Bethesda resident here. No one is really nostalgic for the Bethesda of yesteryear--of course there will be new building. But when they built in Silver Spring, they built a community center, a civic gathering space, an ice skating rink.
Bethesda needs those, too. Instead, the white space in front of the Trader Joe's is considered "green space." It's ridiculous. And ugly.
Now the Purple Line mess has us completely paralyzed.
Charlie Cook of the Cook Report put it best. I'll post a link to his article. But don't worry if you don't agree--the developers OWN the City Council. They will get anything they want for anything they want to build. One developer at Chevy Chase Lake was supposed to plant trees and put wires underground. Guess what? After receiving all permits to build, he said he couldn't plant trees just right there, maybe elsewhere and some point, and he received a waiver allowing the wires to go aboveground. No one cares. I don't even think there was a fine imposed.
https://bethesdamagazine.com/bethesda-beat/opinion/opinion-i-hate-what-bethesda-has-become/

Anonymous wrote:The goal is to make DC like San Francisco. Homeless encampments and human feces everywhere because, GASP, it would be terrible to allow housing to be constructed!

Do you really believe this?
Do you really believe that all the homeless people are on the streets of major cities is due to a lack of available housing?
Do you think that if D.C., San Francisco or any other city constructed 100,000 - 200,000 housing units that the homeless population would magically disappear?

Anonymous wrote:i live in Bethesda. The huge, hideous high-rises approved with no green spaces or community amenities (and enormous, multi-year tax breaks to developers) kill any sense of community. They destroy any beauty or ability of small retailers to thrive. Bethesda was always a bit of a bedroom community, but I remember the ice skating rink over the Metro station, which was a real community destination. The developer was allowed to build on condition that the skating rink be built. But after a few years, the developer tired of it and converted it to some kind of pebble park.
We've lost a lot of community gathering spaces for these luxury high-rises: they tore down the Regal Movie Theater, and have blocked the street (Elm Street) leading up to the destroyed cinema for YEARS. There is no community center (so jealous of Silver Spring) and no place now where Bethesdans can see first-run movies, or child-friendly movies. I love Bethesda Row Cinema, but they don't show blockbusters or child-friendly movies.

In short, they're not building anything the current residents can use. And what they are building creates a place where rich singletons can change clothes and do laundry and then socialize in DC. And EVERYTHING they're building is an ugly glass box. After my children graduate from high school, we're moving away. There will be nothing here for them.

Well lots of other people obviously want to live there as property values continue to go up so someone will gladly buy what your home, probably at a great profit to you.

And what are you blathering on about when it comes to green spaces or community amenities? None of the new buildings were built on green spaces or replaced community amenities - a few buildings did replace surface parking lots but most of what is going up replaced older low-rise commercial office and retail buildings.

If you live in Bethesda do you know what will be a great community amenity once it is built? The Purple Line and the greatly improved and extended Capital Crescent Trail. And maybe you don't get out much but there are all sorts of existing community amenities in and near downtown Bethesda.

But I really don't get all of the nostalgic yearning for the Bethesda of yesteryear - downtown Bethesda was always kind of meh as far as I am concerned - lots of strip malls and surface parking lots and there was a lot of traffic even 35 years ago. The retail is a but more yuppified than it used to be and some restaurants have come and gone but mostly it is and always was bland suburbia.

But the really stupid thing is that the vast majority of Bethesda was and remains low density single family homes. The area of land that has been changed by the upzoning around the Metro station is probably less than 2% of the total land area of Bethesda (please look at a map if you don't believe me). All of the tearing down of modest single family homes and replacing them with McMansions probably covers more land area and has changed the character of a higher percentage of Bethesda than the re-development of the small now urban core around the Metro station.

Anonymous wrote:i live in Bethesda. The huge, hideous high-rises approved with no green spaces or community amenities (and enormous, multi-year tax breaks to developers) kill any sense of community. They destroy any beauty or ability of small retailers to thrive. Bethesda was always a bit of a bedroom community, but I remember the ice skating rink over the Metro station, which was a real community destination. The developer was allowed to build on condition that the skating rink be built. But after a few years, the developer tired of it and converted it to some kind of pebble park.
We've lost a lot of community gathering spaces for these luxury high-rises: they tore down the Regal Movie Theater, and have blocked the street (Elm Street) leading up to the destroyed cinema for YEARS. There is no community center (so jealous of Silver Spring) and no place now where Bethesdans can see first-run movies, or child-friendly movies. I love Bethesda Row Cinema, but they don't show blockbusters or child-friendly movies.

In short, they're not building anything the current residents can use. And what they are building creates a place where rich singletons can change clothes and do laundry and then socialize in DC. And EVERYTHING they're building is an ugly glass box. After my children graduate from high school, we're moving away. There will be nothing here for them.

Yep/ Amd that's the developers vision for ward 3. I wouldn't urge it on any family neighborhood, ward 3 or 8. Good for Gallery Place.

i live in Bethesda. The huge, hideous high-rises approved with no green spaces or community amenities (and enormous, multi-year tax breaks to developers) kill any sense of community. They destroy any beauty or ability of small retailers to thrive. Bethesda was always a bit of a bedroom community, but I remember the ice skating rink over the Metro station, which was a real community destination. The developer was allowed to build on condition that the skating rink be built. But after a few years, the developer tired of it and converted it to some kind of pebble park.
We've lost a lot of community gathering spaces for these luxury high-rises: they tore down the Regal Movie Theater, and have blocked the street (Elm Street) leading up to the destroyed cinema for YEARS. There is no community center (so jealous of Silver Spring) and no place now where Bethesdans can see first-run movies, or child-friendly movies. I love Bethesda Row Cinema, but they don't show blockbusters or child-friendly movies.

In short, they're not building anything the current residents can use. And what they are building creates a place where rich singletons can change clothes and do laundry and then socialize in DC. And EVERYTHING they're building is an ugly glass box. After my children graduate from high school, we're moving away. There will be nothing here for them.

Anonymous wrote:Developers are a convenient scapegoat for society's ills because two otherwise disparate groups tend to despise them: 1) established, rich, and generally white people, and 2) low-income minorities.

Established homeowners are (rightfully) going to be nervous about anything that significantly changes their neighborhoods, particularly if they think it will negatively impact property values. Sometimes this is well-intention; they bought a house in a neighborhood with a certain feel, and they want it to continue. And sometimes that's thinly-veiled racism; namely, that the look-and-feel they seek is a neighborhood without poor/brown people. Developers are the easy thing to target because they're often the ones seeking to change these neighborhoods.

Low-income minorities, on the other hand, are concerned that developers will bring gentrification that will ultimately force them out of their homes. Many/most of renters, so they won't even see the benefit of increased property values as the neighborhood gentrifies. The though, which isn't entirely wrong, is that developers are benefiting while poor minorities suffer.

I think this is basically right, although as a ward 3 homeowner myself I don’t think established homeowners are in any way “right” to be concerned about “changing” neighborhoods. Things change over time, that’s the nature of existence! You can’t possibly expect that once you buy a house in a neighborhood that all changes will cease and it’ll be frozen in amber for the term of your mortgage.

I think stronger rent control laws and tenant protections would help reduce opposition to development in areas where most residents are renters.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Corruption is the problem. It is all about the deal and lip service to the community. They have too much power through money as it is, so on the government power side, you need balance: the developers MUST NOT be on both sides of the equation.

OK so provide some examples of where this is true? Just because a politician supports more housing that doesn't mean they are pro-developers or corrupt - it could me that they are pro housing.

It could also mean that they are pro-walkability. New construction has brought street-level retail to a lot of neighborhoods. That retail serves residents' weekly needs and helps them to accomplish more closer to home. When I lived in Logan Circle in the early 2000's, I could walk to one coffee shop and had several dry cleaners and some alright bodegas nearby. I drove into MocO or NoVA for most of my shopping and other needs. Now there are groceries, fitness studios, and retail, all in newly constructed or renovated buildings. Now I'm in Ward 4 and very eager for the Walter Reed development to bring more retail and services within a mile of my home.

Since there is currently rent erosion in DC and existing buildings sitting empty, why doesn't the city partner with those buildings to put 10% low-income (or whatever the 'winning' formula is) before building new ones? At the same time, work with supermarket and service deserts like Ward 8 to put in the services they need. Incentivizing grocery stores by helping with security (perhaps police sub-stations within them or next door) and loss prevention issues for example. Improving transportation access. More health and social service hubs. Why not spread the vibrancy around?