No School, All Play at New Bruce Monroe Park

Although reading, writing, and arithmetic may be on the agenda for future visitors to Bruce Monroe Park, for now it is just 24-7 recess at 3012 Georgia Avenue, site of the the former school, redevelopment candidate and now park. The DC government held a press conference last August to vaunt demolition of the PCB and asbestos-ridden school, and to announce that the city would issue an RFP "in the next few weeks" for redevelopment of the site. But the District's solicitation failed to materialize, and city has since spent $2m beautifying the site before releasing a new RFP last week.

Last week, Consys, Inc. finished phase one of construction at Bruce Monroe Park, and the site is now open to the public. Two basketball courts, a tennis court, a small parking lot, and a playground complete the landscaped park, almost entirely enclosed by wrought iron fencing. There is no timetable or specifics yet nailed down, but a small
community building is expected to follow. Originally only funded with $500,000, it looked as if the project would come up short of complete. But the community expressed their disapproval as the two basketball courts and tennis court sat idly, waiting for the necessary hoops, posts, and netting required for proper usage until Ward One Councilman Jim Graham secured an additional $1.5 million in funding for the temporary park, which has since undergone a vast improvement in just a few short weeks.

Meanwhile, the Office of the Deputy Mayor for Planning and Economic Development (DMPED) has asked for redevelopment proposals for the site. Development teams would not be limited to strictly educational uses, as DMPED has asked that proposals feature both a mixed-use (half school, half commercial) option and an entirely commercial plan. The RFP does stipulate that property sales generated from a potentially all-commercial venture would have to be reinvested in the renovation and modernization of the off-site school where former Bruce Monroe students are now housed.

A significant conglomerate of involved parents had previously voiced opposition to the prospects of updating the current Bruce Monroe, and it was assumed that option had been unofficially taken off the table. But as made clear by the new RFP, the possibility remains alive. All proposals must be received by 3PM on October 14th.

Much is in the works for the long-planned makeover of the Georgia Avenue thoroughfare, including several nearby affordable apartment projects, but very little construction has gotten under way. So it remains undetermined whether the priority here is a quality educational facility, or a proposal with the greatest likelihood of immediate construction and hurried completion.

Washington DC real estate development news

Jefferson Pointe at Market Place, to Erase Memory of Addison Square in Shaw

Near CityMarket at O in Shaw, Metropolitan Development's never-built "Addison Square" development is now officially moving forward as "Jefferson Pointe at Market Place" - same specs, new brand - due to the $16.6 million purchase of the fully entitled project by the Jefferson Apartment Group last month. As was the plan in 2004 when Metropolitan purchased the property for $7 million, the development - with architecture by Lessard Design - will include 280 apartments (54 subsidized), 230 below-grade parking spaces, and 13,400 s.f. of retail space along 7th. Construction could happen as early as spring of 2012, after demolition of the seven vacant brick buildings on site (along the 1500 block of 7th) that combined were once the housing project known as Kelsey Gardens. 

  Washington D.C. real estate development news

More Residential Development for Alexandria's Carlyle Neighborhood

Atlanta-based Post Properties announced last week that it will begin construction on phase two of its Carlyle Square apartment project in Alexandria. The development company is confident that they will find enough Metro riders to overcome area's traffic congestion and fill the new 344-unit apartment building. Each unit at 601 Holland Lane will average 906 s.f. of freshly designed contemporary interior space, located not far from Ballenger Avenue in the southeastern corner of the increasingly dense Carlyle neighborhood.

Total development costs are estimated to top out at $95 million. Post is expecting to benefit from cyclically low construction costs, and will bankroll the project using its unsecured revolving lines of credit, it reports. Post hopes to deliver the first apartments in the spring of 2012, a time which the company predicts will present favorable rental conditions.

Architect Sami Kirkdil of SK&I Architectural Design Group received praise and an award from Builder Magazine for his massing arrangement on Post's last Carlyle building, elegantly blending a rather large building into the roof-lines of its smaller surroundings. SK&I will again shoulder the design responsibilities for phase two of the Post Carlyle. The new building will consist of a 4-story structure abutted by a glowing 14-story tower of metal and illuminated glass intended to suggest a glowing lantern. The residencies will be amassed atop 425 below grade parking spaces.

Alexandria Virginia Real Estate Development News

They Love Horses, Don't They?

by Beth Herman

In the shadow of the Appalachians, a young John Blackburn spent years observing his twin sister ride the family’s horses. “I played in the barn, I raced them across the field, but I had no real interest in them,” Blackburn of Blackburn Architects, P.C. confessed.

More than 40 years later, at the forefront of an architectural niche that courts the nation’s estimated two million horse owners and with 150 horse farm projects in his saddlebag, Blackburn is credited with raising the bar on barns to levels once inconceivable - elements such as skylights, recycled rubber, LED lights, solar panels, engineered bamboo and aerodynamic principles all hallmarks of his current and projected equestrian designs. What’s more, according to the firm’s projects manager, Daniel Blair, much of their equestrian construction would very likely qualify for LEED certification except that the USGBC (U.S. Green Building Council) doesn’t yet have a standard for agricultural buildings as they typically don’t rely on infrastructure.

The Trot

“In 1983 I was working at KCF Architects and a friend of mine and I started talking about a partnership,” Blackburn recalled of his shotgun wedding to equestrian architecture, adding that his friend went ahead and got a one-room office in Georgetown to work solo for a while. With Blackburn still not transitioned out of KCF, fate intervened and the two formally joined up when a call came pointing them toward a prospective client in Middleburg, Va. The client, as it turned out, had purchased one of Jack Kent Cooke’s early estates and wanted to start a thoroughbred breeding farm: two barns; staff housing; service buildings, but with the stipulation that construction would reflect the landscape, or have “the Middleburg look,” Blackburn explained. “We had nothing to show in our portfolio except garage additions and porches, so my partner, who was from Middleburg, took some slides of structures there that may have been 200 years old and we projected them onto the wall, talking about generic shapes, forms and materials that would fit in contextually. Somehow we got the job.”

We’re Cantering Now


At the same time, the client had retained Cambridge, Mass.-based landscape architect Morgan Wheelock, someone Blackburn said had previously designed horse farms and had many theories about buildings that responded to the natural environment of the horse. Among these were issues of natural light, which affects the cycle of the broodmare, so the way light fills the barn - how bright it gets - is of primary concern, as are critical ventilation factors due to horses’ sensitive respiratory systems and their predisposition to hay and dust allergies.

From Wheelock, with whom he still collaborates, Blackburn learned about passive barn systems such as siting them perpendicular to the prevailing summer breeze, principles of lift, vertical ventilation and the like. Most barns, he and Blair explained, are sited parallel to the summer wind in order to open the front and back doors and catch the prevailing breeze, which allows air to traverse the barn lengthwise, a practice whose poor results are even exacerbated by the use of fans. “When this happens, the barn is sick,” Blair explained, because any illness a horse may have can be passed horizontally to his barn mates. Horses give off a tremendous amount of humidity, according to Blackburn, and in a confined space like a stall this breeds bacteria, almost like a Petri dish. When a structure is built to employ vertical lift, which includes the use of skylights, roof/eaves ventilation and heat from the sun on the roof to encourage lift (heat rises), the breeze then travels up and out through the opening and pathogens and allergens don’t have a chance to spread to other occupants.

Where lighting is concerned, Blackburn is adamant about not using artificial components because his signature barns, aptly named Blackburn Barns by a community of grateful clients, are built to maximize daylight. Except for a tack room and feed room in which the architects use compact fluorescents, and with the occasional exception of nocturnal arena use which some farms request, Blackburn said lighting is superfluous: not a good use of energy. At the same time, for arenas and for emergency lighting, the firm is investigating the use of LED lighting which Blair said does not attract bugs.

Learning to Post

When yet another recession hit and many architects were laying off staff, Blackburn and Blair put their heads together and like the horses for whom they build, decided the “fight” response was better than “flight.” Because the firm catered to the "upper 5 percent of people who could afford custom barns," according to Blackburn, it was time to create a more egalitarian process. The concept of adaptable, sustainable barn designs - a line of four pre-designed barns called Blackburn Greenbarns “for eco- and cost-conscious horse owners,” per the press material - was born during this period, with only the plans made available for purchase. “We said we would sell the plans and you can build it,” Blackburn recalled, “or we will take it and adapt it at some additional cost and help you build it. But, we then found that people couldn’t get over the next hurdle: How do you get to the point of getting the shovel in the ground?”

“We’d engineered it,” Blair said of the firm’s next step in enhancing and marketing the product, and making it more accessible, “but then the idea was to simplify and give people what they want, but also give them flexibility to make it their own.” With that, the idea of the four distinct green barns further evolved: two all-weather and two for Southern latitudes, each at a different price point ranging from $90,000 to upwards of $258,000, all with custom modification possibilities, but which were offered with the option of the additional services of two Blackburn-affiliated contractors: one based on the West Coast and one in Kentucky for the proverbial east and west of the Mississippi split.

Full Gallop

The barns, named The Hickory, The Sycamore, The Cypress and The Birch, each with characteristics such as low-voc paints, recycled rubber pavers, or maybe three walls or light colored roofing with reflective finish, are endemic in their features and use of FSC-certified regional wood to either Southern or more Northern climes. Technology that includes greywater and rainwater harvesting, solar power and even the use of engineered bamboo, which Blair said “looks fantastic and is among the most sustainable materials,” is available.

Aside from sustainability issues, Blackburn said the health and safety of the horse are always paramount. In every project there are three things: the site; the owner; the horse, he explained. Though the first two may change, “...the care and concern for the horse never does, and that’s the thread that goes through all of this. We’ve been riding that horse for 25 years.”

Takoma's Long Awaited Residences May Be Underway Soon

Long thought to be another dormant development, turned rental then stalled even after Domus Realty presold nearly half of 85 units in 2008, the Ecco Park project in Takoma, at 235 Carroll Street, is now reported to be back on track. Ellisdale Construction, responsible for mixed used developments such as Moderno and Riggs Place, was awarded the $13 million contract earlier this week to build the four-story building, containing 5-6 thousand s.f. of retail, and 70 below-grade parking spots. The building was designed and developed by Bethesda-based SGA Architects and will include a few environmentally friendly features such as a green roof and recycled materials, but is unlikely to receive a LEED certification. Even without the rating, architect Sassan Gharai confidently described Ecco Park as "the building equivalent of a hybrid car." Financiers are hopeful that it sells better than a hybrid car.

No tenants for the retail space have been selected, and the development team is still undecided on whether the building will be built and marketed as entirely rented units or for-sale units. Dan Ford at Ellisdale said a mix of rentals and for-sale condos is technically possible but not exactly the most attractive option from a marketing standpoint; however, their team has accounted for each scenario in their budgeting strategies, and SGA effectively opted for that on Capitol Hill when its Butterfield House condominium real estate project failed to sell all its units after 3 years of marketing and rented unsold units.

Patios or balconies are planned for a majority of units; and a combination of brick veneer, metal and glass paneling, and stucco siding will make up the palette of materials used in creating the exterior fenestration. The building will be a wood frame structure secured over podium slab. Ellisdale President Kevin Ash explained, "We’re really excited about this project; it really is what we do best. With the economics of construction what they are today, wood-frame buildings really hit the sweet spot between density and cost. We’re finding this building type to be the most able to be financed right now.” Dan Ford insisted that the wood frame technique has been perfected by their construction engineers to mitigate common problems such as fire safety and noise transference, enabling them to build safely and keep their budget slim.

A popular technique on the West coast for some time, podium slabs are now becoming a more common occurrence on East coast construction sites. An efficient design solution for up to 4-story residential projects with underground parking, like Ecco Park, this special type of foundation system effectively distributes the weight-load from the wood-frame above the slab to walls and pillars below. This technique is not only cost effective, but also environmentally responsible, reducing concrete usage. The cement industry is considered to be one of two principle producers of CO2, accounting for as much as 5% of worldwide emissions.

The site, adjacent to the Takoma Metro, formerly home to a truck rental facility, and a gas station before that, needed loads of contaminated soil replaced and the excavation of several rusted-out oil drums before it was properly suited for construction. That preliminary work was done over two years ago, and the dirt there has had plenty of time to sit idly by, pondering its future. But ground is expected to finally be broken this fall (somewhere between October and January). Constructions is anticipated to span approximately fifteenth months, meaning a delivery date cannot be expected until at least early 2012.

Washington D.C. Real Estate Development

Whole Foods in Foggy Bottom

Various real estate blogs are reporting that Whole Foods has signed a lease agreement with Boston Properties to occupy 37,000 s.f. in their Foggy Bottom development. The site on Washington Circle, known as Square 54, has long been rumored as a prospective house for the upscale grocer, but Boston Properties had declined to comment on the possible tenant, maintaining a Whole Foods policy of not commenting on leases and plans.

The grocery store will be the closest full-service supermarket to many Georgetowners, providing stiff competition for the newly opened Safeway just north of Georgetown. The former hospital site will provide 335 apartment units and 440,000 s.f. of office space, on a 60-year lease from George Washington University to Boston Properties. The residences are expected to open in early 2011, with Whole Foods thought to open in mid 2011.

Washington DC real estate development new

Parkside Development In A Hurry To Break Ground

A pivotal development in northeast DC may get underway within a few months, say developers of a project that is expected to house a new senior center, health clinic, community college and townhouse development. Just this July, the Zoning Commission denied Parkside Residential's (aka Lano Parcel 12, LLC) "premature" request for an extension of their first stage zoning application, despite a bid by the developer to push back the timeframe, giving developers a little more than a year to start the project or lose approval. Now the development team is hard at work trying to push through the second stage zoning applications for the remaining few blocks of the original 10-block, 15.5-acre master plan for the land located just off the Anacostia Freeway. Earlier this week the Zoning Commission set down a public meeting to hear the applicant's contested request for changes to their original PUD, as well as approval of the second stage specifics for the newly hatched community college plans.

Developers have confirmed that they are in the last stages of editing closing documents on the Victory Housing senior living development set for block A. Final agreements will be sent to HUD for their signature within the next several days and construction is expected to begin in early October. The project will consist of a 98-unit, four-story senior living facility offered at 60 percent of AMI (area median income). Also approved (2nd stage PUD) are the development team's plans for 112 townhouses on blocks B and C, 42 of which would be made available at 80 to 120 percent of AMI. Developers claim that contractual negotiations with financiers should conclude by the end of the week, paving the way for land development, and eventually being turned over for construction early next year.

The centerpiece of the new second stage plan is the flagship campus of the Community College of the District of Columbia (CCDC). The college, initially planned as an apartment building set to range in height from 54 to just 90 feet, would rise to 110 feet along Kenilworth Avenue. The building would stand a modest 21 feet (one-story) along Kenilworth Terrace to better transition the roof-line into the adjacent neighborhood. The first floor would reserve a small portion of its space for retail, potentially including a place for caffeine-deprived students to jump-start their mornings, and a book store where students can fall deeper into debt at the hands of textbook publishers. And like all well designed colleges, the C-shaped design allows room for an open, green courtyard for suntanning and Frisbee.

Not only will the applicant request an increased height allowance for their now 1.1 million s.f. office project, but also for Zoning's permission to bump their residential buildings' height another thirty feet in order to make up for the residential square footage displaced by the alterations. Representing the wishes of Lano Parcel 12, LLC before the Commission, DC Office of Zoning official Joel Lawson argued that increased daytime population use as a result of the proposed changes would make commercial opportunities in the area more viable. This and the increased educational benefit to the community were justification enough, he contended, to accept the extensive changes and reduced residential offerings. The 1.1 million s.f. of office space also makes the project eligible to entertain GSA solicitations for the leasing of office space to the federal government, with a potential suitor being the Department of Homeland Security.

Also on the table for Parkside Residential is the second-stage and modification application for another part of Block I. These augmentations would also ditch the previously suggested high-rise residential building in favor of a "much needed" three-story health clinic. This application was not set down by the Commission at its public meeting of July 12, 2010, but developers are moving forward and hope to get the project scheduled for discussion soon. The proposed 430,000 s.f. clinic is intended to be a primary care clinic open to the entire public regardless of insurance coverage; it would be operated by Unity Health and sponsored by the District of Columbia Primary Care Association (DCPCA)

The Zoning Commission did not entirely reject the proposed changes, but said these plans as currently submitted were rather hasty and "woefully inadequate," barring further evaluation until a traffic study is produced and submitted. Zoning also requested a status update on the pedestrian bridge intended to connect the development with the Minnesota Avenue metro. The bridge has been designed by Boston-based transportation architects Rosales and Partners, but funding questions remained.

Chris LoPiano, Director of Development at City Interests, explained that the Commission doesn't normally entertain extension requests until less than a year remains on the timer. "We're very confident that as plans further materialize and second stage approval comes together for the community college and health clinic, Zoning will be more than happy with our progress...[T]his is why we originally partitioned the development plan into distinct parcels, so we could approach it project by project. We anticipated this being a five to seven year process." LoPiano stressed that the developers expect approval on these latest changes in autumn; at that point a request for a PUD extension would likely be resubmitted to a zoning commission that has been lenient in granting extensions to projects slowed by the recession.

The development team is a partnership between Bank of America Community Development Corporation, Lano International, City Interests, and Marshall Heights Community Development Organization.

Washington D.C. Real Estate Development

Red Sox - 0; Nationals - 1

by Beth Herman

It would appear baseball’s loss is architecture’s gain. Right around the time most high school students are clomping through chemistry and considering calculus, Marshall Purnell of Devrouax & Purnell Architects and Planners was also considering Fenway, weighing an offer from the Boston Red Sox.


“I said no,” Purnell recalled of his junior year in Michigan. “It was the ‘60s, not yesterday, and there was no money in sports at the time: $10,000 a year with a $5,000 signing bonus. It was more money than my dad was making, but I just knew it wasn’t what I wanted to do. I wanted to go to college.” Four decades later, Purnell, the former high school baseball and basketball star, would stand beside the new 41,888-seat, $611 million Nationals Park in SE D.C. as one of its architects, the first ballpark in the country to achieve LEED certification.

Matters of State


Plying his trade since 1978, the former federal agency liaison for AIA (“the greatest job in the world for a young architect”) had met his partner, Paul Devrouax, at a NOMA (National Organization of Minority Architects) conference three years earlier. Devrouax, who died of a heart attack on March 22 at age 67, had offered his prospective partner something none of the other firms around the country with which Purnell met when he left AIA had offered: a career instead of a job. “Paul basically understood where I wanted to go, and he wanted to go to the same place,” Purnell said. Reflecting on the beginning of their partnership, with contacts that included the Assistant Secretary of State in charge of foreign buildings, who was first an AIA boss, Purnell said he brought in two jobs the first day and spent subsequent weeks as a State Department knight errant in 15 degree-below temperatures in Moscow, Belgrade and T’bilisi. “We ended up doing cabinet drawings for the State Department for the next three years,” Purnell said, which he explained meant taking all the floor plans, elevations and the like for ambassadorial residences around the world and making sure they’re correct, putting them into English and standardizing metric numbers, for 87 nations. “It wasn’t glamorous, but it helped pay the rent,” the architect said.

State Department blessings withstanding, when Devrouax - who would become godfather to one of Purnell’s four children - and Purnell first fused professionally, they’d set up shop in an English basement near DuPont Circle. “I had just come from the AIA where I had a third floor office overlooking the courtyard, right over the president’s office,” Purnell said. “I left because I didn’t want to get too fat and happy without ever practicing architecture, but when the first snow came that winter and we had to look up over it, I told Paul we had to get out of there.”

A move two months later to 1215 Connecticut Avenue was undertaken with the two partners, an intern and a secretary (no real division of offices: just open space). Nine months later, the firm had grown to 16 people precipitating an eventual move to 717 D Street NW, where Devrouax & Purnell, with as many as 50 on staff at one time but currently settling for a navigable 18, has remained for 25 years. “Nobody in their right mind would move into this neighborhood for office space when we did,” the prescient Purnell said, reflecting on the tenuous downtown overtones of the 1980s. “But we saw what was coming. We saw the changes that were being planned for this area.”

Matters of the Heart

Claiming never to have argued in 32 years, Purnell said he and Devrouax could sometimes disagree on something but no one would know they were disagreeing. “We used to say we worked different sides of the street,” Purnell said. “Paul (who’d been a solo practitioner for five years prior to the partnership) had his base here in Washington and was an incredible supporter of D.C., and I brought in a federal and national element, but over the years they began to meld.” Responsible for some of the region’s most significant structures in addition to Nationals Park, including Pepco Headquarters, Prince George’s Sports and Learning Complex, the Walter E. Washington Convention center, MCI Arena, the Verizon Center, the expansion of Gallery Place and the garage at National Airport, and cited as the first African-American architecture firm to design a headquarters for a Fortune 500 company: the 190,000 s.f. addition to the Freddie Mac campus in McLean, Purnell acknowledged some early obstacles in their path. His take on race, however, is more Que Sera, Sera than The Sky is Falling. “We are who we are in this world. Race plays a role. Your gender plays a role in whatever you do, but you don’t build your life around it; you don’t build your practice around it and your talents are not based upon it.”

In a more profound example of the scars of race that Purnell recalls, however, when it came time to break ground for the 16,000 s.f. state-of-the-art King Greenleaf Recreational Center in SW, a Devrouax & Purnell project built in a public housing complex, hostility and organized protest quickly ensued from the surrounding community. Purnell noted residents were “up in arms because they thought it was the beginning of the end” – that gentrification like this may portend the end of public housing. Sitting in the stands at the ribbon-cutting, the architect said he was shaken by a woman who stood up and admitted that the reason she’d panicked when the building was going up – when she saw the design – was because she knew “no one in the city would build something this nice for us.” That’s what she said, Purnell frowned. “I was sad that she, in her life, had come to feel like that about anything – that they didn’t deserve it.”

What Matters Most

Designed in conjunction with the Kansas City-based former HOK Sport (architects), now Populous, and opening in 2008, Purnell said research for Nationals Park involved visiting a host of stadiums around the country including venues in San Diego, Philadelphia, San Francisco, Baltimore and Atlanta. “We saw a lot of good,” Purnell affirmed of his stadium safari with HOK’s Joe Spear, specifically about Baltimore’s Camden Yards. “I saw things that make that ballpark special, but I didn’t see a whole lot of things that I thought should be at Nationals Park. As an architect, and as a person, I’ve learned to look at what shouldn’t be done.”

For example, at Camden Yards, when on the concourse for food and other necessities, people have to look up at monitors to see the game. “I couldn’t stay connected to the field,” Purnell said. “A ballgame is a long process: You want to be able to get up and walk around sometimes” without losing that personal connection to the action. “The way we designed Nationals Park, if you get out of your seat for the restroom or a hot dog, or walk over to the third baseline or the first, you’re still very close to the field. You can still see the game.”

Where the locker room was concerned, Purnell recalled a visit to Giant stadium where Barry Bonds was playing at the time. Bonds had cordoned off a corner of the locker room, with his own Barcalounger and monitor, and all the other players knew it, Purnell had observed. “He was the greatest player, he was there on the team, but I didn’t like the idea of him setting himself apart like that.” Accordingly, in the seat of the nation, a few miles from the White House and in a nod to equality and shared values, the architects first created a round design for the Nationals’ locker room, which quickly evolved into a famous oval – for obvious reasons.


Reflecting on his high school baseball years in Michigan, Purnell said he believes it helps if you’ve played the game. Understanding distances to left field, right field, center field and what plays are exciting, as well as building either a pitcher’s park where the fences are a little further back, or a hitter’s park where they’re closer, are all integral to stadium science. At one point, Purnell said, they designed the Nationals Park fence at 14 feet all the way around, but by doing that it detracted from the excitement of the outfielder going up to catch the ball. “If you put in an 8-foot fence, he can jump high into the fence and prevent a home run. Let’s don’t take away one of the most exciting plays in baseball!” Purnell declared.

Speaking to his three-plus decades in practice, Purnell said that architecture is so much a part of his soul, he “doesn’t feel like (he’s) worked in 32 years.” With the loss of his valued partner and friend, he relies perhaps more heavily upon senior designer Anthony Brown who has been with the firm for 27 years.

“With Paul, I miss his voice, I miss his presence, and like in many marriages, we finished each other’s sentences,” Purnell said. “But with Anthony,” he said, brightening slightly, “we’ve been known to finish each other’s drawings.”

Wormley School Phase II Development Begins

Five years after Bethesda-based Encore Development purchased the Wormley School building from Georgetown University for $8.3 million and began marketing townhouses and condos, Encore says it is ready to begin building its townhouse portion of the project. The initial plan was to transform the historic brick school into seven condominiums and construct six new townhouses on top of a parking garage, replacing the school's parking lot and playground. The 7-unit converted schoolhouse delivered in 2008, but the vision for a row of six new townhouses seemed to fade as sales for the condos were stubbornly sluggish and presales of the townhouses nonexistent. However, after recently selling the last of the condos after more than 3 years of marketing, Encore's financiers gave them the go ahead to begin construction on the six townhouses, and work has now begun on the site.

The site, at 3325-3329 Prospect Street, is just one block north of the M Street, along the migratory student path between M and Georgetown University. The six townhouses will each consist of four levels and a loft, totaling somewhere between 4800 and 5200 s.f. Each home will be accompanied by two parking spaces, and are currently priced starting at $3.95 million, running up to $4.95 million. The row-houses should be delivered in roughly a year.

The "finely-crafted, Victorian-style luxury townhouses with details of quintessential Georgetown originals" (according to the listing) are designed by Cunningham & Quill Architects. The end unit will include four bedrooms and bathrooms, four fireplaces, formal living room and dining room, library, and a grand kitchen that opens into a family room. The master suite features a private terrace, and the third floor operates as a two story conservatory. That's not all, also comprised in the property is an in house elevator and relaxing private garden.

A diligent effort has been made by the architects and developers of this project, in cooperation with Old Georgetown, Citizens Association of Georgetown, and HPRB, to ensure that the historical integrity of the block and the neighborhood are preserved. Because two row houses already existed at the end of the block, these new houses will join the established roof line and facade closest to the street, while the renovated Wormley School will soak up the majority of the passerby's attention - as it remains set back several feet to draw the wandering eye towards its historical and architectural significance.

Many specific architectural details will be replicated in the newly constructed houses so to provide visual clues for the onlooker, reminding them that this is a classic Georgetown townhouse in the historic Georgetown neighborhood. Both cornice lines and the articulations of the roof line will be matched to the existing houses as the row tapers down the street. The houses will all be approximately the same width as a typical Georgetown row house. They will also be proportionally similar. Other visual clues meant to reference the iconic Georgetown home are the windows (mainly type two over two), archway styling, the steps and entryway as they relate to the proportioning of the transition to the sidewalk, as well as stone stoops, railings, and gardens. Although many row houses in Georgetown are bare brick, the designers opted for the also common painted frontage, selecting subtle neutrals (grays, yellows, and whites) so to enliven the facade but not call too loudly for attention (think San Francisco painted lady houses). "Our ultimate goal with the design was to complete the pattern of the existing block," says architect Chris Morrison, "and I think we did that intelligently and respectfully."

Washington D.C. Real Estate Development News

Two-Mile Missing Link on Anacostia Trails Coming Soon

The undeveloped land between Bladensburg Waterfront Park and the National Arboretum will soon see a spike in the ratio of aluminum and spandex to natural habitat, as cyclists will be gifted a $1.3 million trail system serving as a nexus for bikers coming from Prince George's County into the District of Columbia. Construction on the coupling bike paths began in late June and the official opening is expected by the end of this calendar year, just in time for anxious winter-cycling enthusiasts.

Once finished, the link will add an already operable and underutilized 24 miles of Maryland trails (Anacostia Tributary Trail System) to 16 miles of trails in the District (Anacostia Riverfront Trail). About half of the District's involved trails are already completed, and the other half are currently under construction. For those willing to tolerate the sweat-soaked business attire that accompanies environmental stewardship, the trails will potentially serve as a commuting option for Marylanders coming into the city for work.

The area on which the proposed trail system will be built is in much better shape than it was a decade ago. An $8.5 million wetland rehabilitation effort in 2006 helped beautify the former dump site, but limited access into the area has made it difficult for citizens to recognize the dramatic improvement. The new trail will not only provide new options for commuters, but open the 22 acres of wetlands and wildlife to cycling and hiking eco-tourists looking for exercise and the chance at spotting a bald eagle or oh-so-adorable muskrat.

This much needed link was targeted by Gov. Martin O'Malley as Maryland's highest-priority trail project in his Maryland Trails Plan, made public earlier this spring. Mayor Fenty and his administration remain vocal in their commitment to providing the proper funding and support to ensure completion and maintenance of the link and involved trail-ways on the District's side of the border.

"This is just the first of eight major, missing-link projects proposed by the governor," explains Maryland Department of Transportation (MDOT) spokeswoman Erin Henson, "that when fully completed will connect over 800 miles of trail-ways. The goal is to encourage people to get out of their cars by offering transportation alternatives to commuters. The projects also intends to provide citizens with opportunities for a healthier, more active lifestyle, while connecting them to the local environment."

Washington D.C. Transportation News

New Condo Opens in Petworth

DC's newest condo project has opened in Petworth. The Flats at Taylor Street began sales in July after completing a one-year renovation of the 26 unit apartment building, with prices ranging from $199,900 to $299,900 for one and two-bedroom condominiums. The condo project, near the Petworth / Georgia Avenue Metro, is in one of DC's more active development districts, joining a cluster of other large projects either recently completed or underway. The new condominiums will beef up the housing stock, along with recently completed Park Place apartments and NDC's newly opened Residences at Georgia Avenue with Yes! Organic market, as well as the 130-unit apartment building Georgia Commons now underway one block south, Donatelli Development's apartment building going up across from the Metro and a new retail development next door, as well as a CVS that opened just last week, effectuating years of promises for upper Georgia Avenue. Taylor Flats, at 804 Taylor Street, NW, is the rebirth of an apartment building that was fully gutted in 2009, with unit layouts redesigned by Bonstra Haresign Architects for more contemporary living spaces that include in-unit washer & dryer and larger living rooms. Taylor Flats condos will also be the first large condominium to utilize CityFirst Homes, a District-sponsored program to give condo buyers downpayment assistance. The program provides moderate-income purchasers with $75,000 toward financing and downpayment costs, with an interest-only repayment for the first seven years at a fixed 3.79% interest rate, allowing a 2% downpayment without mortgage insurance. The remaining purchase price is financed privately through Bank of America. The condominium sales office is open on Sundays or by appointment, email sales @ TaylorFlats.com.

Washington DC real estate development news

For Two Young Boys, Universal Design Will Alter Their Universe

By Beth Herman

Imagine the world from a single spot on the floor, in a small wheelchair where most things extend beyond your reach. For two growing boys in Virginia, a conventional home with inadequate access on almost every front limited their participation in family life and put the burden, in every sense of the word, on their parents. Everyday tasks such as entering and exiting the house, bathing, studying and recreation challenged backs and brains; the need to do better for their family becoming a decade-long mission for aerospace engineer and Navy Captain Andy Cibula and his wife, Jennifer.

California transplants who’d “looked at 100 homes” in Reston, Springfield, Chantilly and other places during relocation efforts in 1999, their quest to find a ranch home for their first physically challenged child (the younger child was not yet born) was compromised by doorways and hallways not wide enough to accommodate a wheelchair. Finally settling upon a rambler in Reston, a restrictive home owner’s association handicapped a planned expansion after the birth of a second child with cerebral palsy in 2001, precipitating a move in 2003 to a four-bedroom, 2,500 s.f. rambler in Oakton - purchased with the intent to bump out the back of the house.

“We met with a few architects and no one was listening,” Jennifer Cibula recalled. “Bob (Robert Wilkoff, President, Archaeon Architects & Planners) was open to anything and everything, with a background in accessibility issues. The combination of the two really sold us,” she said.


Scion of late renowned industrial designer William L. Wilkoff, who’d pioneered many of the nation’s forays into universal, or barrier-free, design, was president of ASID (American Society of Interior Designers), served on the President’s Committee on Employment of People with Disabilities and co-authored Practicing Universal Design: An Interpretation of the ADA (Americans with Disabilities Act), the younger Wilkoff carefully identified inherent design challenges in renovating an existing home that needed not only to accommodate disabled and growing children, currently ages 12 ½ and 9, but to enrich their lives as well.

Seeds
With initial meetings in 2003, and various medical and other issues precluding the family’s full immersion into the project until 2008, Wilkoff set out to create an environment that would embrace the children and eventually also support their mother, whose burgeoning orthopedic problems (she sometimes uses a cane) are the result of years of heavy lifting. The quest for specific products, fixtures and features that worked with the boys’ capabilities and limitations had many iterations over five years, Wilkoff said, noting that products came and went from manufacturers. Preliminary plans to expand through the back of the house were later jettisoned in favor of a complete renovation, with demolition (or “deconstruction,” where items are taken apart, inventoried and repurposed at another site) begun on July 15 and the family taking up temporary residence down the block.

Thorns
“The house is elevated off the ground by four or five steps,” Wilkoff said, noting the Cibula’s had to lift the boys in their wheelchairs several times a day. Inside, they could move through the halls and into their bedrooms in wheelchairs, but bathrooms and kitchens did not conform to the children’s needs. A finished basement down a flight of stairs with play space, adjacent to the garage where the family’s handicap van parks and lets them out, was also out of the children’s reach.

Among the first orders of business is a full elevator to utilize the basement, though according to Wilkoff the challenge lies in codes for residential elevators that have a maximum footprint which will not accommodate two wheelchairs. “Their mom has to be with both kids – get them both into the elevator and move them up and down,” Wilkoff explained. “Otherwise, you’d have to put one in, go up, come down, put the other one in, which is just insane so we are seeking a special exception to code without the expenditure of putting in a commercial elevator, which costs three times as much.”

Taking Root
In the boys’ bedrooms which will flank a common bathroom, a ceiling track will allow a push button-controlled lift to travel from their beds to the bathroom, with a turnstile ferrying the boys to shower, bath or individual lavatories which can move up and down 18 inches as they grow. Fold-down grab bars will punctuate the space and can disappear when not in use. Precluding the need for heavy wheelchair transfers by their parents or a caregiver when lavatory-bound, the boys can be rolled from bed into a suspended harness which goes up and down. For dressing, rods and shelving in the closets drop down where the children can access them from their wheelchairs.

In the bathroom, a tub with sliding 30-inch door will facilitate movement from a wheelchair, should the boys not be in the lift, directly into the tub. “There have been accessible tubs around for a long time with little swing doors,” Wilkoff said, “but the problem was that they’d been designed for somebody who could walk into them. This tub is elevated to the same level as the seat of a wheelchair, so someone can slide themselves in and close the door.” Where the shower, which is separate, is concerned, Wilkoff said “…basically the entire bathroom is built as a shower; there’s no curb and the floor pitches over very gradually toward the actual shower space so any water that spills (from other sources) will roll over to it.” In the parents’ bathroom, a similar no-threshold shower and a tub conceived for transfers (not the same as the one in the boys’ bathroom) will also accommodate Jennifer if her condition worsens. Back in the boys’ bathroom, a push button-operated changing table that folds against the wall will move from floor all the way up to table level, where the children can be dried and dressed.

According to Jennifer, because their older son has the use of one hand with very good dexterity and his brother, though more challenged, can operate push buttons and the like with some focus, it was important to have a kitchen and family room that encouraged their participation in various activities. To that end, at the push of a button the kitchen counter will raise and lower 14 inches for wheelchairs to slide underneath and cabinets on wall-mounted, articulated lifts will descend to wheelchair height where the boys can open doors and retrieve objects. In the family room, desks will move up or down to accommodate different wheelchairs as the children grow, and wall cabinets that store school supplies will function on the same principle as those in the kitchen. The finished basement, with an exercise room, is also home to the train room, where Andy Cibula keeps large-scale trains that the boys love. “They run them all around the yard, so we’re building this room with a mini-garage door so they can go from inside the house, drive around the yard and come back,” Wilkoff smiled. On this level, just outside the elevator, a “wheelchair corral” will provide storage for pieces of equipment not being used in the house.

In Full Bloom
Outside the front door, Wilkoff indicated plans became “tricky” when the home’s elevation had to be raised even more than the old structure - the impetus, low headroom in the basement. As such, a series of complicated ramps in the guise of a meandering walkway with engaging landscaping will be created to facilitate the boys’ egress as they wheel down to grade level and out to the bus, a distance increased by the design but originally deemed “55-60 feet as the crow flies,” according to Wilkoff.

Aesthetically, because interior spaces are large and high, hall ceilings will be visually broken up for the boys’ interest. The bottom cord of the roof trusses will protrude through the ceiling in one place, and a deep bench storage seat at the end of the hallway will invite them to sit and read or play.

“I don’t think people realize good design can be compatible with this kind of functionality,” Wilkoff said, explaining that to Archaeon Architects & Planners, this is not an issue at all. “When you walk into this house, it’s going to be a custom, beautiful home. No one will look at it and say it looks a little bit like a nursing home or hospital facility, something very important to Andy and Jennifer and to the boys as they grow up.” In fact, very much in the Cibulas’ plans is the practicality of a caregiver feeling comfortable in the house for the rest of the boys’ lives when their parents are gone.

“If you take all of the elderly now, and the preemies (premature babies) who all died in the past – now they’re surviving with these disabilities,” Jennifer said. “Ten years ago they didn’t make it, but they do today,” she added, affirming the increasing need for design, without stigma, that both facilitates and enriches their lives.

Washington D.C. design news

Big Bear Cafe Mauled By Angry ANC Members

Every hipster's favorite independent coffee house seems to be tangled up in a web of bureaucratic tape as it attempts to expand its business; and nagging NIMBY'ers don't seem to be aiding their cause. The Bloomingdale-based Big Bear Cafe's recent attempts at getting a proper liquor license, along with its appeal to the local ANC for their support in such endeavors, have been heavily covered by local blogs. But for fans of Big Bear Cafe the news being reported hasn't exactly been peachy. Last week ANC 5C lettered a harshly worded official report voicing the commission's strong and unanimous opposition to Big Bear Cafe's liquor license application. The letter accused Big Bear of, among other things, "operating illegally" (without proper zoning documentation) since 2007. It seems these allegations were a bit sensationalist in nature, and generally inaccurate. Owner Stuart Davenport and the Department of Consumer and Regulatory Affairs (DCRA) confirmed that the premise has grandfathered permission to operate as a commercial entity, having existed as a zoning exception for over a century.

But as Davenport and Big Bear look to expand their operations, they've petitioned the Zoning Commission for a map adjustment that would grant their property C-2-A status (currently zoned as 4 - A residential), thereby allowing more leeway in the business's efforts to increase capacity numbers, to freely expand onto the sidewalks and public space, to hold musical events, poetry readings, and the like, and to sell beer and wine to customers. Zoning officials were not much more sympathetic than the rabble rousing ANC commissioners. On Monday Zoning agreed to set down a public hearing of the applicant's case, but did so with stonewalled faces, and seemingly obdurate concerns. One panel member expressed his reservations about what might happen if the potentially C-2-A-zoned property changes hands in the future. "Theoretically it could be torn down and rebuilt ten feet higher," he worried. "We've seen that happen, where a skinny apartment building is constructed in the midst of several row houses, and it just doesn't fit - it doesn't work." Board member May, proved he too had been watching the local blog forum drama unfold when he timidly said: “There are some legitimate concerns in the neighborhood about the use of this property. The existing use seems to be a very comfortable fit…but gee, a liquor license there, or a sidewalk cafe? I’m not sure.”

Foregoing the normal prerequisite ANC support, the Alcoholic Beverage Regulation Administration (ABRA) heard Big Bear Cafe's request for a liquor license early on the morning of the 26th. If approved Big Bear would be able to please customers who might want a little whiskey in their coffee. Liquor could be served until 1AM outside and 2AM inside on Friday and Saturday. On weeknights, patrons could enjoy their cocktails until ten in the evening. No ruling on the case will be made for 60 to 90 days, as ABRA must allow time for a subsequent "status hearing" and potentially a "protest hearing" if complications and objections cannot be solved through party mediation. It seems that any chance of making it safely through the ABRA application process is heavily reliant on Big Bear's ability to quell the local ANC's fears of their neighborhood quickly deteriorating into the mass hysteria of a late night in Adams Morgan. The time frame also allows for the applicant to negotiate the zoning map amendment process prior to its reappearance before ABRA. Another Commission hearing has yet to be scheduled, and won't happen for at least another 40 days.

These melodramatic happenings don't just make for juicy blog content, they also have serious implications. One question that arises from the flames: how can such a popular business that has faithfully served the community for several years - in an area that has a dismally minuscule number of retail and restaurant options - be so angrily opposed by residents? Big Bear Cafe was even granted the Mayor's 2009 Environment Excellence award. Granted, that sounds like a meaningless certificate a third grade teacher would give to make sure all her students felt appreciated, but still! Another logical question is: why is the ANC bestowed the authority to raise such a hissy fit? It seems the large majority of the community is in support of the business's plans (600 signed a petition in support of the liquor license application), but the ANC has given a symbolic megaphone to a minority of elected curmudgeons in opposition. When an organizations only real power is to say no to things, it's apparent that they are more likely to conjure the zeitgeist of prohibition-era attitudes in order to play devil's advocate. How can residents expect property values to improve if amenities like restaurants, bars, and markets are not readily incorporated into the community? For awhile at least, patrons of Big Bear Cafe will have to settle for a caffeine induced buzz, or go elsewhere.

Washington D.C. Real Estate Development News