Posts about Retail

It is located just off of the Capital Beltway at Arena Drive—steps away from the Largo Town Center Metro Station on the Blue Line, and approximately one mile away from FedEx Field.

Borders Books was one of the Boulevard's original anchor tenants. However, in 2011, Borders shut its doors as part of the company's bankruptcy and eventual nationwide liquidation. The space, pictured below, has been vacant ever since.

Based on the guidelines established by Whole Foods for consideration of new retail locations, the old Borders space at the Boulevard is an ideal site. This is what the retailer says it is looking for:

• 200,000 people or more in a 20-minute drive time
  
• 25,000-50,000 square feet
  
• Large number of college-educated residents
  
• Abundant parking available for our exclusive use
  
• Stand alone preferred, would consider complementary
  
• Easy access from roadways, lighted intersection
  
• Excellent visibility, directly off of the street
  
• Must be located in a high traffic area (foot and/or vehicle)
  

Let's see how the old Borders space matches up. In terms of demographics, more than 252,000 people live within a five-mile radius—well within a 20-minute drive. In addition, all Blue Line Metrorail stations from Capitol South eastward to Largo Town Center are within a 20-minute ride of the Boulevard (and within a 20-25 minute drive on a good day). This dramatically increases the population count within the target area of this retail space.

The average household income in the immediate three-mile radius is $80,600, and more than 64% of the adult population within a one-mile radius of the Boulevard has either attended or graduated from college. Taking into account the entire area within a 20-minute drive or Metro ride of the Boulevard, including the affluent and highly-educated Capitol Hill neighborhood, the household income and educational attainment levels increase significantly.

The old Borders space is also very well situated, meeting all of Whole Foods' desired site location criteria. It is clearly visible from Arena Drive, just off of a lighted intersection. There are multiple signalized vehicle access points to the Boulevard—two from Arena Drive at the north end, and one from Harry S. Truman Drive at the south end. In addition, there is a lighted pedestrian path (near Truman Drive) that provides direct access to the Boulevard from the Largo Town Center Metro station.

Finally, there is ample parking directly in front of the store space that would be available for the near-exclusive use of Whole Foods customers. Simply put, in terms of foot and vehicle traffic, visibility, and parking availability, few locations in Prince George's County can match it.

Aside from the necessary construction to convert the old Borders space from a bookstore into an upscale specialty grocery store, Whole Foods would need to do very little work to get the store up and running. At 22,915 square feet, this one-story stand-alone space is currently slightly smaller than the Whole Foods stated minimum goal of 25,000 square feet. However, as you can see from the above picture, the space was built with a faux second floor, complete with ample window lighting.

Although I am not an architect or structural engineer, it seems that it should be feasible to add the necessary floor and ceiling to convert this space into two actual stories—in which case, there would be nearly 44,000 square feet of usable space. If not, the existing space is sufficient for a specialty grocer like Whole Foods. Similar competitors, like Greensboro, North Carolina based The Fresh Market, regularly build stores that are about 20,000 square feet.

So what would be the downside, from Whole Foods' perspective, of coming to the Boulevard? Sure, the Boulevard has had its challenges over the years with crime and rowdy teens, but so have other great Metro-accessible shopping centers, like Gallery Place and DC USA in the District. The Boulevard has also had the misfortune of having three of its anchors—Borders, Circuit City, and Linens 'N Things—file for bankruptcy and close their doors.

Recently, though, things have been looking up for the Boulevard. HH Gregg and Shoppers World have taken over the Circuit City and Linens 'N Things spaces, and a new T.G.I. Friday's recently opened in the space vacated by Uno's Chicago Grill. The Boulevard's property managers have instituted a "Parental Escort Policy" that has been successful in discouraging teenagers from loitering.

Increased security and police presence throughout the Boulevard have improved both public perceptions and the realities of safety. Furthermore, it should be noted that the old Borders property is located on the opposite end of the mall, far from the movie theater and other venues that attract many of the youngsters.

The success of the nearby Woodmore Town Center development, which houses a Wegmans grocery store, Costco, Best Buy, and other retailers, shows that there is sufficient spending power in central Prince George's County to make a speciality grocer like Whole Foods extremely profitable.

Indeed, locating a Whole Foods at the old Borders Books store at Boulevard at the Capital Centre offers two advantages that Woodmore Town Center cannot: walkable proximity to Metro and direct visibility from a major street. (Not to mention that Whole Foods probably could not open at Woodmore anyway, given the likelihood of a restrictive covenant in favor of Wegmans that would prohibit another grocery store in that development.)

Whatever decision the Prince George's County Planning Board and County Council eventually make regarding the rezoning of the Cafritz Property in Riverdale Park, it will likely result in years of litigation before Whole Foods, or any other commercial retailer, can start developing there. Local opposition to that new greenfield development is stiff (e.g., see here and here.)

Whole Foods cannot and should not wait that long to bring a store to Prince George's County. Neither should Whole Foods think that there can be only one of its stores in the entire county. The old Borders Books at Boulevard at Capital Centre in Largo is "transit ready" and waiting for a store like Whole Foods.

If you agree that Whole Foods (or another specialty grocer like The Fresh Market) should come to the Boulevard, contact the following people and let them know you support the idea:

• Whole Foods' Master Broker for Maryland: Mark J. Katz, H&R Retail, 2800 Quarry Lake Drive, Suite 320, Baltimore, MD 21209; Email: mkatz@HRRetail.com; 410-308-6366.
  
• The Fresh Market's Director of Real Estate for the Northeast and Mid-Atlantic Region: James Dewey, 628 Green Valley Road, Suite 500, Greensboro, NC 27408; Email: jamesdewey@thefreshmarket.com; 336-272-1338.
  
• Property Manager for Boulevard at the Capital Centre: Mark Nicholas, Inland US Management, LLC, 2901 Butterfield Rd, Oak Brook, Illinois 60523; Email: nicholas@inland-western.com; 866.646.5263.
  
• Brokerage Contact for Boulevard at the Capital Centre: Ryan Wilner, KLNB, LLC, 100 West Road, Suite 505, Baltimore, MD 21204; Email: rwilner@klnb.com; 443.632.2058

Greenberg grew up in the DC area, living briefly in Wheaton during the 1950's. After working for a Boston-based real estate investment firm on their D.C.-area projects, he struck out on his own and founded Greenhill Capital in 1974. In the 1980's, he's began buying and developing properties in Wheaton, anticipating the opening of a new Metro station.

"It was the last [central business district] that was scheduled to be developed" after Silver Spring, Bethesda and Friendship Heights, says Greenberg. "Plus, it was human scale. And there's something about the small proprietors."

Most of Greenberg's properties in Wheaton are single-story retail buildings, many of which were designed by Rockville architect Steven Karr. But he's always itched to do something greater. As he told the Gazette last week, Greenberg sees Wheaton as the next Adams Morgan, a vibrant hub for entertainment, shopping and culture. Not only that, but he knows how to do it.

"I'm a johnny-one-note. I've been saying this for 25 years, to get people on the street. I'm an urbophile. I'm a believer in 'city.' I get it."

If Greenberg had his way, he'd change liquor licenses to allow up to 75% of a venue's total sales to be alcohol, drawing bars and clubs. He wants a "county sponsored lease plan and economic program" to fill empty stores with theatres, artists and even university ventures. And he would've made sure that businesses displaced by redevelopment stayed in the area, unlike Barry's Magic Shop, which was condemned by the county to build a pedestrian walkway and received $260,000 to move to Rockville.

Finally, Greenberg would build lots of housing, both downtown and in surrounding neighborhoods, to create more foot traffic that can support local businesses. He's not convinced that B.F. Saul's plan to build offices over the Wheaton Metro will pencil out. "It costs as much to build in Wheaton as it does in Friendship Heights, but the rent multiplier is significantly higher," he explains.

In other words, tenants will pay more for an office in Friendship Heights than in Wheaton, no matter how nice it is. Meanwhile, rents for apartments in Wheaton are the same as those elsewhere in the county. "The county will have to heavily subsidize that office building," Greenberg told me on Monday, two days before Leggett's announcement.

After our talk, I e-mail Greenberg to ask what he thought about the $40 million subsidy B.F. Saul could receive. "Development would have occurred in Wheaton with bolder (even traditional urban) planning, but the county was too lazy and too anti-business for change to naturally evolve," he replies. "We never considered a [government] subsidy ... on any of our other projects."

“We're not apologizing”

According to Greenberg, any attempts to take Wheaton beyond the strip mall have been stifled by local opposition and red tape. "Boy, do I try to do more and better there," says Greenberg, "and you cannot imagine the resistance we have."

In 1990, the county passed a plan for downtown Wheaton that instituted a "Retail Overlay Preservation District." The district was supposed to protect small businesses while ensuring that new construction was of high quality. However, by limiting the density of new development and requiring that all new buildings be reviewed by the Planning Board, even ones that complied with the zoning code, it actually repelled investment.

"I absolutely abhor what the county has been doing all these years" in Wheaton, says Greenberg. "What they needed to do is have more density, more people to walk and support the urban core."

Upon buying the Anchor Inn restaurant at Georgia Avenue and University Boulevard in 2004, Greenberg envisioned redeveloping it with new housing and shops. It was the height of the real estate boom, when new apartments and townhouses were being built at the edges of downtown Wheaton. However, his proposal to build a 600,000 square feet mixed-use development on the site went nowhere because the county took too long to finish a new plan for the downtown, which was finally approved last year. "They wouldn't repeal the overlay district" in time, he grumbles.

In a Gazette article from 2006, Greenberg lamented that Wheaton "missed the train" on the economic boom. Instead, he built what zoning allowed: the smaller Georgia Crossing project, a series of one-story retail buildings that one resident called underwhelming.

"In the 1950's and 60's, Montgomery County was the standard by which suburbia was to be developed," Greenberg says. "The Wedges and Corridors [Plan], blah blah blah. But as we became more urbanized, they . . . tried to impose suburban standards on urban locations, without consideration to alleys and deliveries and urban edge and human scale, doors at the urban edge and creating a liveliness that was required."

That said, Greenberg isn't doing terribly well in Wheaton. He calls me out for using the above photo of Triangle Park, a shopping center at the intersection of Ennalls Avenue and Veirs Mill that he rebuilt after a large fire in 2008. The photo was taken in 2010 and shows the complex when it was new and empty. "That space has been leased for 18 months," says Greenberg. "We're getting mid-$30's [the leasing rate per square foot] and the parking lot is always full."

Not all of his tenants have been happy, though. In 2010, several disgruntled former tenants complained to the Gazette of broken contracts and unfairly high rents. One of those tenants was Eddie Velasquez, whose DeJaBel Café at Georgia Crossing opened in 2008 and closed 14 months later. Greenberg says it's simple why DeJaBel closed.

"If you owned a coffee shop, when would you open?" he asks me. "I guess 6 or 7 am, for people going on their way to work," I say.

"He opened at 9," Greenberg replies. Nonetheless, Greenhill got Velasquez a liquor license so the cafe could stay open at night, but even that wasn't enough to keep them in business. Cavan Wilk, suggests that it was a lack of foot traffic that killed DeJaBel Café, which wouldn't have been a problem if Greenberg had been able to build apartments on top.

"We're not apologizing" for the work Greenhill does, Greenberg says. "Think about the jobs we've created. We start people in businesses and we keep people in business."

“No one asked me to do it”

One place where Greenberg sees the county doing something right is in downtown Bethesda, where Greenhill Capital's headquarters are located. The difficulty of doing business elsewhere in the county, whether it's Wheaton's retail overlay district or limits on procuring liquor licenses, sends people here, Greenberg says.

Not surprisingly, the handful of projects Greenhill has built here are much better than those in Wheaton: buildings close to the street, a mix of uses, and little aesthetic flourishes here and there. And no parking lots.

On Cordell Avenue, a pizzeria he developed features trompe l'oeil, or an optical illusion of fountains along the sidewalk. "No one asked me to do it," Greenberg says. "I did it." Over at Woodmont Avenue and Elm Street is what Greenberg calls "the Haagen-Dazs building" after its former ground-floor tenant, which has since moved down the street. The building remains a nice, and fully-occupied, piece of urbanism: it's a mix of retail and office space, has lots of windows facing the street, and a little plaza in front that is occasionally used for concerts.

Then there's the Edgemoor, shown at the top of the post, a complex of condominiums and townhomes on Montgomery Lane that was developed by Greenberg and built by three local builders. He rattles off a list of high-end features: "Real copper gutters and downspouts, slate roofs on the end units, oak doors," he says. "And until they screwed it up, Georgian gardens. I had these really nice Georgian gardens, but they took out all of the benches." Greenberg also lives in the high-rise building, which looks like an old-school New York apartment house.

"I wanted something between the Dakota and the Plaza," he says.

Yet these accomplishments generally go unnoticed east of Rock Creek Park, where Greenberg's reputation (including on this blog) is as an unscrupulous landlord and purveyor of strip malls. "Nobody talks about the stuff that we've given or the contributions we've made," he says. "To put your name on the line for a construction project is far different than throwing spitballs at it."

As a result, Greenberg is content to wait. "We got so frustrated with the process [in Wheaton] that we said we'll go forward and we'll wait for the next generation to take it to the next level," he says. "We are constrained by a non-business friendly environment, and Montgomery County's paid the price for that. Developers are not willing to take the risk."

And they'll sit on their substantial holdings in Wheaton until everyone else comes around. "We have enough ground for 1.5 million square feet" of development under current zoning, he says. "We're interested in the right kind of deal. We're not interested in selling."

He adds, "We'll see if Wheaton's time is now."

The former Babe's sits on the corner of Wisconsin Avenue and Brandywine Street, near the top of a hill with downward slopes to the south and west, and Douglas's proposal promises to utilize this topography creatively.

Douglas Development's proposal would allow for a potential sit-down restaurant to have an outdoor seating area along Brandywine Street and for the sought-after retail tenants (no dry cleaners, fast-food restaurants, or banks) to have tall, airy ceilings as high as 16-18 feet.

Although the retail mix in Tenleytown is improving, this stretch of Wisconsin Avenue has long been associated with mattress stores, cheap fast food, dry cleaners and lots of banks (okay, maybe not the banks) that belies the affluence of upper Northwest and the proximity to the student population at American University.

A ground-floor restaurant would be an ideal tenant for the space and provide significant value to the community, but if the ANC or Zoning Commission requires parking, that won't be possible due to the topography.

Foregoing on-site parking will also help make the upstairs housing units more affordable. This is appropriate, as the cost of underground parking can cost as much as $40,000 per unit, a significant barrier to working-class people seeking to move to the Wisconsin Avenue corridor.

The site is also just a few hundred feet from the Metro station, is well-served by several bus routes, and is within walking distance of two grocery stores and other amenities.

Despite the fact that people who are willing to pay a premium to live directly next to a Metro station have fundamentally different travel patterns, with much lower car ownership and transit usage rates than the surrounding neighbors, Douglas Development is planning ahead for the few people who may own a car. The company proposes to aggressively pursue shared parking agreements with neighboring businesses with spaces that go unused every day.

Douglas could also help reduce driving demand further by providing amenities like car sharing spaces and dedicated bicycle parking. Supportive neighbors have recommended making both a part of the community benefits package.

While the predictable opponents of any change have opposed the Babe's development, city officials in Santa Monica, California, recently approved a very similar 56-unit mixed-use development without any off-street parking. This despite the fact that it will be at least a half decade until the light-rail Expo Line is extended to Santa Monica. The Babe's site already has Metro nearly at its doorstep.

If a mixed-use development can be built in car-centric Southern California without any off-street parking, years before a light rail connection will be provided to the neighborhood, DC's elected leaders and planning officials should have the courage to support a similar development in a walkable community, already well-served by transit.

I urge smart growth advocates to attend the ANC 3E meeting. The Babe's issue might not come up until later in the meeting (perhaps around 9:30pm), but if you come earlier, you can hear from the folks at Safeway who are planning to rebuild the store at 42nd and Ellicott Streets NW, along Wisconsin Avenue.

There are sure to be the usual opponents of any Wisconsin Avenue development in attendance, so the more proponents of a mixed-use development of the Babe's site in attendance, the better.

More activity on the sidewalk is a good thing. We want it. Sidewalk activity is what makes for good cities.

To be fair, there are occasional places where adding a walk-up window would be troublesome. Especially narrow sidewalks that already have especially heavy pedestrian traffic, for example. A hypothetical walk-up window at the corner of Wisconsin and M Street might get in the way, and ultimately harm walkability by inconveniencing too many other people. That's a legitimate concern.

But 99.9% of the time, walk-up windows are great. The proposed walk-up macaron shop in Georgetown is way up Wisconsin Avenue, well north of the busiest area, on a stretch of sidewalk with plenty of room for existing shops to put out clothes racks and wicker furniture. It should be approved.

And hopefully there will be even more proposals in the future for these great features of urbanism.

One of the main challenges in convincing people to switch to transit is the unpredictability of bus arrivals. If every stop featured a digital screen displaying the number of minutes until each bus arrived, more people would be willing to take the bus.

Outdoor screens, however, are expensive to install, which is why we created this indoor alternative at a fraction of the cost. For the past few months I have been working with Andy Chosak and David Alpert at the Mobility Lab in Arlington to bring this low-cost alternative to fruition.

Every 20 seconds, our web server queries each transit agency for the arrival predictions for the stops near both test sites, then relays the data to the screens. The actual unit inside the shops is just a low-cost, barebones Linux system connected to a standard computer monitor and the business's own Wi-Fi and power. We've configured the box to automatically load up the screen when it starts, so there's no need to log in or launch an app after the unit is plugged in.

We are continuing to build the system so it can be deployed quickly and cheaply throughout the region at participating shops, bars, cafes, and restaurants. Ultimately, a business will be able to sign up, type in their address, and get a screen automatically customized with the nearest bus stops, Metro station, and Capital Bikeshare station. And someone with their own computer connected to a standard computer monitor will be able to set up their own screen for free.

This project is only possible thanks to open data from our transit agencies. We can only pull bus and train predictions as well as the status of each CaBi station because the agencies behind these systems have wisely chosen to provide stop locations, route information, and real-time arrival predictions to outside software developers.

If you run a businesses are interested in finding out more about purchasing one of these screens for your location, let us know at screens@mobilitylab.org.

According to land records, the two-story red brick building at 2021 Martin Luther King, Jr. Avenue SE was constructed in 1906. With more than 3,000 square feet, the building has held temporary office space for non-profits in recent years but is currently without a tenant.

Community opposition & political malaise

On June 30th, Greta Fuller, ANC8A03, sent Calvary a letter stating her resistance. "Bringing another social service to the business corridor of Anacostia will make it all the more difficult to bring in more businesses and shop owners."

On August 18th, the entire 8A Advisory Neighborhood Commission sent DC Council Chairman Kwame Brown a letter requesting a meeting with CWS as pursuant to DC statute. Along with the letter were 22 pages of support petitions representing several hundred residents.

"It's disappointing the parties involved don't think it's worth their time to sit down with the community that is affected to engage in a conversation," said Charles Wilson, ANC8A04. "After repeatedly denying our request to meet, it shows that Calvary could care less about how we feel or what we think."

"We don't have any authority to intervene. This needs to be resolved by the executive." said Joyce Clement Smith, Chief of Staff to Ward 8 Councilmember Marion Barry. Noting the growing unrest of the community, Smith said, "We are clearly aware of the opposition."

Councilmember Barry struck a different tone yesterday in a twitter message, but this political rhetoric may be too little, too late.

To compound the community's frustration, in October Calvary launched a "grassroots fundraising campaign" to raise $100,000 in 100 days to support the building of the facility's kitchen. Kristine Thompson, Calvary's Executive Director, did not respond to repeated emails.

According to the press release announcing the campaign, "The Morris & Gwendolyn Cafritz Foundation has been the first to commit their support to the Good Hope Kitchen by offering a $50,000 matching gift for funds raised through project." In response to an inquiry about what weight the community's lack of support for the shelter played in the grant evaluation process, Rose Ann Cleveland, Executive Director of the Cafritz Foundation, wrote in an email, "I would suggest that you contact directly Ms. Kristine Thompson, the executive director of Calvary. She is the best source for information on the transitional housing program for women that Calvary provides and knows most about the many donors that support Calvary's efforts."

Good Hope Road SE: "Anything you want!"

The community's discontentment stems from its gnawing angst that further concentration of social service agencies will undermine Historic Anacostia's fledgling business district. With the high profile Uniontown Bar and Grill facing an uncertain future, Anacostia's retail future is all the more precarious.

"Everything they do for this community is to get people over, under it, around it, and through it," said Reverend Oliver Johnson, a lifelong Anacostian and former ANC Commissioner, on a recent morning.

District leaders' silence on the shelter project only reinforces residents' feelings that politicians view Anacostia as a social service dumping ground. This taciturn endorsement of the convergence of relief agencies in Anacostia makes the neighborhood indeterminably unattractive to young families, a demographic vital to the city's future says Johnson.

"Here's the issue about any community that has rehabilitation as its primary function. You got St. Elizabeths Hospital - the only community in the city that has a mental health hospital - that releases to the streets. You got the largest methadone treatment clinic here, and the people from Virginia who don't have methadone [clinics] anymore are coming here to DC."

The commerce that defined the Anacostia of Johnson's youth - a full fledged grocery store, movie theater, People's Drug store, and multiple clothing stores - is nearly gone, dominated by non-profits, carry-outs, street hustlers, and mendicants.

"I have a three year old grand son," says Johnson, "and when I walk him down Good Hope Road, people say, 'Singles and packs. Anything you want!' My grandson asks, 'Grandpa, what's that?' And I tell him, 'They're selling single cigarettes and drugs.'"

"Then we walk up the street. A man approaches and says, 'Gotta dollar? Got fifty cents?' My grandson asks, 'What is he doing?' I tell him he's begging," Johnson said. "I had one of the people say to my grandson, 'Gotta learn how to hustle!' I stopped and said my grandson is three years old. I said, 'Don't you know I will exercise some parking lot fellowship on you that you ain't never seen.'"

"So what happens is, you got a 900 hundred people per day methadone clinic, The Good Hope Institute, you have a 12 step program for AA/NA called the Anacostia Young People's club. And now this Kitchen. Everybody has a clean name. Nobody says who they are. They all have a clean socially acceptable name."

According to Calvary's website, the 14,000 square foot project comes at a price tag of $3 million and "will transform an abandoned building in Anacostia into a new home that will serve 50 women a night and provide 100 meals a day."

While the investment is needed in Anacostia, the kind of use is not. No matter the redemptive mission of the shelter, its presence has the potential to be detrimental to the community in the long run. Additionally, Calvary's refusal to meet with the community hasn't allayed residents and property owners' trepidations.

In the 70s and 80s, old center cities across the country discovered that headquartering human and social service agencies downtown dashed hopes of economic recovery. It would appear DC is now poised to re-learn this lesson in Historic Anacostia.