SILVER SPRING, MD – The Montgomery County Planning Board today approved a plan for a new retail, office, and residential development in White Flint, an area undergoing dramatic change as landowners begin to capitalize on planners’ urban vision for the area.
North Bethesda Market II, approved with four buildings housing up to 414 dwellings and up to 368,000 square feet of retail, including restaurant and entertainment sites, will add a striking set of buildings to Rockville Pike.
It was the third urban-styled, pedestrian-oriented project approved by the Board in the last month, highlighting the resurging local real estate market. The string of approvals also shows support for new mixed-use zoning that encourages innovative development projects near transit.
Last week, the Board approved the Pike and Rose site plan. The project, about a mile north of North Bethesda Market II, will build up to 492 dwelling units and close to 350,000 square feet of commercial uses in its first phase. Eventually, the project will cover 24 acres, converting a huge surface parking lot to an innovative mix of uses, including an upscale cinema and half-acre park.
Planning Board members spoke effusively at today’s hearing about the North Bethesda Market II plan after seeing renderings showing a modular glass, concrete, and metal residential building that steps back floor-by-floor from a retail base to a height of almost 300 feet. The buildings are located at Nicholson Lane and Woodglen Drive one block from the White Flint station on Metro’s Red Line.
Both projects are located in the new Commercial Residential Zone, which fosters a mix of uses and public amenities to update the county’s 1950s-era commercial areas. North Bethesda Market II will provide public benefits, such as a new pedestrian walkway with wayfinding signs, tree canopy, public parking, and public art. The new zone requires such amenities as part of planners’ strategies to replace acres of surface parking lots with more dynamic and productive land uses and improve stormwater management. The North Bethesda Market II site is now occupied by four commercial buildings and surface parking lots.
The public space includes a central plaza with artwork, fountains, seating, planting, and structures. A stormwater management plan approved by the county Department of Permitting Services includes green roofs, bio-filters, and underground filter systems.
In January, the Board approved the residential-retail Falklands Chase development one block from the Silver Spring Metro. This full-block project uses the natural topography as the defining element in locating several, modern-designed residential buildings with new commercial uses lining East-West Highway.
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