The development team behind the future St. Elmo Apartments has requested demolition permits from Montgomery County for the buildings that currently stand on the future tower's site. These include the former Vuk, Chef Tony's (the owners of which have a new restaurant in the Promenade at Pooks Hill, and are planning to open a second in downtown Bethesda at a future date) on St. Elmo Avenue, and a legendary TV repair shop on Fairmont Avenue.
The St. Elmo will be right next to the Bainbridge Bethesda, with which it will share a redesigned public plaza. Along with the now-leasing 8001 Woodmont development, the St. Elmo is the longest-running redevelopment project in downtown Bethesda. Both projects were first proposed in 2014, and ran into numerous delays. Some demolition for the St. Elmo already took place along Fairmont Avenue in 2018, and that portion of the property has been put to interim uses, such as storage parking for EuroMotorcars.
13 comments:
Thanks for the heads up! It’s nice to see another 22 story mixed-use, multi-family over retail project starting up. Hopefully some of these displaced retail tenants can find a temporary home until they can move into the base of the new tower. It would be great to see that pedestrian passage between the St.Elmo and the Bainbridge lined with restaurants and shops, maybe becoming a bit more like Bethesda Lane. Gallery Lane seems to be slow to lease up, but its a bit farther from Norfolk, the Main Street in the Woodmont Triangle.
Let’s hope we will see signs of other fully approved capers starting up soon, like 4915/4921 Auburn, the Artena, the Claiborne, the former La Madeline, 8008 Wisconsin, and perhaps even the Rugby Lofts. Four or five new towers could really continue the transformation of the area, especially with the new Marriott HQ and Marriott Hotel as an anchors, chock full of employees and hotel guests. The new Trader Joe’s should add some nice foot traffic for all the nearby multi family residents in the area.
Robert, this would probably require more work that anyone ought to volunteer for, but can you offer a tally of the total number of apartment and condo units, both online already and proposed or being built, for the Bethesda beats you cover, possibly? (Including Friendship Heights, Westbard, Chevy Chase Lake, Pike & Rose, White Flint, etc.) It seems like the developers are bulldozing every last commercial space to construct high-rise apartment blocks. Who are all these people who are going to live here, and where are they going to go to get their goods and services? Pretty soon, there won't be any space left for any businesses at all except the 7,000 restaurants in the area.
Most of these new towers include lots of ground floor retail space. It’s usually 12’ to 16’ tall with floor to ceiling windows facing the street. These space are likely much nicer than the older one story high retail spaces they replace. Wider sidewalks are usually constructed that allow space for outdoor dining, benches, and more street trees and street lighting. By having 300 or so folks living above these spaces, the ground floor retail gets a built in group of patrons. More density in these towers usually means more (and usually higher quality retail for all of us. More residential density in downtown Bethesda means less suburb urban sprawl in up-county areas.
With all the new ground floor s-aces providing goods and services, and better access to transit, less people need to drive and can sim-Le walk or ride their bike for most needs. The new Trader Joe’s will be a great example of ground floor retail serving these dense urban communities.
I image many of the 3500 employees of Marriott might choose to move to the area once they see how nice it would be to walk or ride their bike to work. Lots of folks that work at NIH and Walter Reed have already figured out how cool it is to live nearby. Both are planning and building major expansions that will only expand the demand for multi-family apartments and condos in nearby downtown Bethesda.
The Purple Line will connect Bethesda and Chevy Chase Lake, and more importantly, Silver Spring with only an 8 minute ride connecting all tree downtowns. Live in Chevy Chase Lake, work in Silver Spring, dine and shop in Bethesda, all without owning a car.
Bethesda still has plenty of underutilized and vacant ground floor retail scattered around the are. Lots of older B and C class retail spaces are still available for any retailer displaced by new development, and can’t afford the likely more expensive rent.
Anonymous at 8:36 and 6:51 AM: Sure, utopia is only a few more multi-family high rises away. If developers build them, they will come! Americans will gladly give up their single-family suburban homes and their cars to live in your vision of paradise. Who wouldn't want to pay $3500 or more per month for a 2 bedroom apartment in Bethesda, when they could pay the same or less for a mortgage on a single-family home? But if you are right, please explain why the market for condominiums in Bethesda is soft, whereas the market for single-family homes in the surrounding suburban areas is still hot. And the latest additions to the Bethesda high-rise market, the Edge and Maizon Bethesda, still look nearly empty to me.
What 8:21 said.
I lived in a nice suburban home for most of my life. It’s a great way to build wealth if you are willing to put in some effort to make improvements. It’s also nice if you want a back yard, a private garage and a basement. Interest and taxes on a home or condo are usually tax deductible, which is nice.
On the other hand, now that we live in a rental apartment in downtown Bethesda, we can invest all that equity we had built up in our house to pay for most of our rent. We also don’t have to pay for maintenance or repairs like new roofs, windows, siding, driveways, sidewalks, and of course we pay no real estate tax. Our utilities are much lower than in a single family detached home. We don’t have to pay a realtor 6% of the value of our home when we wish to move. In fact we can easily move to any other apartment if our building gets tired or old, so we can always live in brand new housing, in any place in the world, if we choose. By living in a walkable community with excellent transit access, we only need one car, and barely drive it. The amenities like a fitness center, club room, lounge, roof top terrace and much greater in our apartment than any single family home we could afford. We can easily walk to 200 restaurant’s and cafes, 500 businesses, five grocery stores, a movie theater, a library, two theaters and dozens of urban parks and plazas. Of course the Metro and soon the Purple Line are only steps away.
The cost to buy a condo of the size, location and quality of our flat would be way more than we would be willing to invest for the above reasons. In our case the flexibility of rental housing is very important.
The Edge and Maizon just opened, so of course they will take time like any multi-family housing to apartments lease up or sell out for condos. The Elm seems to be leasing up rather quickly. I think the market for condos in downtown Bethesda is driven by the hyper-luxury nature of these properties, which always seems to take a long time to sell out.
Yes, as we all know the 8:21 internet rando knows more about downtown real estate than all of these developers and market analysts combined. They're all just throwing away billions of dollars on new construction because no one wants to live in walkable areas, despite literally centuries of proof otherwise.
Anonymous at 8:21 AM continued: btw, I bike on the CC trail on the weekends, but I always ride on the sidewalk to get from my home to the trail on Bethesda Avenue to avoid getting killed or maimed by a motorist. I wonder what anonymous at 8:36 and 6:51 AM is smoking to think it will ever be safe for Bethesda residents to walk or ride their bikes for most needs.
If people are griping about price, then there needs to be more supply and competition for the given demand. I hope developers keep building more multi-story rental and condo units in Bethesda. It's the only way that rents and prices will come down and stay down.
Anonymous at 4:06 PM, I’m sure you realize that the county is building a large network of separated bike lanes in downtown Bethesda. I couldn’t agree more that bike on the current network of streets is dangerous. Hopefully the expanded network of separated bike lanes will help. I don’t see any problem with walking though, unless you choose to jaywalk. Certainly caution is warranted as many drivers are not careful at crosswalks.I can’t think of an urban place that is more walkable than downtown Bethesda.
Of course the narrow 5’ wide sidewalk directly adjacent to fast moving Arlington Road might be the exception. I’m always worried that a simple stumble on a chunk of raised sidewalk could cost me my life…
Anonymous at 11:41 PM, I hope more developers take advantage of the density bonus’s that can be granted for exceeding the minimum amount of required MPDU’s. The county should track this and perhaps increase the bonus if required to get more affordable housing. As these newer towers age, they will likely remain more affordable at least compared to the newest buildings. The Gallery, Bainbridge and 7770 Norfolk are all approaching ten years of age, and likely showing lots of wear and tear, unless they are remodeled and updated every few years. It is good that lots of options exist for folks willing to move.
@6:04 AM: Developers just have to keep building as much as they can. It's a shame that development at the White Flint Mall site has completely stalled. A large development there would really address the supply constraint. It would drop prices and it would bring additional business revenue and jobs into MoCo.
The county adopted real estate tax abatement for housing development on Metro owned land might spur some development at White Flint, opps, I mean North Bethesda…
The former White Flint Mall site is so large, and controlled by a single entity, it seems like it will take a real visionary developer to pull the trigger. Not sure the current owner/developer has the vision and foresight that Federal Realty had to create Pike & Rose, Rockville Town Center and of course, Bethesda Row. Saul Centers and JBG Smith also come to mind as bold developers, willing to take risks, that can pull off these very large capers.
Lots of stalled projects in Bethesda. The old surplus store and cleaners are a real eye sore on Wisconsin Ave.
Developers should be required to keep up vacant properties.
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