By Brian Trompeter
Another office-to-residential conversion is in the works, this time at a prominent location near the Beltway in Tysons.
Fairfax County Planning Commission members on Sept. 14 recommended that county supervisors approve a proposal by McLean Corporate Ridge Property LLC to convert an existing 10-story, 257,548-square-foot office building into a live/work use with up to 250 residential units.
“It’s really a story of unrealized opportunities,” said Gregory Riegle, the applicant’s attorney, adding that the proposed conversion would provide active and passive amenities.
The 8.07-acre property is located about 800 feet north of Magarity Road in the northeast quadrant of the intersection of Interstate 495 and Leesburg Pike. In addition to the office building, the site has an L-shaped, four-story parking garage.
McLean Corporate Ridge Property LLC would repurpose the building’s entire first floor as a professional-amenity space for residents. The applicant also would add color and texture to the building’s facades to make the structure look more residential, and upgrade windows to meet residential noise standards.
County planning staff recommended that the applicant commit to further mitigation measures to offset impacts from the Beltway’s vehicular roar on the site’s park spaces.
Much of the existing surface parking at the site would be converted to urban parks and open space, with the site’s parking needs being covered by the garage. The result would be 51-percent open space on the site, including a 0.73-acre private area for tenants and a 3.42-acre publicly accessible area. Elements of the latter would include an area called The Preserve and Boardwalk, plus a neighborhood park and reforested hillside.
Pedestrian access to the site would be provided via a boardwalk along the Preserve area, a 5-foot-wide sidewalk along Corporate Ridge and an 8-foot-wide, Americans with Disabilities Act-accessible trail that would meander through the property’s northern portion.
The applicant also would provide a pedestrian connection to the adjacent McLean Hills Condominium at Enola Street, as well as to the pedestrian bridge over Interstate 495 via a trail along a sound wall that would connect with the existing Virginia Department of Transportation trail.
Such building-repositioning proposals are not a panacea for challenges facing the commercial office market, but can support the prospects – and rental rates – of viable commercial buildings by removing non-competitive products, Riegle said. These proposals need to be evaluated on a case-by-case basis, he said.
“Repositioning can be done in a way that does not force an absolute choice between residential and non-residential options,” Riegle said. “The potential remains for these buildings to still be predominantly or even exclusively workplaces as market and needs change and continue to evolve.”
The subject property “has enormous potential to be a quality place to live and work, Riegle said. “There are abundant walkable [and] biking amenities, parks and business opportunities.”
The building was renovated before the applicant embarked on the conversion process, has access to light and air and offers quality interior and exterior architecture, Riegle said. The conversion would change the site’s previous auto-centric, inward-focusing heritage with no connections to surrounding areas, he said.
Planning Commission Chairman Phillip Niedzielski-Eichner (Providence District) moved for recommendation of the proposal.
“What you have done in your design to make this area a green space [with] significantly reduced imperviousness is dramatic and the access of the public to these amenities that [are] provided by this development is remarkable,” he said.
Commission member Mary Cortina (Braddock District) worried about potential tree losses at the site near the Beltway.
“Every tree coming down between 495 and buildings is really changes the air quality for people living around there,” she said.
Riegle said obtaining access to the 495 pedestrian bridge through the forested area is “foundational” to unlocking the site’s opportunities. The conversion project exceeds all required tree-canopy metrics and the applicant will take care to remove no more trees than necessary, he added.
Despite her concerns, Cortina otherwise was supportive of the application overall.
“This is really a remarkable repurposing,” she said. “The design of it is beautiful and the attention to detail is really great.”
