A plan to build four dozen townhouses as part of a 10-year redevelopment of a Potomac shopping center is expected to receive Planning Board approval following a public hearing this week.
The townhouses, to be priced around $1 million each, are included in the first phase of a mixed-use development at the Cabin John Village center, according to planning documents and a builder.
A preliminary 10-year plan for the overall development was approved by the Planning Board in October 2018, and calls for a total of 59 townhomes and 60,000 square feet of retail and office space, that would take place in three stages.
Once the plans are approved, “we’ve got about six months of detailed engineering and permit work to do, with the goal of starting land development in the early fall,” said Jack Lester, executive vice president of Washington area homebuilder EYA.
Of the 48 new single-family townhouses, six will be classified as affordable housing, in accordance with Montgomery County law.
The houses will stand “between 30 and 35 feet” tall, Lester said. “It’s going to be three stories in the front, and then there’ll be a tuck-under garage off the alley in the back.”
The shopping center, owned by retail real estate corporation Edens, has about 241,000 square feet of commercial space. Tenants include a Giant Food grocery and CVS drug store, several restaurants and fast-food chains.
Edens is overseeing the commercial redevelopment.
“The project will revitalize the existing aging strip shopping center and enhance community connectivity, creating a more vibrant, pedestrian friendly, mixed-use village center,” according to documents on file with the Planning Board.
Home goods stores, fitness centers, food vendors and music venues were all listed as potential occupants of the commercial space.
To make way for the development, internal roads are expected to be reconfigured, according to planning documents, and 15,600 square feet of existing retail space will be demolished and rebuilt in the center of the complex. Existing parking areas will also be replaced, with the new development including approximately 1,013 parking spaces and seven electric-car charging stations.
Sidewalks and bike pathways will also be added, to connect the site to adjacent streets Seven Locks Road and Tuckerman Lane, as well as the nearby Inverness townhome community and Cabin John Regional Park.
The project will include 4.8 acres of public open space, including plazas and small parks.
Edens did not respond to requests for comment on their plans.
Bethesda Beat’s Caitlynn Peetz contributed to this report
