The planning board’s decision to nix Falkland Chase’s northern parcel may not have been the final nail in its coffin, but it was certainly the shrill creak of that lid closing. On Thursday, the board said redevelopment on the apartment complex’s north side wouldn’t ruin the historic character of its southern and western parcels, which would be preserved in perpetuity. The final decision belongs to the county council.
But commissioner Joe Alfandre, new guy on the planning board and Kentlands developer, said he wanted to see redevelopment on that site move as one piece. That would give the planning board muscle over what any new plan would look like, and “to ensure that we see the whole thing in the proper context” of garden-style apartments, he said.
So now what? While the blogosphere dreams of dashing through a wide-aisled Harris Teeter, and preservationists plot to chain themselves to Falkland’s front doors, the property’s owners have cooked up plans of their own.
Gone is the original concept racking high-rise towers around a large green space (below). According to representatives of Home Properties, which owns the property, that idea was “too literal an interpretation” of public-space requirements.
Instead, Home Properties has come up with a tentative plan B. That concept drops 60,000 square feet of street-level retail space along East-West Highway. (Earlier concepts set most of the retail away from the street.) Building heights will step down as the project moves south, away from the CSX tracks, keeping in line with the southern parcel’s historic buildings (below).
According to documents submitted to the planning board, about 1,060 new apartments could be constructed, with 133 pegged as moderately priced dwelling units and 100 set aside as work-force housing. The new buildings would contain a smattering of studio apartments plus one-, two- and three-bedroom digs, which Home Properties claimed would improve the neighborhood’s diversity.
None of these ideas are carved in granite. The planning board still must put them through the wringer, even if the county council okays demolition of the north parcel’s existing structures.
As for the southern and western parcels, planning staffers on Thursday said they would hold Home Properties to a covenant for improvements to those buildings. That rings up to $13,000 of insulation, plumbing, wiring and exterior improvements for each existing apartment, Home Properties’ Don Hague told the board. However, board commissioner Alfandre worried that amount wouldn’t cut it.
And what about current tenants of the north parcel’s 182 existing apartments? Residents told the board that Home Properties would relocate them to other apartments on the property, though some worried the space wouldn’t be there.
“When I checked on apartment availability on the complex’s own website, … there were only ten vacant units in the entire three parcels,” testified Jane Bergwin-Rand, who has lived at the Falklands on and off for more than 30 years. “Current residents should not be forced to move for the sake of phantom future renters.”
Images courtesy of MNCPPC.
Read 
What the hell are they building now? Learn more from 
Boxed wines and rosés are back in vogue. Just ask The Penguin's sommeliers.
“Current residents should not be forced to move for the sake of phantom future renters.”
Uh, sure in a socialist state or public. Had Jane Bergwin-Rand had invested just $200/year (about 55 cents per day)starting 30 years ago when she moved into Falkland Chase she would now have more than $20,000 to put down on a condo of her own and she wouldn’t have to worry what the big bad greedy landlord would do.
Assuming a very conservative 6% average annual growth
The second plan B proposal is a thousand times better than the original scheme you show. First of all, you get so much traffic from Summit Hills walking past that northern edge of East-West Highway, it would be a retail crime not to take advantage of it. Secondly, speaking as an urbanist , to extend the web of active streets from the metro will spread Silver Spring’s urban experience and further mitigate the Ellsworth promenade as urban theme park.
Scaling down the buildings to work with the scale of the remaining Falklands buildings and keeping the street wall intact with a lively base is urbanism 101. Go Silver Springopolis!
I’m a bit worried about what that intersection at 16th and E-W Hwy is going to be like. It appears that they new development will have two entrances on E-W, both too close to 16th St to put in a light. There’s a median on E-W Hwy, too, which will have to be cut through to allow left turns into and out of the entrances.
Think about someone heading east on E-W and stopping to wait for a turn into the entrances. Traffic backs up through the intersection. The residents of the new apartments are going to have a worse time getting in and out than we do at Summit Hills during peak traffic.
Thanks for your comment, Terry.
I’m not sure where vehicular access points will be in this new concept (and it’s just that — a concept). But I feel the design really encourages walking, and its location encourages Metro use. Vehicular traffic may not be so big a problem.
And I’m with you, Thayer-D. This new concept could do a lot to bringing nightlife to that part of Silver Spring. Late-night strolls through the 24-hour CVS just aren’t cutting it anymore.
Picking up on Terry’s concern, the traffic along the 16th Street and East-West Hwy is going to be a nightmare. As a pedestrian who crosses the E-W Hwy/16th Street each day, I worry about my safety. I came close to near-death experiences on the asphalt because of reckless drivers trying to beat the light at that intersection. Montgomery Co. police are always responding to traffic accident calls in that general area. Imagine if you had a 1,000 more residents and more retail space along E-W Hwy.
Seriously, do you really think people are going to walk to those shops at Falkland Chase? People will be coming from Chevy Chase, Wheaton and DC to shop at Harris Teeter. This means automobiles and parking spaces. This also means a clogged traffic artery in the western section of DT Silver Spring. When people shop for groceries and other items…they prefer to use an automobile.
Home Properties should provide ZERO parking for shoppers. Parking should be available for residents only. I think this is an unrealistic expectation though because retail stores will NOT lease from property unless there is adequate parking for customers.
Editor’s note: This comment has been edited for content. — JD (Sep 9, 2008)
These are beautiful, unique apartments, with lovely grounds.
Instead, I would redevelop that strip mall on 16 street, and put apartments above. No displacement. And remember — those current residents would be displaced by the Home Properties plan. But all the people who would have lived there in the future would also lose that opportunity. If one wishes to live in a big building with a view unencumbered by trees and unbothered by sun-dappled shade, ample opportunities already exist in Silver Spring.
That strip mall on 16th street would be the next project to redevelope. It’s true that traffic would be a significant issue at this juncture, but it’s like the Purple Line argument, if one dosen’t start building a pedestrian friendly environment, we’ll never get there because we’re scared of the extra traffic. If traffic is so bad, won’t that be just the kind of market and lifestyle incentive to further a sustainable, mass-transit oriented future we all seem to agree is best? Then again, the Safeway on 17th street in Dupont circle has no parking either!
I agree that the 16th St./EW HWY intersection area would need retooling if this is going to work. This can be managed, however, by having appropriately timed traffic lights and having any parking enter/exit on different streets. You could also just have a really tiny parking lot. The PURPOSE of this is to give the locals something to walk to. I live in Summitt Hills and would shop at that Harris Teeter exclusively. I’d probably even spend more money than normal because I’d stop in several times a week on the way home from the metro. I regularly wish for a grocery store on that corner.
I’d also note that traffic in that intersection really isn’t bad after 6:30 and is negligible on weekends. So we may be overestimating the traffic effect. I don’t know many people who’d drive 6 miles from Wheaton every week to do their regular grocery shopping when there’s about 5 other grocery stores between them and the proposed Teet. It’s not like the store is cheaper than Giant or Safeway. It is more likely to compete with people who like Whole Foods but don’t want to pay the $.