This June, planners are set to resume their work on the future of 290 acres around Rockville Pike, though some would like to see it happen sooner.
The White Flint 2 Sector Plan encompasses the horseshoe-shaped area on either side of Rockville Pike between the White Flint area and the official boundary of the City of Rockville.
It includes suburban-style office buildings along Executive Boulevard, the Montrose Crossing Shopping Center, Pike Center, Randolph Hills Shopping Center and a number of light-industrial and commercial uses along Parklawn Drive.
Planners would look at new, mixed-use zoning that would make the area more similar to what’s planned just to the south in White Flint. They would also hope to address traffic flow issues and how to connect areas divided by a CSX rail line running north and south.
On Tuesday, some County Council members told Planning Department Director Gwen Wright they’d like to see work restart on the plan as soon as this month. Planners held a community meeting in 2012 on the area before it was delayed in the work plan.
“There’s money to be made there,” Councilmember George Leventhal told Wright during the Council’s semi-annual review of the department’s work schedule. “White Flint 2 has the nearest-term opportunity to grow our tax base significantly. I don’t think it’s especially controversial.”
Wright said the department got a letter requesting the plan be finished by March 2016, which she said would be overly ambitious for a process that involves traffic studies, community meetings, Planning Board hearings and plenty of zoning tweaks and changes.
“It’s complicated because it is tied in with a lot of the same traffic issues that came into play in White Flint,” Wright said.
The department says the plan could be ready for Council review by December 2016.
Councilmember Nancy Floreen said both the White Flint 2 and Rock Spring plan for an area of office parks in Bethesda should be made a top priority. Floreen alluded to Marriott International’s desire for a new headquarters location.
The corporation is now located in Rock Spring on Fernwood Road. Some in the White Flint area would like to see it relocate there to help spur the expected redevelopment approved by the 2010 White Flint Sector Plan.
Floreen also asked Wright to speed up the department’s planned study of naturally occurring affordable housing. Wright said securing a consultant to help with the study slowed down the process and that an advisory committee on the topic is set to meet for the first time this month.
The Planning Department now expects the Bethesda Downtown Plan to reach the Council in January 2016, instead of the previously scheduled June 2015. The Westbard Plan has also been moved back from a November 2015 submittal to the Council to March 2016.
Via Planning Department
