Marriott's New Bethesda HQ

The skin on the 22-story Marriott headquarters in Bethesda is nearly installed, providing an early look at the one of the many projects that will line the Bethesda stretch of Wisconsin Avenue.  The site 800 feet north of the Bethesda Metro station at 7750 Wisconsin Avenue will serve as Marriott's new global headquarters opening in mid 2021, and include an "urban campus," chosen for its urban amenities and proximity to public transportation. The project will include a 244-room hotel operated by Marriott opening in 2022.  Boston Properties and the Bernstein Companies jointly own the land and are co-developing the hotelier's headquarters, while Bernstein will solely own and develop the hotel.  The projected $600 million project will be home to an estimated 3500 Marriott employees in the the 785,000 s.f. office building.

General Contractor Hensel Phelps is building the pair of towers that were designed by Gensler to achieve LEED Gold standards.

Bethesda Maryland commercial real estate news

JBG Smith Readies Another Apartment Building in Woodmont Triangle

Bethesda's Woodmont Triangle may be small in size (15 city blocks, give or take), but it continues to be one of the DC region's most active construction sites, delivering up some of the highest density in the region.  The latest of the projects is JBG Smith's apartment building, a 322-unit apartment building with retail, including an Orange Theory Fitness, along Wisconsin Avenue.

click image for photo gallery

Of course the world has changed since the start of the project, and design of the 420,000 s.f. building was revised from including originally approved 450 apartments down to 322 units, increasing the unit size and maintaining the same building envelope.  JBG declined to comment on the change.  15% of the units will be subsidized as required by the county.  Designed by NYC-based FX Collaborative, the building parallels Wisconsin Avenue with a staggered glass panel design, saving its more attractive curvilinear brick exterior to face Woodmont Avenue.  The 17 story project is expected to complete late this year, and will be joined shortly thereafter by the Marriott headquarters and hotel one block to the south.

Project:  7900 Wisconsin Avenue

Renderings: Libovich

Developer:  JBG Smith

Architect:  FX Collaborative

Construction: Plaza Construction

Use:  322 apartments, 20,000 s.f. of retail

Expected Completion:  Late 2020

Bethesda commercial real estate news

Downtown Bethesda Project Heads Back to Planning Board

A hotel is back on the boards for Woodmont East, the long-planned JBG Companies development on Bethesda Row, if the Montgomery County Planning Board accepts the latest amendments to allow redevelopment of an additional site -- Artery Plaza -- that is an existing 11-story office building at 7200 Wisconsin Ave.

New plans include a hotel with as many as 230 rooms along with additional retail and office space, to be considered by the planning board during the April 12 hearing. JBG nixed plans for a hotel in 2009 because of market trends, instead designating the area as office space.

The County already approved the Project Plan and Preliminary Plan in 2008, and approved an amendment to those plans in 2009.  JBG now proposes another amendment to allow additional development of an adjacent site. Total real estate development including new and existing space now could include the hotel, 81,165 s.f. of retail space, 755,739 s.f. of office space, and 210 residential units (with 12.5 percent MPDUs), according to the revised staff report prepared for the hearing. The additional property brings the site to 5.82 acres with 4.85 acres available for developing the more than 1.2 million square foot project.

2009 rendering of Woodmont East

Matthew Blocher, Senior Vice President at JBG, said the company is unable to discuss the project until after the hearing.

But according to the staff report, proposed construction will take place in three phases with some office and retail space created in all three phases. Residential units will be built in the first phase. The hotel will follow in the second phase. The third phase entails redeveloping the Artery building with two upper floors of office space and ground-floor retail.

Federal Realty Investment Trust (FRT), owners of half the Woodmont site, partnered with JBG for the development project designed by Shalom Baranes Architects.

The planning board is no stranger to Woodmont East proposals. The board first heard plans for the site in 2007, at which time it denied the application for further consideration of the project’s impact on Capital Crescent Trail. The developers agreed to reroute the path along Bethesda Avenue.

Other concerns included the impact on buildings already onsite. The new staff report states only a stand-alone restaurant and an office building fronting on Bethesda Avenue will be removed, while the Landmark theater will remain. Already approved plans call for third-phase construction of residential space to replace an existing parking deck.

Staff-recommended conditions on approval of the new amendments still include specific measures to keep the trail open during construction, provide an alternate route and install signs to guide trail users. Other conditions in the report require a green roof, LEED Rating Certification with an effort to achieve LEED Silver, and traffic mitigation measures. This will take place directly across the street from redevelopment of the parking lot into condos and apartments.

Bethesda, Maryland, real estate development news

Bethesda Industrial Site to Be Remade as Residential Complex

A moribund, paved-over industrial site just off of Little Falls Parkway in Bethesda is slated to be replaced with a 30-townhome housing development.

The 1.8 acre property at 5400 Butler Road is bracketed by Little Falls Parkway and Butler Road, between River Road and Massachusetts Avenue, and surrounded on three sides by parkland.  Presently the site of the BETCO complex of buildings and surface parking lots, plans call for the site to be razed, the pavement removed, and replaced with a Lessard Group-designed "scale-appropriate residential community" of 30 single-family garage-centered homes.

"We actually just got our planning board approval last week for the site plan and preliminary plan," said Stephanie Marcus of lead developer EYA Development.  "We hope to start construction at very end of this year or early in 2013."

Five of the townhouses (16.67%) will be moderately-priced units, and just under forty percent of the new site will be green space, up from basically zero percent at the current site.  Plans also call for about 2 parking spaces per market rate unit and one per MPDU, totaling approximately 64 spaces.

The developers have made several optional concessions, including
removing the existing pavement at their own cost, throwing in an extra MPDU (they're only required to include four), installing stormwater management at their own cost, and setting the amount of green space at 38%, 8% above the requirement.  The project will also remedy the BETCO plant debris' encroachment onto nearby parkland.

The plan itself is somewhat unremarkable - let's face it, a development of townhomes excites pretty much no one - but it's essentially making something from nothing, and in the big picture the removal of the pavement, remediation of parkland encroachment, and significant addition of greenspace, more than makes up for what may be lacking aesthetically.


Bethesda, Maryland real estate development news

The Gallery of Bethesda Demolition Complete, Excavation Underway

With a $55 million construction loan recently secured, and demolition complete, developers Donohoe Companies and MPM Investments are aggressively moving forward on the Gallery of Bethesda, its 17-story 234-unit residential tower at 4800 Auburn Avenue.

“Donohoe Construction is making great progress on the site," said Jad Donohoe of Donohoe Companies.  "Excavation will finish up in November. The 17-story building will 'top out' in July of next year. And then by early 2014, residents will be moving in. The Gallery of Bethesda is going to bring more life and more activity to this part of Bethesda, and it’s going to prove all over again why Bethesda is one of the best places to live in the Washington region.”

The Gallery will be a quarter-million-square-foot tower featuring a 0.25-acre public plaza, a rooftop pool, and 4.600 s.f. of ground floor retail space.  The project is one of three towers that will make up downtown Bethesda mega-development in Woodmont Central; an additional residential tower is slated to be built at 4850 Rugby, with a six-story office building at 8280 Wisconsin Avenue (possibly breaking ground this summer), completing Donohoe's trifecta, not to mention JBG and Bainbridge, both of which are building 17-story residential projects in the neighborhood.  When all three phases are complete, WDG-designed Woodmont Central will bring nearly 600,000 square feet of residential, office and retail space to downtown Bethesda.

The $55 million construction loan, secured in mid-May, is financed by AXA Equitable Financial Services LLC, and sister company Donohoe Construction is the general contractor.

Bethesda, Maryland real estate development news

Woodmont Central Office Building Up for Bid, Construction to Begin Midsummer

Donohoe Development's Bethesda office building at 8280 Wisconsin Avenue, one of three components of the developer's ambitious Woodmont Central megadevelopment, went up for bid last week, with an eye towards breaking ground in midsummer.

"Right now we're pricing it among subs as a GMP [Guaranteed Maximum Price]," said an estimator at Donohoe.  "Assuming things go forward as planned, it's supposed to start construction in July."

The rectangular six-story building, designed by WDG Architecture, will feature just over 81,000 square feet of office space, including 10,500 square feet of ground floor retail.  Developers anticipate LEED Silver certification. In renderings, the Wisconsin-facing facade is a visually interesting massing of planes, mostly metal and glass with a few precast concrete panels for contrast.  On the northeast corner is a vertical element that denotes the entrance to the Battery Lane District.

The first phase of the Woodmont Central project, the Gallery of Bethesda, kicked into gear last month, when demolition began at 4800 Auburn Avenue, the planned site of the residential tower.  That 17-story building will feature 234 dwellings, just under 200 below-grade parking spaces, and 4600 s.f. of ground floor retail space.  A second 16-story residential tower is also planned at 4850 Rugby Avenue, separated from the Gallery of Bethesda by a large plaza, but is reportedly still in the design development stage.


Bethesda, Maryland real estate development news

Heated Discussion Ends In Trillium Site Approval

In a slip-of-the-tongue Thursday afternoon during the developer’s presentation at the Montgomery County Planning Board Meeting, Harris Teeter was named as the grocery store slated for the StonebridgeCarras residential and retail development at the Trillium Site in downtown Bethesda.


Residents speculated and hoped for various stores including a Harris Teeter and Whole Foods, but it had not been confirmed before today.

In a heated discussion, the StonebridgeCarras team proposing a 9-story, 360-unit apartment building for the recently purchased Trillium Site pushed back against a few key conditions placed on their proposal by Montgomery County Planning Commission staff: calculated vehicle trips and required gateway architecture.

The site, filling the block along Battery Lane between Woodmont and Wisconsin avenues, is designated as a gateway in the master plan, requiring special treatment to the building along both Wisconsin and Woodmont. Neither side disputes that fact, but they do disagree on how to indicate the gateway.

Staff wants special treatment to the corners of the building along the streets, and they argue the special treatment is in the center of the development. Developers say they intentionally created understated, stepped corners to meet the requirement and used different techniques in the center to draw the public into the public space.

The Board weighed both arguments and ultimately decided to allow the developers to keep their deign.

Staff received a handful of community comments that focused on the lost arts incubator space in the new plan,  but that feature was not added back into the development.

With the new plans approved, Stonebridge can continue moving toward development.

Bethesda, Maryland, real estate development news

Planning Board to Consider New Trillium Site Plans

New plans for a single 9-story apartment building with  a grocery store and a public plaza at 8300 Wisconsin Ave. will make its way Thursday to the Montgomery County Planning Board.

StonebridgeCarras submitted its amended plans for Bethesda's former Trillium site back in January, and now it will seek approval from the Board. StonebridgeCarras and Walton Street Capital purchased the site in early 2011 for $29.25 million from Houston-based Patrinely Group, which had planned to build three residential towers designed by Davis Carter Scott.

Northwest-facing view from Wisconsin

StonebridgeCarras now plans a U-shaped building designed by WDG Architecture with up to 360 apartments - nearly double the Trillium plan - and 55,000 s.f. of retail encompassing a 22,000 s.f. public plaza that extends to the adjacent National Institutes of Health open space.

Ellen Miller, principal at StonebridgeCarras, said the apartments will range from efficiencies to large three-bedroom units - the size and price of which are not finalized.

The plan amendment submitted to the Board shows 30 efficiency, 185 one-bedroom, 127 two-bedroom, and 18 three-bedroom units. Of those, 45 units -- or 12.5 percent -- will be moderately priced dwelling units (MPDUs). Patrinely planned 198 units in its three buildings.

Intersection of Woodmont and Battery Lane

A grocery store Miller declined to name will anchor the building with entrances at the intersection of Woodmont Avenue and Battery Lane with a second entrance from the public plaza. Parking for 599 vehicles will be located on four levels below ground.

Removed from earlier plans is a 2,000 s.f. arts incubation space, a reduction that community groups opposed, but the developers say it no longer fits the project.

"We did try to consider how such a space might work in that location and in this project," Miller said. "In the end, we believed we had a different approach to the site. We had a use that was a magnet. We believe we have provided a beautiful public amenity space that has a very rich art component."

South-facing view from Wisconsin with NIH open space in the foreground

Instead, developers are working with Kent Bloomer Studio to bring a variety of artwork to the site. Miller said she hopes to present new renderings Thursday that better illustrate the integration of art.  At least five sculptures from other artists also are included in the plans.

The linear plaza will have a series of water features and various seating options for public use, and steps will lead down into the NIH open space.  More images of the plaza can be found here.

Planning Commission staff recommend approving the amendments, with some conditions such as streetscape improvements, an executed traffic mitigation plan, and using signs and focal points to draw people into the public space.

The Planning Board is scheduled to review the plan amendments at 2:15 p.m. Thursday.

Bethesda, Maryland, real estate development news