Two residential buildings planned for Kingstowne Towne Center might move forward without any retail.
The developer Halle Companies is seeking to remove a requirement that the 9-story buildings include non-residential uses on their ground floor, according to a rezoning application submitted to Fairfax County on Monday (Sept. 9).
The developer says it wants to retain the option to provide up to 4,500 square feet of retail space in the northeastern corner near the town center’s pedestrian plaza, but it now sees a lobby as a more viable option in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic.
“Given the challenges facing the retail market, the Applicant suggests an activated residential lobby space is a better way to enliven and add a sense of place to the unoccupied side of the pedestrian plaza than a small retail space that risks going vacant,” DLA Piper senior land use planner Kelly Posusney wrote in a statement of justification on Halle’s behalf.
In the statement, Posusney notes that Kingstowne already boasts over 1 million square feet of retail, including the 70,000-square-foot movie theater currently operated by Regal that anchors the town center.
Originally approved for mixed-use development in 1985, the 35-acre Kingstowne Towne Center has been mostly built out with four office buildings in addition to the main shopping strip along Kingstowne Blvd.
A revised plan approved in January 2000 envisioned two office buildings on a nearly 4.7-acre parking lot along Kingstowne Village Parkway. Halle Companies switched gears to housing after the 2008 recession, but the site remains vacant, even after the developer scaled down its vision.
With its new proposal, Halle, which sold Kingstowne Towne Center to Federal Realty Investment Trust for $200 million in 2022, still intends to deliver 646 multi-family units in two adjacent buildings, as approved by the Fairfax County Board of Supervisors on Feb. 25, 2020, but the design has been “slightly modified.”
Totaling 761,746 square feet, the project will be constructed in two phases, with the initial Building N providing up to 328 units and the following Building M providing up to 318 units. Both buildings will be served by an eight-level parking garage accessible from Kingstowne Village Parkway.
According to the application, a garage entrance off of an access road was eliminated after county staff objected to it in previous iterations of the development plan. The developer has also been working with Franconia District Supervisor Rodney Lusk’s office and the Kingstowne Residential Owners Corporation to redesign the pedestrian plaza.
“The Applicant proposes to remove the ice rink and associated ancillary building from the pedestrian plaza, the design and approval of which goes back several iterations of the project and is no longer considered viable,” Posusney wrote. “The pedestrian plaza has been redesigned and reprogramed to provide a more accessible and quality experience for the community.”
Located across from the theater, next to the retail building whose current tenants include Panera Bread and Pasara Thai, the amenities proposed for the plaza include a central turf lawn, a promenade, a fountain feature, a tree grove with movable tables and chairs, an informal stage, shade structures, garden areas, and two outdoor dining areas.
The concept plan also shows lighting improvements, a connection to the residential buildings, and crosswalks across the Kingstowne Towne Center access roads.
The county hasn’t officially accepted the application for review yet. If it’s approved and built, the project provide housing in the town center’s core for the first time, though there are about 5,200 homes in the surrounding area.
“The Proposed Development promotes the vision established in the Comprehensive Plan for the Towne Centre and overall community in a more economically viable fashion than prior approvals,” Posusney wrote. “The incorporation of high-density residential uses will enhance this already popular, mixed-use core and reinforce the overall development concept for the Towne Centre as a place to live, work, and play.”
Correction: This story initially identified Federal Realty as the developer. Though Halle Companies sold Kingstowne Towne Center in 2022, it remains the developer for the planned residential block, a Federal Realty spokesperson says.
