Downtown DC is a storefront ghost

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I just wanted to note that La Cosecha has a large parking garage underneath it where you can park for free for the first three hours. It is also used as overflow parking for Union Market.

Every large building being built in the Union Market area has a parking garage, there is zero reason to rely on street parking there. Eventually they'll get rid of the lot at UM to build another building there (with underground parking). Also eventually none of the parking in that neighborhood will be free unless you are shopping at Trader Joe's.

This is how urban development works.

Surface parking lots and then above ground garages are more highly preferred than underground garages from a consumer standpoint. All of the surface lots at Pike and Rose fill first before the garages. In downtown Bethesda, the above ground lots fill before the underground lots which never fill. People will circle the garage in Bethesda Row for 15 minutes and not even consider parking in the underground garage just around the corner that has 700 spaces.

It doesn't matter. Pike and Rose is in the suburbs. Surface lots are incredibly inefficient in the urban core and surface lots don't last. The surface lot at Union Market will be eliminated in the next few years. It's not even well maintained now -- it's nothing like the lots at Pike and Rose which were built to last a long time.

The developers who are building up Union Market are going to force all the parking underground because it allows them to put up buildings with street level retail and then high rise apartments, greatly increasing the value of the lot. Also, since the build up of the neighborhood involves so many apartments, the development is building in a customer base that does not even need a car, on top of the people who live nearby in NoMa. None of those people are going to drive to Union Market. These are people who bought there specifically so they could walk to all the amenities.

Development in the city and in the suburbs operates differently. Eventually it will be close to impossible to park in Union Market, and when you do, it will cost a lot of money, just like in Navy Yard or the Wharf. And suburbanites will complain. And no one will care because the neighborhood will have enough well off residents to sustain business there, and people from outside the city will just have to suck it up and pay a premium for underground parking, or use public transportation. And many of you will, because you actually like these destinations and they offer a lot more than anything you have in the burbs. Even at a place like Pike and Rose or the Mosaic District, which ultimately are just facsimiles of what the city offers. Sorry.

Hm. The ratio of 28 yr olds without kids or a mortgage relative to the rest of the adults in DC and the close suburbs is lopsided in favor of the latter. Spoiler alert - the group that doesn’t live in the micro apartments has more disposable income.

But, feel free to push the vision that the younger, carless renters alone can sustain the kind of CRE conversion needed in downtown DC

I don’t even understand what that word salad meant.

The rest of us get that driving to a city center and parking in a surface lot or street for cheap, right in front of the restaurant you want to go to, is not really a thing.

If you chose to live driving distance away from the city core and won’t take metro, it is what it is.

I don’t think turning downtown DC into a stripmall is anyone’s notion of an economic turnaround plan.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I just wanted to note that La Cosecha has a large parking garage underneath it where you can park for free for the first three hours. It is also used as overflow parking for Union Market.

Every large building being built in the Union Market area has a parking garage, there is zero reason to rely on street parking there. Eventually they'll get rid of the lot at UM to build another building there (with underground parking). Also eventually none of the parking in that neighborhood will be free unless you are shopping at Trader Joe's.

This is how urban development works.

Surface parking lots and then above ground garages are more highly preferred than underground garages from a consumer standpoint. All of the surface lots at Pike and Rose fill first before the garages. In downtown Bethesda, the above ground lots fill before the underground lots which never fill. People will circle the garage in Bethesda Row for 15 minutes and not even consider parking in the underground garage just around the corner that has 700 spaces.

It doesn't matter. Pike and Rose is in the suburbs. Surface lots are incredibly inefficient in the urban core and surface lots don't last. The surface lot at Union Market will be eliminated in the next few years. It's not even well maintained now -- it's nothing like the lots at Pike and Rose which were built to last a long time.

The developers who are building up Union Market are going to force all the parking underground because it allows them to put up buildings with street level retail and then high rise apartments, greatly increasing the value of the lot. Also, since the build up of the neighborhood involves so many apartments, the development is building in a customer base that does not even need a car, on top of the people who live nearby in NoMa. None of those people are going to drive to Union Market. These are people who bought there specifically so they could walk to all the amenities.

Development in the city and in the suburbs operates differently. Eventually it will be close to impossible to park in Union Market, and when you do, it will cost a lot of money, just like in Navy Yard or the Wharf. And suburbanites will complain. And no one will care because the neighborhood will have enough well off residents to sustain business there, and people from outside the city will just have to suck it up and pay a premium for underground parking, or use public transportation. And many of you will, because you actually like these destinations and they offer a lot more than anything you have in the burbs. Even at a place like Pike and Rose or the Mosaic District, which ultimately are just facsimiles of what the city offers. Sorry.

Hm. The ratio of 28 yr olds without kids or a mortgage relative to the rest of the adults in DC and the close suburbs is lopsided in favor of the latter. Spoiler alert - the group that doesn’t live in the micro apartments has more disposable income.

But, feel free to push the vision that the younger, carless renters alone can sustain the kind of CRE conversion needed in downtown DC

I don’t even understand what that word salad meant.

The rest of us get that driving to a city center and parking in a surface lot or street for cheap, right in front of the restaurant you want to go to, is not really a thing.

If you chose to live driving distance away from the city core and won’t take metro, it is what it is.

I don’t think turning downtown DC into a stripmall is anyone’s notion of an economic turnaround plan.

What is it with you "Urbanists"?! Talk like a real person, not some AI bot version. "Downtown" will do just fine.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I just wanted to note that La Cosecha has a large parking garage underneath it where you can park for free for the first three hours. It is also used as overflow parking for Union Market.

Every large building being built in the Union Market area has a parking garage, there is zero reason to rely on street parking there. Eventually they'll get rid of the lot at UM to build another building there (with underground parking). Also eventually none of the parking in that neighborhood will be free unless you are shopping at Trader Joe's.

This is how urban development works.

Surface parking lots and then above ground garages are more highly preferred than underground garages from a consumer standpoint. All of the surface lots at Pike and Rose fill first before the garages. In downtown Bethesda, the above ground lots fill before the underground lots which never fill. People will circle the garage in Bethesda Row for 15 minutes and not even consider parking in the underground garage just around the corner that has 700 spaces.

It doesn't matter. Pike and Rose is in the suburbs. Surface lots are incredibly inefficient in the urban core and surface lots don't last. The surface lot at Union Market will be eliminated in the next few years. It's not even well maintained now -- it's nothing like the lots at Pike and Rose which were built to last a long time.

The developers who are building up Union Market are going to force all the parking underground because it allows them to put up buildings with street level retail and then high rise apartments, greatly increasing the value of the lot. Also, since the build up of the neighborhood involves so many apartments, the development is building in a customer base that does not even need a car, on top of the people who live nearby in NoMa. None of those people are going to drive to Union Market. These are people who bought there specifically so they could walk to all the amenities.

Development in the city and in the suburbs operates differently. Eventually it will be close to impossible to park in Union Market, and when you do, it will cost a lot of money, just like in Navy Yard or the Wharf. And suburbanites will complain. And no one will care because the neighborhood will have enough well off residents to sustain business there, and people from outside the city will just have to suck it up and pay a premium for underground parking, or use public transportation. And many of you will, because you actually like these destinations and they offer a lot more than anything you have in the burbs. Even at a place like Pike and Rose or the Mosaic District, which ultimately are just facsimiles of what the city offers. Sorry.

Hm. The ratio of 28 yr olds without kids or a mortgage relative to the rest of the adults in DC and the close suburbs is lopsided in favor of the latter. Spoiler alert - the group that doesn’t live in the micro apartments has more disposable income.

But, feel free to push the vision that the younger, carless renters alone can sustain the kind of CRE conversion needed in downtown DC

I don’t even understand what that word salad meant.

The rest of us get that driving to a city center and parking in a surface lot or street for cheap, right in front of the restaurant you want to go to, is not really a thing.

If you chose to live driving distance away from the city core and won’t take metro, it is what it is.

I don’t think turning downtown DC into a stripmall is anyone’s notion of an economic turnaround plan.

What is it with you "Urbanists"?! Talk like a real person, not some AI bot version. "Downtown" will do just fine.

We “urbanists” actually know DC well. The Wharf and Union Market are not “downtown.”.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I just wanted to note that La Cosecha has a large parking garage underneath it where you can park for free for the first three hours. It is also used as overflow parking for Union Market.

Every large building being built in the Union Market area has a parking garage, there is zero reason to rely on street parking there. Eventually they'll get rid of the lot at UM to build another building there (with underground parking). Also eventually none of the parking in that neighborhood will be free unless you are shopping at Trader Joe's.

This is how urban development works.

Surface parking lots and then above ground garages are more highly preferred than underground garages from a consumer standpoint. All of the surface lots at Pike and Rose fill first before the garages. In downtown Bethesda, the above ground lots fill before the underground lots which never fill. People will circle the garage in Bethesda Row for 15 minutes and not even consider parking in the underground garage just around the corner that has 700 spaces.

It doesn't matter. Pike and Rose is in the suburbs. Surface lots are incredibly inefficient in the urban core and surface lots don't last. The surface lot at Union Market will be eliminated in the next few years. It's not even well maintained now -- it's nothing like the lots at Pike and Rose which were built to last a long time.

The developers who are building up Union Market are going to force all the parking underground because it allows them to put up buildings with street level retail and then high rise apartments, greatly increasing the value of the lot. Also, since the build up of the neighborhood involves so many apartments, the development is building in a customer base that does not even need a car, on top of the people who live nearby in NoMa. None of those people are going to drive to Union Market. These are people who bought there specifically so they could walk to all the amenities.

Development in the city and in the suburbs operates differently. Eventually it will be close to impossible to park in Union Market, and when you do, it will cost a lot of money, just like in Navy Yard or the Wharf. And suburbanites will complain. And no one will care because the neighborhood will have enough well off residents to sustain business there, and people from outside the city will just have to suck it up and pay a premium for underground parking, or use public transportation. And many of you will, because you actually like these destinations and they offer a lot more than anything you have in the burbs. Even at a place like Pike and Rose or the Mosaic District, which ultimately are just facsimiles of what the city offers. Sorry.

Hm. The ratio of 28 yr olds without kids or a mortgage relative to the rest of the adults in DC and the close suburbs is lopsided in favor of the latter. Spoiler alert - the group that doesn’t live in the micro apartments has more disposable income.

But, feel free to push the vision that the younger, carless renters alone can sustain the kind of CRE conversion needed in downtown DC

I don’t even understand what that word salad meant.

The rest of us get that driving to a city center and parking in a surface lot or street for cheap, right in front of the restaurant you want to go to, is not really a thing.

If you chose to live driving distance away from the city core and won’t take metro, it is what it is.

I don’t think turning downtown DC into a stripmall is anyone’s notion of an economic turnaround plan.

What is it with you "Urbanists"?! Talk like a real person, not some AI bot version. "Downtown" will do just fine.

We “urbanists” actually know DC well. The Wharf and Union Market are not “downtown.”.

Neither have significant levels of housing, so why are they doing so well and downtown not so much? Kind of kills that excuse.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I just wanted to note that La Cosecha has a large parking garage underneath it where you can park for free for the first three hours. It is also used as overflow parking for Union Market.

Every large building being built in the Union Market area has a parking garage, there is zero reason to rely on street parking there. Eventually they'll get rid of the lot at UM to build another building there (with underground parking). Also eventually none of the parking in that neighborhood will be free unless you are shopping at Trader Joe's.

This is how urban development works.

Surface parking lots and then above ground garages are more highly preferred than underground garages from a consumer standpoint. All of the surface lots at Pike and Rose fill first before the garages. In downtown Bethesda, the above ground lots fill before the underground lots which never fill. People will circle the garage in Bethesda Row for 15 minutes and not even consider parking in the underground garage just around the corner that has 700 spaces.

It doesn't matter. Pike and Rose is in the suburbs. Surface lots are incredibly inefficient in the urban core and surface lots don't last. The surface lot at Union Market will be eliminated in the next few years. It's not even well maintained now -- it's nothing like the lots at Pike and Rose which were built to last a long time.

The developers who are building up Union Market are going to force all the parking underground because it allows them to put up buildings with street level retail and then high rise apartments, greatly increasing the value of the lot. Also, since the build up of the neighborhood involves so many apartments, the development is building in a customer base that does not even need a car, on top of the people who live nearby in NoMa. None of those people are going to drive to Union Market. These are people who bought there specifically so they could walk to all the amenities.

Development in the city and in the suburbs operates differently. Eventually it will be close to impossible to park in Union Market, and when you do, it will cost a lot of money, just like in Navy Yard or the Wharf. And suburbanites will complain. And no one will care because the neighborhood will have enough well off residents to sustain business there, and people from outside the city will just have to suck it up and pay a premium for underground parking, or use public transportation. And many of you will, because you actually like these destinations and they offer a lot more than anything you have in the burbs. Even at a place like Pike and Rose or the Mosaic District, which ultimately are just facsimiles of what the city offers. Sorry.

Hm. The ratio of 28 yr olds without kids or a mortgage relative to the rest of the adults in DC and the close suburbs is lopsided in favor of the latter. Spoiler alert - the group that doesn’t live in the micro apartments has more disposable income.

But, feel free to push the vision that the younger, carless renters alone can sustain the kind of CRE conversion needed in downtown DC

I think it's hilarious you think the two kinds of people in this area are:

1) 28 yr olds without kids and no mortgage
2) everyone else, all of whom have young kids and a mortgage

Nope. DC has a ton of 20- and 30-something professionals with no kids (many with limited or no interest in having them) and they have driven the development of multiple neighborhoods, including Union Market, Navy Yard, and the Wharf. There are also a bunch of people with kids who are choosing to live in dense, walkable neighborhoods -- they want a lifestyle akin to living in Manhattan, without actually moving to NYC. I also see older folks in these neighborhoods, maybe new retirees looking for a car free lifestyle but who want lots of stuff to do.

Have you ever spent time in these neighborhoods? They are PACKED. Despite high prices on the food and. services in them.

Turns out there are lots of people in this area who aren't like you. I know, shocking.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I just wanted to note that La Cosecha has a large parking garage underneath it where you can park for free for the first three hours. It is also used as overflow parking for Union Market.

Every large building being built in the Union Market area has a parking garage, there is zero reason to rely on street parking there. Eventually they'll get rid of the lot at UM to build another building there (with underground parking). Also eventually none of the parking in that neighborhood will be free unless you are shopping at Trader Joe's.

This is how urban development works.

Surface parking lots and then above ground garages are more highly preferred than underground garages from a consumer standpoint. All of the surface lots at Pike and Rose fill first before the garages. In downtown Bethesda, the above ground lots fill before the underground lots which never fill. People will circle the garage in Bethesda Row for 15 minutes and not even consider parking in the underground garage just around the corner that has 700 spaces.

It doesn't matter. Pike and Rose is in the suburbs. Surface lots are incredibly inefficient in the urban core and surface lots don't last. The surface lot at Union Market will be eliminated in the next few years. It's not even well maintained now -- it's nothing like the lots at Pike and Rose which were built to last a long time.

The developers who are building up Union Market are going to force all the parking underground because it allows them to put up buildings with street level retail and then high rise apartments, greatly increasing the value of the lot. Also, since the build up of the neighborhood involves so many apartments, the development is building in a customer base that does not even need a car, on top of the people who live nearby in NoMa. None of those people are going to drive to Union Market. These are people who bought there specifically so they could walk to all the amenities.

Development in the city and in the suburbs operates differently. Eventually it will be close to impossible to park in Union Market, and when you do, it will cost a lot of money, just like in Navy Yard or the Wharf. And suburbanites will complain. And no one will care because the neighborhood will have enough well off residents to sustain business there, and people from outside the city will just have to suck it up and pay a premium for underground parking, or use public transportation. And many of you will, because you actually like these destinations and they offer a lot more than anything you have in the burbs. Even at a place like Pike and Rose or the Mosaic District, which ultimately are just facsimiles of what the city offers. Sorry.

Hm. The ratio of 28 yr olds without kids or a mortgage relative to the rest of the adults in DC and the close suburbs is lopsided in favor of the latter. Spoiler alert - the group that doesn’t live in the micro apartments has more disposable income.

But, feel free to push the vision that the younger, carless renters alone can sustain the kind of CRE conversion needed in downtown DC

I don’t even understand what that word salad meant.

The rest of us get that driving to a city center and parking in a surface lot or street for cheap, right in front of the restaurant you want to go to, is not really a thing.

If you chose to live driving distance away from the city core and won’t take metro, it is what it is.

I don’t think turning downtown DC into a stripmall is anyone’s notion of an economic turnaround plan.

What is it with you "Urbanists"?! Talk like a real person, not some AI bot version. "Downtown" will do just fine.

We “urbanists” actually know DC well. The Wharf and Union Market are not “downtown.”.

Neither have significant levels of housing, so why are they doing so well and downtown not so much? Kind of kills that excuse.

Actually there is tons of housing in those neighborhoods. What are you talking about?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Surface parking lots and then above ground garages are more highly preferred than underground garages from a consumer standpoint. All of the surface lots at Pike and Rose fill first before the garages. In downtown Bethesda, the above ground lots fill before the underground lots which never fill. People will circle the garage in Bethesda Row for 15 minutes and not even consider parking in the underground garage just around the corner that has 700 spaces.


This is truly maddening behavior by drivers. They will circle, they will park in a bus stop/bike lane/fire hydrant zone, throw on their flashers in a travel lane for thirty minutes when a free or cheap garage is right there to use.

What is even going through their heads? Do they not know about the garage?

One of the reasons people avoid underground garages is a safety concern, particularly for women. This is somewhat silly in Bethesda---even though there has been the occasional mugging but is a real concern in DC with respect to people parking in underground garages. The redevelopment of the downtown DC area in the way envisioned by Jodie McLean/Nina Alpert and Deborah Ratner Salzburg---the task force assembled by the Mayor when it looked like Monumental was leaving---is not bad in concept but it will take a long time for the market to get there. The existing commercial office buildings sitting 75% vacant are going to have to have huge declines in values, foreclosures and then reselling to developers willing to take on redevelopment. Out of every 10 office buildings, probably only 1 is really suitable physically for cost-effective conversion---the rest of the buildings have to be scraped and then rebuilt completely. There is also a millennial demographic bulge which works against this as the millennials renting the small but expensive apartments at 14th & U are now moving into "family formation" age where they want to get married, get more space, etc. They aren't going to stay downtown. So as a developer who is evaluating whether to buy a foreclosed office building, scrape it completely (demolition costs are not insignificant), and rebuild it to residential, I need to be able to convince a lender in this high interest rate environment that there is enough potential revenue at the end of the day to justify making a loan. That means I need to charge high residential rents when the depth of that market is questionable.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I just wanted to note that La Cosecha has a large parking garage underneath it where you can park for free for the first three hours. It is also used as overflow parking for Union Market.

Every large building being built in the Union Market area has a parking garage, there is zero reason to rely on street parking there. Eventually they'll get rid of the lot at UM to build another building there (with underground parking). Also eventually none of the parking in that neighborhood will be free unless you are shopping at Trader Joe's.

This is how urban development works.

Surface parking lots and then above ground garages are more highly preferred than underground garages from a consumer standpoint. All of the surface lots at Pike and Rose fill first before the garages. In downtown Bethesda, the above ground lots fill before the underground lots which never fill. People will circle the garage in Bethesda Row for 15 minutes and not even consider parking in the underground garage just around the corner that has 700 spaces.

It doesn't matter. Pike and Rose is in the suburbs. Surface lots are incredibly inefficient in the urban core and surface lots don't last. The surface lot at Union Market will be eliminated in the next few years. It's not even well maintained now -- it's nothing like the lots at Pike and Rose which were built to last a long time.

The developers who are building up Union Market are going to force all the parking underground because it allows them to put up buildings with street level retail and then high rise apartments, greatly increasing the value of the lot. Also, since the build up of the neighborhood involves so many apartments, the development is building in a customer base that does not even need a car, on top of the people who live nearby in NoMa. None of those people are going to drive to Union Market. These are people who bought there specifically so they could walk to all the amenities.

Development in the city and in the suburbs operates differently. Eventually it will be close to impossible to park in Union Market, and when you do, it will cost a lot of money, just like in Navy Yard or the Wharf. And suburbanites will complain. And no one will care because the neighborhood will have enough well off residents to sustain business there, and people from outside the city will just have to suck it up and pay a premium for underground parking, or use public transportation. And many of you will, because you actually like these destinations and they offer a lot more than anything you have in the burbs. Even at a place like Pike and Rose or the Mosaic District, which ultimately are just facsimiles of what the city offers. Sorry.

Hm. The ratio of 28 yr olds without kids or a mortgage relative to the rest of the adults in DC and the close suburbs is lopsided in favor of the latter. Spoiler alert - the group that doesn’t live in the micro apartments has more disposable income.

But, feel free to push the vision that the younger, carless renters alone can sustain the kind of CRE conversion needed in downtown DC

I don’t even understand what that word salad meant.

The rest of us get that driving to a city center and parking in a surface lot or street for cheap, right in front of the restaurant you want to go to, is not really a thing.

If you chose to live driving distance away from the city core and won’t take metro, it is what it is.

I don’t think turning downtown DC into a stripmall is anyone’s notion of an economic turnaround plan.

What is it with you "Urbanists"?! Talk like a real person, not some AI bot version. "Downtown" will do just fine.

We “urbanists” actually know DC well. The Wharf and Union Market are not “downtown.”.

Neither have significant levels of housing, so why are they doing so well and downtown not so much? Kind of kills that excuse.

Actually there is tons of housing in those neighborhoods. What are you talking about?

“Tons”. LOL.

There is a lot of new housing in Navy Yard. The Wharf has a few hundred multi-million dollar condos complimented by DCHA and Section 8 housing in the adjacent community. There is clearly not enough people that live there that could ever keep that boardwalk of mediocre restaurants viable.

Union Market area similarly just has a few apartment buildings and clearly not enough to make the vendors at La Cosecha viable because it’s at the ground floor of a large building.

Union Market itself has no housing above it (how awful!) and sits next to a good sized surface parking lot and it’s thriving.

Go figure.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I just wanted to note that La Cosecha has a large parking garage underneath it where you can park for free for the first three hours. It is also used as overflow parking for Union Market.

Every large building being built in the Union Market area has a parking garage, there is zero reason to rely on street parking there. Eventually they'll get rid of the lot at UM to build another building there (with underground parking). Also eventually none of the parking in that neighborhood will be free unless you are shopping at Trader Joe's.

This is how urban development works.

Surface parking lots and then above ground garages are more highly preferred than underground garages from a consumer standpoint. All of the surface lots at Pike and Rose fill first before the garages. In downtown Bethesda, the above ground lots fill before the underground lots which never fill. People will circle the garage in Bethesda Row for 15 minutes and not even consider parking in the underground garage just around the corner that has 700 spaces.

It doesn't matter. Pike and Rose is in the suburbs. Surface lots are incredibly inefficient in the urban core and surface lots don't last. The surface lot at Union Market will be eliminated in the next few years. It's not even well maintained now -- it's nothing like the lots at Pike and Rose which were built to last a long time.

The developers who are building up Union Market are going to force all the parking underground because it allows them to put up buildings with street level retail and then high rise apartments, greatly increasing the value of the lot. Also, since the build up of the neighborhood involves so many apartments, the development is building in a customer base that does not even need a car, on top of the people who live nearby in NoMa. None of those people are going to drive to Union Market. These are people who bought there specifically so they could walk to all the amenities.

Development in the city and in the suburbs operates differently. Eventually it will be close to impossible to park in Union Market, and when you do, it will cost a lot of money, just like in Navy Yard or the Wharf. And suburbanites will complain. And no one will care because the neighborhood will have enough well off residents to sustain business there, and people from outside the city will just have to suck it up and pay a premium for underground parking, or use public transportation. And many of you will, because you actually like these destinations and they offer a lot more than anything you have in the burbs. Even at a place like Pike and Rose or the Mosaic District, which ultimately are just facsimiles of what the city offers. Sorry.

Hm. The ratio of 28 yr olds without kids or a mortgage relative to the rest of the adults in DC and the close suburbs is lopsided in favor of the latter. Spoiler alert - the group that doesn’t live in the micro apartments has more disposable income.

But, feel free to push the vision that the younger, carless renters alone can sustain the kind of CRE conversion needed in downtown DC

I don’t even understand what that word salad meant.

The rest of us get that driving to a city center and parking in a surface lot or street for cheap, right in front of the restaurant you want to go to, is not really a thing.

If you chose to live driving distance away from the city core and won’t take metro, it is what it is.

I don’t think turning downtown DC into a stripmall is anyone’s notion of an economic turnaround plan.

What is it with you "Urbanists"?! Talk like a real person, not some AI bot version. "Downtown" will do just fine.

We “urbanists” actually know DC well. The Wharf and Union Market are not “downtown.”.

Neither have significant levels of housing, so why are they doing so well and downtown not so much? Kind of kills that excuse.

Actually there is tons of housing in those neighborhoods. What are you talking about?

Right? What downtown actually lacks is housing.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I just wanted to note that La Cosecha has a large parking garage underneath it where you can park for free for the first three hours. It is also used as overflow parking for Union Market.

Every large building being built in the Union Market area has a parking garage, there is zero reason to rely on street parking there. Eventually they'll get rid of the lot at UM to build another building there (with underground parking). Also eventually none of the parking in that neighborhood will be free unless you are shopping at Trader Joe's.

This is how urban development works.

Surface parking lots and then above ground garages are more highly preferred than underground garages from a consumer standpoint. All of the surface lots at Pike and Rose fill first before the garages. In downtown Bethesda, the above ground lots fill before the underground lots which never fill. People will circle the garage in Bethesda Row for 15 minutes and not even consider parking in the underground garage just around the corner that has 700 spaces.

It doesn't matter. Pike and Rose is in the suburbs. Surface lots are incredibly inefficient in the urban core and surface lots don't last. The surface lot at Union Market will be eliminated in the next few years. It's not even well maintained now -- it's nothing like the lots at Pike and Rose which were built to last a long time.

The developers who are building up Union Market are going to force all the parking underground because it allows them to put up buildings with street level retail and then high rise apartments, greatly increasing the value of the lot. Also, since the build up of the neighborhood involves so many apartments, the development is building in a customer base that does not even need a car, on top of the people who live nearby in NoMa. None of those people are going to drive to Union Market. These are people who bought there specifically so they could walk to all the amenities.

Development in the city and in the suburbs operates differently. Eventually it will be close to impossible to park in Union Market, and when you do, it will cost a lot of money, just like in Navy Yard or the Wharf. And suburbanites will complain. And no one will care because the neighborhood will have enough well off residents to sustain business there, and people from outside the city will just have to suck it up and pay a premium for underground parking, or use public transportation. And many of you will, because you actually like these destinations and they offer a lot more than anything you have in the burbs. Even at a place like Pike and Rose or the Mosaic District, which ultimately are just facsimiles of what the city offers. Sorry.

Hm. The ratio of 28 yr olds without kids or a mortgage relative to the rest of the adults in DC and the close suburbs is lopsided in favor of the latter. Spoiler alert - the group that doesn’t live in the micro apartments has more disposable income.

But, feel free to push the vision that the younger, carless renters alone can sustain the kind of CRE conversion needed in downtown DC

I don’t even understand what that word salad meant.

The rest of us get that driving to a city center and parking in a surface lot or street for cheap, right in front of the restaurant you want to go to, is not really a thing.

If you chose to live driving distance away from the city core and won’t take metro, it is what it is.

I don’t think turning downtown DC into a stripmall is anyone’s notion of an economic turnaround plan.

What is it with you "Urbanists"?! Talk like a real person, not some AI bot version. "Downtown" will do just fine.

We “urbanists” actually know DC well. The Wharf and Union Market are not “downtown.”.

Neither have significant levels of housing, so why are they doing so well and downtown not so much? Kind of kills that excuse.

Actually there is tons of housing in those neighborhoods. What are you talking about?

“Tons”. LOL.

There is a lot of new housing in Navy Yard. The Wharf has a few hundred multi-million dollar condos complimented by DCHA and Section 8 housing in the adjacent community. There is clearly not enough people that live there that could ever keep that boardwalk of mediocre restaurants viable.

Union Market area similarly just has a few apartment buildings and clearly not enough to make the vendors at La Cosecha viable because it’s at the ground floor of a large building.

Union Market itself has no housing above it (how awful!) and sits next to a good sized surface parking lot and it’s thriving.

Go figure.

Wtf are you talking about? NOMA is crammed with housing, then you have all of the rowhouses/small apartments south of Union Market. Granted SW doesn’t have as much new housing but still absurd. You really need to get out of Barnaby Woods more often.

[Anonymous]

I miss gritty city life. American cities have traditionally for more than century have been where more working-class housing could be found. They haven’t been like Paris, where the rich live in the city. The poseurs there now are unbearable. It isn’t as attractive as it once was. Now it’s all about “a brand” and upselling. I don’t like the suburbs but the city around here hasn’t changed for the better.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I just wanted to note that La Cosecha has a large parking garage underneath it where you can park for free for the first three hours. It is also used as overflow parking for Union Market.

Every large building being built in the Union Market area has a parking garage, there is zero reason to rely on street parking there. Eventually they'll get rid of the lot at UM to build another building there (with underground parking). Also eventually none of the parking in that neighborhood will be free unless you are shopping at Trader Joe's.

This is how urban development works.

Surface parking lots and then above ground garages are more highly preferred than underground garages from a consumer standpoint. All of the surface lots at Pike and Rose fill first before the garages. In downtown Bethesda, the above ground lots fill before the underground lots which never fill. People will circle the garage in Bethesda Row for 15 minutes and not even consider parking in the underground garage just around the corner that has 700 spaces.

It doesn't matter. Pike and Rose is in the suburbs. Surface lots are incredibly inefficient in the urban core and surface lots don't last. The surface lot at Union Market will be eliminated in the next few years. It's not even well maintained now -- it's nothing like the lots at Pike and Rose which were built to last a long time.

The developers who are building up Union Market are going to force all the parking underground because it allows them to put up buildings with street level retail and then high rise apartments, greatly increasing the value of the lot. Also, since the build up of the neighborhood involves so many apartments, the development is building in a customer base that does not even need a car, on top of the people who live nearby in NoMa. None of those people are going to drive to Union Market. These are people who bought there specifically so they could walk to all the amenities.

Development in the city and in the suburbs operates differently. Eventually it will be close to impossible to park in Union Market, and when you do, it will cost a lot of money, just like in Navy Yard or the Wharf. And suburbanites will complain. And no one will care because the neighborhood will have enough well off residents to sustain business there, and people from outside the city will just have to suck it up and pay a premium for underground parking, or use public transportation. And many of you will, because you actually like these destinations and they offer a lot more than anything you have in the burbs. Even at a place like Pike and Rose or the Mosaic District, which ultimately are just facsimiles of what the city offers. Sorry.

Hm. The ratio of 28 yr olds without kids or a mortgage relative to the rest of the adults in DC and the close suburbs is lopsided in favor of the latter. Spoiler alert - the group that doesn’t live in the micro apartments has more disposable income.

But, feel free to push the vision that the younger, carless renters alone can sustain the kind of CRE conversion needed in downtown DC

I don’t even understand what that word salad meant.

The rest of us get that driving to a city center and parking in a surface lot or street for cheap, right in front of the restaurant you want to go to, is not really a thing.

If you chose to live driving distance away from the city core and won’t take metro, it is what it is.

I don’t think turning downtown DC into a stripmall is anyone’s notion of an economic turnaround plan.

What is it with you "Urbanists"?! Talk like a real person, not some AI bot version. "Downtown" will do just fine.

We “urbanists” actually know DC well. The Wharf and Union Market are not “downtown.”.

Neither have significant levels of housing, so why are they doing so well and downtown not so much? Kind of kills that excuse.

Actually there is tons of housing in those neighborhoods. What are you talking about?

“Tons”. LOL.

There is a lot of new housing in Navy Yard. The Wharf has a few hundred multi-million dollar condos complimented by DCHA and Section 8 housing in the adjacent community. There is clearly not enough people that live there that could ever keep that boardwalk of mediocre restaurants viable.

Union Market area similarly just has a few apartment buildings and clearly not enough to make the vendors at La Cosecha viable because it’s at the ground floor of a large building.

Union Market itself has no housing above it (how awful!) and sits next to a good sized surface parking lot and it’s thriving.

Go figure.

Wtf are you talking about? NOMA is crammed with housing, then you have all of the rowhouses/small apartments south of Union Market. Granted SW doesn’t have as much new housing but still absurd. You really need to get out of Barnaby Woods more often.

+1, this is such a bizarre take by someone who sounds like they've spent a few hours in these neighborhoods over the last few years. The residential neighborhoods adjacent to the Wharf have seen major increases in property values in recent years, in addition to the new housing in the Wharf itself. The elementary school in that neighborhood, Amidon-Bowen, is rapidly gentrifying and is gong to get a renovation in a few years likely to accelerate that process. Union Market has at least 10 brand new apartment buildings build in the last 10 years (counting the market district and the area just south of Florida where 3-4 new buildings have gone up just in the last few years, plus the area is adjacent to tons of residential housing along H Street, in Trinidad, and of course Capitol Hill. Thanks in part to poor development on H Street, Union Market itself is a major draw for this neighborhood. Oh yeah and don't forget the large college campus directly adjacent to Union Market! I am so confused by the proposition that Union Market lacks housing -- what the neighborhood actually lacked for many years was decent retail and food options, and that's what Union Market provided and it's only made the neighborhood boom more.

The PP appears to think that the success of the Union Market district hinges on that one little surface lot by the market. What a weird, weird take from some sad Bethesdan obsessed with DC.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I miss gritty city life. American cities have traditionally for more than century have been where more working-class housing could be found. They haven’t been like Paris, where the rich live in the city. The poseurs there now are unbearable. It isn’t as attractive as it once was. Now it’s all about “a brand” and upselling. I don’t like the suburbs but the city around here hasn’t changed for the better.

Are you actually romanticizing DC in the 80s and 90s? Is it possible you are actually currently doing crack?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I miss gritty city life. American cities have traditionally for more than century have been where more working-class housing could be found. They haven’t been like Paris, where the rich live in the city. The poseurs there now are unbearable. It isn’t as attractive as it once was. Now it’s all about “a brand” and upselling. I don’t like the suburbs but the city around here hasn’t changed for the better.

Are you actually romanticizing DC in the 80s and 90s? Is it possible you are actually currently doing crack?

I am a bit nostalgic for the old DC. The city now has no heart. The area you are talking about now has become vapid.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I just wanted to note that La Cosecha has a large parking garage underneath it where you can park for free for the first three hours. It is also used as overflow parking for Union Market.

Every large building being built in the Union Market area has a parking garage, there is zero reason to rely on street parking there. Eventually they'll get rid of the lot at UM to build another building there (with underground parking). Also eventually none of the parking in that neighborhood will be free unless you are shopping at Trader Joe's.

This is how urban development works.

Surface parking lots and then above ground garages are more highly preferred than underground garages from a consumer standpoint. All of the surface lots at Pike and Rose fill first before the garages. In downtown Bethesda, the above ground lots fill before the underground lots which never fill. People will circle the garage in Bethesda Row for 15 minutes and not even consider parking in the underground garage just around the corner that has 700 spaces.

It doesn't matter. Pike and Rose is in the suburbs. Surface lots are incredibly inefficient in the urban core and surface lots don't last. The surface lot at Union Market will be eliminated in the next few years. It's not even well maintained now -- it's nothing like the lots at Pike and Rose which were built to last a long time.

The developers who are building up Union Market are going to force all the parking underground because it allows them to put up buildings with street level retail and then high rise apartments, greatly increasing the value of the lot. Also, since the build up of the neighborhood involves so many apartments, the development is building in a customer base that does not even need a car, on top of the people who live nearby in NoMa. None of those people are going to drive to Union Market. These are people who bought there specifically so they could walk to all the amenities.

Development in the city and in the suburbs operates differently. Eventually it will be close to impossible to park in Union Market, and when you do, it will cost a lot of money, just like in Navy Yard or the Wharf. And suburbanites will complain. And no one will care because the neighborhood will have enough well off residents to sustain business there, and people from outside the city will just have to suck it up and pay a premium for underground parking, or use public transportation. And many of you will, because you actually like these destinations and they offer a lot more than anything you have in the burbs. Even at a place like Pike and Rose or the Mosaic District, which ultimately are just facsimiles of what the city offers. Sorry.

Hm. The ratio of 28 yr olds without kids or a mortgage relative to the rest of the adults in DC and the close suburbs is lopsided in favor of the latter. Spoiler alert - the group that doesn’t live in the micro apartments has more disposable income.

But, feel free to push the vision that the younger, carless renters alone can sustain the kind of CRE conversion needed in downtown DC

I don’t even understand what that word salad meant.

The rest of us get that driving to a city center and parking in a surface lot or street for cheap, right in front of the restaurant you want to go to, is not really a thing.

If you chose to live driving distance away from the city core and won’t take metro, it is what it is.

I don’t think turning downtown DC into a stripmall is anyone’s notion of an economic turnaround plan.

What is it with you "Urbanists"?! Talk like a real person, not some AI bot version. "Downtown" will do just fine.

We “urbanists” actually know DC well. The Wharf and Union Market are not “downtown.”.

Neither have significant levels of housing, so why are they doing so well and downtown not so much? Kind of kills that excuse.

Actually there is tons of housing in those neighborhoods. What are you talking about?

“Tons”. LOL.

There is a lot of new housing in Navy Yard. The Wharf has a few hundred multi-million dollar condos complimented by DCHA and Section 8 housing in the adjacent community. There is clearly not enough people that live there that could ever keep that boardwalk of mediocre restaurants viable.

Union Market area similarly just has a few apartment buildings and clearly not enough to make the vendors at La Cosecha viable because it’s at the ground floor of a large building.

Union Market itself has no housing above it (how awful!) and sits next to a good sized surface parking lot and it’s thriving.

Go figure.

Wtf are you talking about? NOMA is crammed with housing, then you have all of the rowhouses/small apartments south of Union Market. Granted SW doesn’t have as much new housing but still absurd. You really need to get out of Barnaby Woods more often.

The fact that you think NOMA is contiguous with Union Market says a lot about how well you know DC. Not much evidently. A lot of the so-called progressives trying to influence DC politics seem to live in Takoma Park and Hyattsville, which probably explains why you don’t know basic geography or neighborhoods.