The amount of parking spaces included in the massive redevelopment of Union Station has become a flashpoint in the debate over the long-planned project, with D.C. officials and neighbors alike arguing for a substantial reduction in parking on the property.
Plans call for 1,575 spaces in a new, 10-story garage replacing the station’s existing parking structure, which sits on First Street NE. The Federal Rail Administration and the Union Station Redevelopment Corp., the main groups managing the extensive revitalization effort, say that they’ll need that much parking to accommodate travelers and patrons of the station’s retail offerings. Parking fees are also expected to help fund the costly project.
Amazon is set to deliver two new towers to Pentagon City after getting zoning approval Saturday from the Arlington County Board.
The 2.1-million-square foot project will occupy 6.2 acres in Pentagon City’s Metropolitan Park. The development will replace vacant warehouses and parking lots.
The plans call for two 22-ystory towers along South Eads Street, as well as a new public park. Amazon is also contributing $20 million to the county’s affordable housing fund.
“This project is extraordinary in many respects,” Arlington County Board Chair Christian Dorsey said in a statement. “It will bring us significantly closer to fulfilling the community’s vision of Pentagon City as an urban neighborhood with a better balance of office, residential and retail development, more and better public spaces, and more and better access for pedestrians and cyclists.”
A lot of things happened in the summer and the fall of 2004. What sticks out most is the night in August I stood with three of my closest friends at the entrance of a new parking garage in downtown Silver Spring, yet to open, daring each other to go in.
The concrete was still clean and smooth as we strode up the big ramp, our voices bouncing around seven empty floors as we ascended. At the top of the garage, we walked out onto the sun setting over the then- brand new development called Downtown Silver Spring: a 20-screen movie theatre, a Whole Foods, a hotel, a brightly-colored tile plaza with a fountain.
D.C.’s not done with food halls yet, apparently. The latest? A new food hall called Feria is planned for the Anthem Row development at Eighth and K streets NW, across from the Carnegie Library Apple store.
The food hall from an independent food hall operator has a signed lease for 17,000 square feet across two levels in 700 K St. NW. The venue appeared on a leasing flyer for Anthem Row, the new name for the project there.
Meridian Group is in the process of renovating the former TechWorldPlaza development and rebranding it. In addition to rehabbing the office above, Meridian is renovating 60,000 square feet of retail space and has already announced it will be home to a revamped Equinox gym and Truluck’s, a seafood and steak restaurant out of Texas.
The developments that have the greatest impact on a neighborhood are often those that bring a new grocery store, offering a new option for residents to make their regular food shopping trips.
Building grocery stores as part of low-rise shopping centers with surface parking lots appears to be a thing of the past in the D.C. Metro area, as developers are now building grocery stores into mixed-use developments with hundreds of apartments that bring a consistent stream of demand.
The D.C. region is lined with new grocery-anchored developments that will bring retailers such as Wegmans, Whole Foods, Aldi and Trader Joe’s to their respective neighborhoods. From Rockville to Shaw to Southeast D.C. to Alexandria, Bisnow found 11 grocery-anchored developments underway in the D.C. area.
D.C. United has selected PN Hoffman to remake a pair of sites at the foot of Audi Field in Buzzard Point, setting the stage for additional street-level activity at the foot of the 20,000-seat stadium.
The District’s Major League Soccer franchise has tapped Hoffman to take on the project, final details of which are still being ironed out, according to a source familiar with the situation. Hoffman emerged as the winning bidder from what as said to be a short list including Hines, Toll Brothers (NYSE: TOL) and Cordish Cos. The District-based developer won out for several reasons including its portfolio of projects, notably its role as co-developer of The Wharf on D.C.’s Southwest Waterfront not far from the soccer stadium.
The site includes the 2-acre Parcel B, which could potentially support up to 600,000 square feet of commercial development or mixed-uses, and a smaller Parcel C, with a land area of about 10,000 square feet. Conceptually, Hoffman’s project is slated to include some sort of entertainment concept, possibly a sports bar with a stage for live music, with residential or maybe a hotel above it.
Economic impact is projected at $246 million annually. Neighborhood sentiment is strongly pro-Center. But how to address persistent concerns about an environmental lawsuit, traffic disruptions and the refusal to sign a Community Benefits Agreement
”Don’t call it a “library.”
The Obama Presidential Center (OPC) is the official name of the proposed complex to commemorate the nation’s 44th President, slated for location in Jackson Park, on Chicago’s South Side. None of the actual papers and documents from Barack Obama’s two terms will live there. Instead, existing facilities within the National Archives and Records Administration (NARA) system will store those documents, with digitized copies of nonclassified documents made available online. However, the Center is projected to include a branch of the Chicago Public Library, while the grounds will feature an incline suitable for sledding in winter, an outdoor track, indoor athletic facilities, community gardens and outdoor food trucks. The Barack Obama Presidential Library website, administered by NARA, is already live, housing whitehouse.gov archives from Obama’s presidency.
Courtesy: JBG Smith A rendering of the north section of Amazon’s National Landing, including parts of Pentagon City and Crystal City
Northern Virginia won half of Amazon’s second headquarters, the tech giant announced Tuesday, and after over a year of anticipation, the details about what exactly the company’s presence in the region will look like are finally coming to light.
Amazon refers to its new Northern Virginia hub as National Landing, a newly coined neighborhood that includes Crystal City, the eastern portion of Pentagon City and the northern piece of Potomac Yard. The company said it will invest $2.5B, create over 25,000 high-paying jobs and occupy 4M SF of office space, with the opportunity to expand to 8M SF.
The Seattle-based tech giant will lease space in Crystal City and Pentagon City from JBG Smith, which owns 6.2M SF of existing office space and 7.4M SF of future development sites in the neighborhood. Additionally, a Virginia Tech Innovation Campus will be developed in the Alexandria portion of Potomac Yard.
The company will lease roughly 500K SF of existing office space at 241 18th St. South, 1800 South Bell St. and 1770 Crystal Drive, JBG Smith said. It expects to begin construction before the end of the year on the renovations at 1770 Crystal Drive, which include 272K SF of offices.
Bisnow: Jon Banister Amazon Vice President of Public Policy Brian Huseman at the Nov. 13 HQ2 announcement in Crystal City
Amazon also plans to purchase sites from JBG Smith, including the long-planned Pen Place site in Pentagon City that could support up to 4.1M SF of total development. It said it will begin planning the first office building this year and expects to begin construction next year. JBG Smith would serve as Amazon’s development partner, property manager and retail leasing agent.
The fabric of D.C.’s built environment is going through monumental changes, from the push toward mixed-use development to embracing the city’s rivers. No project is more representative of those shifts than The Wharf.
Bisnow: Jon Banister PN Hoffman CEO Monty Hoffman and Gensler co-CEO Diane Hoskins
“I believe we are in a renaissance, and maybe even in the early stages of that renaissance,” said PN Hoffman CEO Monty Hoffman, the lead developer behind The Wharf. “It’s exciting to be a part of and watch how residential, retail and office spaces are becoming more compact around each other and the lines are blurring.” Hoffman, speaking at Bisnow’s Inaugural D.C. Architecture and Design Summit, said the mixed-use development happening in D.C. today is wildly different from what he saw when he began developing in the city in the 1980s, when office was limited to the Central Business District, and residential and retail areas were siloed.
Amazon is set to deliver two new towers to Pentagon City after getting zoning approval Saturday from the Arlington County Board. 
