Keating Development - the Pennsylvania-based firm behind
the development of
The Phoenix in Clarendon and renovation of its historic post office, may soon be able to repeat that accomplishment in Bethesda. Keating has been planning
Arlington Road, a mixed-use residential development and conversion of what is now
a post office for years, and now reportedly has funding and a decision from the U.S. Postal Service, removing obstacles in the path of development.
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In 2009 Keating completed its Clarendon project, now on the
Federal Register of Historic Places, and has since been working on its Bethesda sequel. "Now that it's funded, it's just a question of when," said
Christopher Gordon,
Principal for
Kishimoto Gordon Dalaya (
KGD), the architect for the project.
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Keating
initially applied for approval of the mixed-use project at 7001 Arlington Road back in 2007. The project will add a four-story, 105 unit building to the 2.5 acre plot, with 40,000 s.f. of commercial space dedicated to a post office and over 300 parking spaces below the building. Construction had also been thwarted by the USPS, which owns the land, and which had not determined the ultimate use of the facility. But according to Gordon, the USPS has recently decided that the building will become a distribution facility.
Significant design features include retail frontage on Arlington Road and the tapering of the building toward
Capital Crescent Trail, "so it wont create a large amount of mass on the trail itself," said Gordon. Design plans will remain as they were approved, said Gordon.
Bethesda, Maryland Real Estate Development News