction company building the center had identified ways to make the center smaller and less costly.

So far, the Fallen Heroes Fund has raised $57 million for the facility over the past year and plans to raise the remaining $3 million while construction is taking place.

"These kids can't wait any longer for our attention, and that is the attention of the country on this debilitating issue of traumatic brain injury," White said. "We needed to start this right away."

He said the $7 million that had been raised since the start of the year came primarily from local fundraisers, and that 35 such events were taking place across the country this month to raise money for the center. The Fallen Heroes Fund will donate the center to the Army and Navy upon its completion, and the center will share the Bethesda campus with the new Walter Reed National Military Medical Center, set to open in September 2011 as part of the Base Realignment and Closure process.

"The TBI (traumatic brain injury) center is an integral part of what the new Walter Reed center is all about," said Phil Alperson, the county's BRAC coordinator.

White stressed that the core technologies and treatments available to soldiers suffering from traumatic brain injury were not affected by the cost-cutting measures. He said some of the space that had been eliminated from the facility (originally planned for 72,000 square feet) could be added after the Intrepid Center opens if the money is found.

Those interested in donating to the Intrepid Center can visit www.fallen

heroesfund.org, or call 1-800-340-HERO.

[bamboo stick]

Dank City, can you link to the articles, please?

[bamboo stick]

Originally Posted by Dank City

I read that it will be 289ft to the top of the highest residential floor, but there will be an additional 2-4 mechanical floors on top of that adding to the 289ft figure and totalling between 26-28 floors.

Mechanical features on top of buildings aren't figured into official heights. That's why you'll see buildings in downtowns Bethesda and Silver Spring built up to the 200-foot limit (ridiculous that there is a limit, I know) but with mechanical floors exceeding it.

[StevenW]

Originally Posted by Dank City

The would-be developers of Monty, LLC will head back before the Montgomery County Planning Board on Thursday, July 2nd to finally shore up their final site plan for The Monty – a high-rise residential project on a 1.12-acre lot in Bethesda that currently hosts several vacant storefronts from 4915-4917 Fairmont Avenue and 4914-4918 St. Elmo Avenue in the Woodmont Triangle.

Since its initial approval in May 2007, the 17-story residential development has grown (via an update to the developer's plans this past March) from 133 apartments to include "a maximum of 200 units" for a total of 210,188 square feet of new Bethesda real estate. Described by Planning Board staff as “an attractive urban infill redevelopment project,” the project is still planned to subsidize 30 moderately priced dwelling units, 7,700 square feet of ground floor retail and 211 underground garage spaces.

One of the Monty’s more interesting flourishes will be the 5,480 square feet of (mandatory) public use space. A so-called “pedestrian promenade” on the building’s south side will include art installation, composed of a chain link backdrop and live bamboo, by artist Dan Steinhilber and the landscape architects of Parker Rodriguez. Once complete, the piece will “provide an animated experience as a person moves through the space” for a quasi-hallucinogenic stroll that would seem more Burning Man than Bethesda (and make it a sure-fire destination for area Zendik pamphleteers. Eew.)

Since the first of this year, both the County’s Transportation and Environmental Planning divisions have both lent their final approval to the re-jiggered development scheme, as have Planning Board staff. Though the developer has not stipulated a final timeline for construction, once complete, it will stand directly across from the site of another Woodmont Triangle high-rise, the also delayed 4900 Fairmont development. The project has been approved in the past, but just might possibly happen this time.

Boy, I sure hope people buy these units fast! Would be nice if everyone sold! Cause let's face it, everyone loves a full Monty!

[hpal3]

It's official. Dutch Farmers Market is leaving Burtonsville this week.

[urbanaturalist]

Originally Posted by hpal3

It's official. Dutch Farmers Market is leaving Burtonsville this week.

Never been to that one.....whats the reason??? Economic issues?

[hpal3]

Under a new state smart growth program, state agencies say they are going to make it as easy as possible to attract private investment to Wheaton and other areas on the verge of revitalization.

State government designated downtown Wheaton as one of 15 Smart Sites across the state, the only such designation in the county, in an initiative that is supposed to spur mixed-use growth and encourage public and private investment in areas near public transit or job centers.

Within each Smart Site, staff from state departments such as planning, environment, transportation, natural resources and business and economic development will sit on committees that look for ways to cut down on unnecessary regulation, said Carol Gilbert, the assistant secretary for neighborhood revitalization at the Maryland Department of Housing and Community Development.

Gilbert said the committees will attempt to alleviate the bureaucracy that comes with working with multiple state agencies and discourages developers from building in smart growth areas.

"If it's too much red tape to build where we'd like to see growth, it might be easier [for developers] to build in a cornfield," she said.

In Wheaton, cutting down on regulation may make it easier to attract a major anchor to downtown, said Councilwoman Valerie Ervin (D-Dist 5.) of Silver Spring.

Ervin said private developers may be more inclined to invest in Wheaton because the Smart Site designation puts Wheaton on the short list for any state grants for smart growth projects, such as revitalizing the area near Wheaton's Metro station.

"Things are moving in a really good direction for Wheaton," she said.

Wheaton was chosen as a Smart Site because of its proximity to two Metro stops, Wheaton and Glenmont, and three state highways – Georgia Avenue, Veirs Mill Road and University Boulevard - which make it an ideal candidate for mixed-use transit-oriented development, according to a state memo.

With its transit-oriented focus, Wheaton is one of the larger projects designated as a Smart Site, Gilbert said. Larger, transit-oriented Smart Site projects are all in the concept phases and thus are going to require more coordination among government agencies than the projects already in construction phases, Gilbert said.

County planners in Wheaton are hoping to have a proposal ready by the fall to solicit a master development team that could develop a plan to revitalize downtown.

Other transit-oriented Smart Sites include a mixed-use project planned for land adjacent to a Laurel commuter rail station in Prince George's County and a Howard County town center planned for 10 acres near a commuter rail station.

The Smart Sites were nominated by staff within the various stage agencies. Wheaton's designation marks the first time the town was recognized by the state without any push from local officials as a promising area for revitalization, said Natalie Cantor, the director of the Mid-County Regional Services Center.

"The governor recognized and reached out to us and said, ‘Hey, this is a perfect place to get this program launched,'" Cantor said.

Smart Sites is a branch of Gov. Martin O'Malley's (D) Smart Green and Growing initiative, which encourages environmentally-friendly growth and revitalization in existing urban areas. Gilbert said the Smart Site program should expand in September to allow local officials to apply for the designation.


http://www.gazette.net/stories/07082...44_32536.shtml

[Infoman]

http://washington.bizjournals.com/wa...3/daily87.html
Shady Grove life sciences park to expand

[hpal3]

Originally Posted by Infoman

http://washington.bizjournals.com/wa...3/daily87.html
Shady Grove life sciences park to expand

You are quite the AMBITIOUS fellow!!...lol

[rockin'.baltimorean]

welcome back, infoman.

[hpal3]

Originally Posted by urbanaturalist

Never been to that one.....whats the reason??? Economic issues?

Its a great place for meat's, bread and baked good's. It was probably a combination of economics ans space that drove them out of Burtonsville.

[Dank City]

Anyone have an pictures of Wisconsin Place? Apparently construction is complete....

[hpal3]

Kensington residents know change is coming to their town, but want their historic suburb to remain just that, according to testimony given at the public hearing for the Kensington Sector Plan on Thursday.

"The citizens would like to stay a town," testified resident Barry Peoples. "We don't want to become a city."

The Kensington Sector Plan, an update of the master plan for the town and vicinity, is intended to revitalize Kensington into a more pedestrian-friendly environment that would include housing in the business district. The plan is not seeking as much growth as large-scale plans like the concurrently redeveloping White Flint Sector Plan, but will use the same new zoning designation, the CR zone, which county planners are crafting to encourage developments that are a combination of housing, retail and commercial facets.

The public record for the Kensington Sector Plan will remain open until July 24. Written testimony may be submitted by e-mailing MCP-Chair@montgomeryplanning.org. The first Planning Board work session on the plan will take place July 30, at which time the Planning Board will begin to consider the testimony given and direct staffers to make changes to the draft as necessary.

Use of the CR Zone, as well as proposed 75-foot buildings along Connecticut and respect for the historic district were the hot topics at the hearing.

Peoples testified that Kensington's position as a "choke point" between the White Flint and Wheaton Sector plans, the Base Realignment and Closure project that will relocate Walter Reed National Military Medical Center to the campus of the National Naval Medical Center in Bethesda, and the Inter-County Connecter, a highway linking Montgomery and Prince George's County, left it vulnerable to worsening traffic conditions that should be mitigated with planning for sufficient infrastructure and minimal growth in the Kensington plan.

"…[W]e cannot afford the problems of super-sizing Kensington," he said.

Resident TJ O'Malley testified that Kensington's "brand" should remain as is, a Victorian garden suburb. O'Malley said he knows growth is coming and is supportive of revitalization efforts that would bring more activities and amenities to town, but felt the scale of that revitalization should be controlled.

"I am concerned about the infrastructure, about the traffic, about the density that we propose," O'Malley said. "It may all be too much of a good thing. I'm very concerned about that."

The public draft plan calls for 75-foot height limits on buildings along Connecticut Avenue and University Boulevard, as well as 60-foot height limits around the MARC station and the current business district. Currently the tallest building in Kensington is 70 feet and is located at Connecticut Avenue and Knowles Avenue.

O'Malley said he is concerned large buildings and overgrowth would result in Kensington losing its unique identity.

"We certainly don't want to trade (Kensington's historic nature) for too much density and a town center that looks like every other town center in the county."

An attorney representing the Burka family, which owns the land on which the Kensington Shopping Center currently exists, testified that the plan needs to allow more development on the property, increasing the density from what is being proposed in the sector plan. Density is a planning tool that determines how big a development can be relative to the land it's on.

Redevelopment of the Burka property has been identified by Park and Planning staff as one of the essential catalysts for the plan's success, and Pat Harris, an attorney with Holland & Knight, testified the proposed density does not provide enough incentive for the family to redevelop the property.

"Recommendations must be reasonable and economically feasible, otherwise it's just an academic exercise," Harris said of the plan.

At the end of the hearing, Planning Board Vice Chairman John Robinson, a former president of the Kensington Historical Society, indicated the sector plan team led by Park and Planning staffer Fred Boyd may have to lower its suggested building heights as the sector plan process continues and that the townspeople may win out.

"I still have this feeling that Mr. Boyd's 75 feet is a little ambitious," said Robinson, whose term with the Planning Board is set to end in a few weeks.



http://www.gazette.net/stories/07152...56_32527.shtml

[Infoman]

Originally Posted by hpal3

You are quite the AMBITIOUS fellow!!...lol

Yes I am quite "AMBITOUS"!

Originally Posted by Infoman

okay, I apologize... BTW I'm still trying to figure out what you are talking about, I'm not comparing MD, VA, or D.C.

CONTACT A MODERATOR!!! I don't care, I'm friends with most of them anyways. If they infract me oh well. But I can guarantee that I "WILL" come back as another member so what would be the point of doing that?

Thank You Rockin for the welcome back to SSC, yo guys know I cant stay away from here!

[StevenW]

Originally Posted by Infoman

Yes I am quite "AMBITOUS"!



Thank You Rockin for the welcome back to SSC, yo guys know I cant stay away from here!

How many names have you had, Infoman?
I mean, on the forum, that is.