Community Center and Town Center: More Details Emerge for Waterfront Station in Southwest

• March 19th 2018

by Nena Perry-Brown

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Last August, more-detailed plans emerged for the remaining sites at the Waterfront Station development along 4th and M Streets SW as Forest City applied to modify the use of the pair of buildings from office to residential. Now, the uses have shifted slightly once again.

In addition to roughly 604 residential units, there will now be 32,400 square feet of office space (rather than the previously-proposed 38,110 square feet), 39,933 square feet of ground-floor retail (rather than the previously-proposed 41,870 square feet), and a 6,000 square-foot community center across the two buildings at 425 M Street SW (map) (west building) and 375 M Street SW (map) (east building).

While the appearance of the buildings hasn’t changed appreciably, the programming of the buildings has been adjusted in response to the community’s expressed desire that the Waterfront Station development evoke the feel of a “town center”. The applicant completed a pedestrian study and a retail report that recommends “an ideal mix of retail” that would break down as follows — 40-50 percent anchor store, 10-30 percent full-service dining, 5-15 percent limited-service dining and 25-35 percent neighborhood goods and services.

All of the office space and the newly-introduced community center will now be in the east building. The community center will be operated by a third party that the applicant and the ANC will agree upon; no rent will be charged to the center operator for the first 30 years. There will also be a total of 399 parking spaces (327 for residents; the previous total for parking was 363) and 172 long-term bicycle spaces. Five of the inclusionary zoning units will be three-bedrooms rather than four.

Perkins Eastman is the development architect. The Zoning Commission will reconsider the second-stage planned-unit development (PUD) application on April 8th.

This article originally published at https://dc.urbanturf.com/articles/blog/community_center_and_town_center_more_details_emerge_for_waterfront_station/13710.