Washington Property Company unveils plan for La Madeleine site in Bethesda (Photos)

The property currently home to La Madeleine at 7607 Old Georgetown Road in Bethesda hasn't changed much since the restaurant opened in 1990. But what is around it has, leaving the suburban-style eatery with surface parking to stand out among increasingly-dense downtown Bethesda. That will change, under a new plan unveiled by developer Washington Property Company at a public meeting last night in Bethesda.

One of the owners' daughters was at the meeting; the owners are in their 90s, and decided to sell to WPC. Attorney Bob Dalrymple represented WPC, and had to address the biggest issue in the room - residents' disappointment over the pending demise of La Madeleine.

"We don't want to lose it," one attendee said. Residents compared the loss of La Madeleine to the recent shuttering of Barnes & Noble, as the loss of a community gathering space, citing its atmosphere of "community and warmth." Some expressed a desire to have the French cafe return in the ground floor of the new building. Dalrymple cautioned them not to get their hopes up, noting that such an outcome would require mutual interest by the restaurant and WPC.

An employee of La Madeleine in attendance said high rent was the reason the Pike & Rose outpost of the chain closed. Rents aren't likely to be cheap in a new building in 20814 - that's just the reality of a jurisdiction that places massive taxes and costs on property owners.

What the new building will have, is 200 residential units and a modest 2500-2700 SF of ground floor retail. Dalrymple said the developer would like curb cut access from Old Georgetown and Commerce Lane, but that the Maryland State Highway Administration may restrict access to Commerce.

There were essentially no architectural or design details presented last night, but some massing diagrams were displayed. The building could be up to 225' tall.

Dalrymple said WPC plans to submit its Sketch plan to the County this month, with a Development Review Committee scheduled for April. A public hearing would likely be held by the Planning Board in June. If approved, the Preliminary and Site plans would be submitted in September, with a hearing on those held by the board in January 2019. Groundbreaking would begin as soon as just six months later, with an estimated delivery of the building in June 2021.

Anthropologie Coming Soon; Redwood going soon?; Calypso, Read Wall gone at Bethesda Row (Photos)

Bethesda residents orphaned by Barnes & Noble are getting their first message from future stepmom Anthropologie. The retailer has posted a modest "Coming Soon" flyer in the window of the vacant bookstore, where Bethesdans were unable to charge their gadgets during the latest Pepco weather debacle.

Meanwhile, the curtain appears to be falling on the Bethesda Lane drama known as Redwood. To be frank, I was told by a source last September that Redwood would be closing in October. A second source said January 1 would be the end. Clearly, they lasted until January 1. Then they closed, citing a burst pipe. But burst pipes don't take two months to reopen from.

Wet-dry vacs gave way to floors being torn up. Finally, the walls and roof were being torn apart, and over the weekend, the windows were blacked out, and apology-reopening-soon signs ripped down. It doesn't look like Redwood is coming back, from all indications at this point, but there is still no official announcement from the restaurant. It's unclear why a closed business would need to continue the charade beyond the closure date, but perhaps one of our readers in the business can shed light on the strategy.

Read Wall 

Meanwhile, men's clothing pop-up Read Wall has vacated its space on Bethesda Avenue, and Calypso St. Barth wrapped up its closing sale across the street and closed.

Calypso St. Barth

Bethesda Bagels to reopen this week at Bethesda Row

It sure doesn't look like it from the outside, but Bethesda Bagels says they'll be reopening their Bethesda Row location this week. When they do, they say they'll be offering a special off-menu item, a Spinach Florentine Egg Sandwich. Sounds good to me.

Washington First Bank in Bethesda will be Sandy Spring Bank...then close (Photos)

Starting this morning, the 7708 Woodmont Avenue branch of Washington First Bank will become Sandy Spring Bank. The branch in the Lionsgate condos, among the rest, were acquired by Sandy Spring a couple of months ago. Already, a banner has been posted above the bank, and signage indoors has been ripped down - presumably to be replaced this morning.

All is not good news for customers, however - Sandy Spring is going to close this branch at 3:00 PM on April 6, 2018. Customers will be redirected to other Sandy Spring branches in the area. This is probably a big deal if you had planned to walk to the bank from a nearby apartment (or, best of all, from your condo upstairs). Not that you have a shortage of competing banks to choose from in downtown Bethesda!

This will create a second vacancy in the ground floor of the Lionsgate; the Cheval Bethesda sales office has relocated into the Cheval itself.

Many Bethesda residents, businesses left powerless Sunday

Power outages persist across Bethesda tonight, from Spring Hill and Westmoreland Hills to Sumner, Mohican Hills, Glen Cove, Brookdale, Bannockburn, Edgemoor, downtown Bethesda, and beyond. One new outage occurred just before 10:00 PM tonight, in fact, near the intersection of Brookeway Drive and Massachusetts Avenue. Ironically, Pepco was just there around 7:00 PM tonight working with a bucket truck at the top of a utility pole. Those folks are surely enjoying the news that their restoration time is 11:00 PM Monday.

While the Bradley Shopping Center and Liberty gas station had their power restored Sunday, the Shoppes of Bethesda and Hampden Lane continue to be children of a lesser god to the decisionmakers at Pepco. My Eye Dr. was more optimistic than most, speculating they might have power restored before midnight.

Much more Purple Line work in Bethesda, Chevy Chase this week

Construction on the Purple Line light rail between Bethesda and New Carrollton is really going to ramp up in downtown Bethesda and Chevy Chase, starting tomorrow. A tower crane is scheduled to arrive as soon as Monday, March 5, and will be erected on the Elm Street side of the Purple Line station project (where the Apex Building was, before being demolished recently).

According to Purple Line Transit Partners, the entity in charge of the project, the tower crane arrival and assembly will not disrupt traffic patterns on nearby roads (which is pretty unusual, if you're familiar with usually-disruptive tower crane assemblies), and will be completed by March 16 (strange again, as most tower crane assemblies are completed in 1-2 days).

Also starting Monday, "tree-clearing and grubbing" (a.k.a. clearcutting of forest) will begin on the section of the Georgetown Branch/Capital Crescent Trail between the Air Rights Building and Montgomery Avenue (at East-West Highway).

Bethesda businesses lose money, residents lose patience as power outages persist (Photos)

Many Bethesda businesses - and residents - remain without power tonight. The Bradley Shopping Center, home to Strosniders Hardware, is one of the largest to go dark. Another large shopping center shuttered for a second night is the Shoppes of Bethesda on Hampden Lane, where The Lauren remains the only property with power. That means Taylor Gourmet and Kapnos Kouzina were unable to serve meals for a second day, as well. One of the few gas stations left downtown, Liberty at the Bradley Shopping Center, was also shut down.

The largest power outage in Bethesda is currently near Walter Reed National Military Medical Center, where 728 customers are in the dark. But dozens and dozens of smaller neighborhood outages, and over a hundred countywide, are yet to be repaired. Clearly, Pepco did not bring in enough crews from out of state, despite 72 hours advance notice from the National Weather Service.

Hampden Lane

Bradley Shopping Center