Eastgate project gets a green light
The Fairfax County Board of Supervisors on Oct. 24 approved a rezoning application for the Eastgate mixed-use development on John Marr Drive in Annandale.
The project calls for a six-story building with 280 apartment units and 11,200 square feet of ground-floor retail on the site of the Eastgate Shopping Center, which replaced Kmart. Part of the shopping center, including, The Block food hall, would be demolished.
Land use attorney Scott Adams told the BoS that negotiations are underway to incorporate The Block into the new building.
The development is a partnership of property owner Brian Kim and his company, American Properties of Annandale LLC, and the developer, the Insight Property Group.
Adams said the project “sets a great template for future revitalization of Annandale.”
Related story: Eastgate apartment project advances
The board action rezones the property from C-6 (community retail commercial) to PRM (planned residential mixed use). The Planning Commission recommended approval of the project on Oct. 11.
The project includes a civic plaza to function as a public gathering space, a linear park, a private interior courtyard, a structured parking garage, and streetscape improvements along John Marr Drive.
The board approved a 16 percent parking reduction, which cuts the number of spaces from 1.6 to 1.34 per dwelling unit.
Eight percent of the units would be designated as Workforce Dwelling Units, which would be affordable to lower-income households.
The BoS also approved an application to include the Eastgate development in the county’s Economic Incentive Program.
That program provides regulatory and financial incentives to encourage growth in commercial revitalization areas, including Annandale. Benefits to the Eastgate project include a partial real estate tax abatement and a 10 percent reduction in site plan review fees.
According to background information included with the BoS agenda, the Department of Tax Administration determined the 2023 base assessed value of the property is $8,083,370, generating real estate taxes of $88,512 per year, with a base tax rate of $1.095 per $100 of assessed value.
The applicant has estimated the post-development assessed value of the property to be $152 million. The partial tax abatement would be calculated on the $143,916,630 increment or difference between pre and post-development values of the development.
Thus, the total tax abatement would be $1,575,887 per year for a maximum tax abatement of $15,758,870 over the 10-year life of the program.
Holy moly, where? Let’s consider the traffic jam already happening in this area. More people, more traffic. I sure hope someone has some sense to keep this in mind. If the planning commission is only looking at tax revenue, that’s shortsighted.
Don’t be surprised if the Giant in Annandale and the other surrounding businesses is the next target of “revitalization”.
I hope so. That Giant is an antiquated Soviet-style store that makes Annandale look rather bleak and dated.
agreed
The “revitalization” of this Giant you refer to can’t happen soon enough.
Awesome! I can’t wait to see it completed.
What do you think will go in place of Giant? More apartments?
Yep! We current residents lose retail, grocery stores, and dining options, whilst gaining apartment buildings, traffic, and the like.
Sucks. Annadale already has 5 or 6 apartment complexs. Do we need more!!
All this does make the developers and land owner rich.
Why are we abating anything? We property owners are seeing our real estate taxes continually increase. Has the BOS looked at the financial balance sheets of the company? Does it really new an abatement?
Let’s not forget what will happen to all the current local favorites establishments like Tour Les Jour, K Market, Ben Gong, Taco Saam, etc. These small businesses are the heart of this community.
We have terrible traffic in the area already. I can’t imagine this will help. Do we really need more housing?
Not there!!!!
We need housing badly, just not in Katie’s backyard, apparently!
That is correct Joe!!! Part of the Wedgewoods apartments backs up to my back yard. People from there are constantly parking on our street ( you need a parking pass to park overnight). On warm summer nights we at times have the pleasure of smelling the dumpsters.
There is no need for more apart. complex. Annandale already has 5 different apartment complexs. There are town houses being build off Heritage and there were town houses build by H-Mart. Something like Mosaic District would have served the community better.
If you are so worried about not enough housing then maybe they can build an apartment complex next to you!!
Wedgewood was there at least as early as the 1960s. What is new about the dumpsters? Did they not smell back then? And what about the parking has changed. Could it be that more people are living in those units than are supposed to be?
I have heard that Wedgewood no longer has reliable heat and hot water and stuff, and that the units are infested with bedbugs, and there are rats in the units, and all kinds of other problems. What’s going on over there?
I lived for a couple years across the street in Wadsworth Court, when it was nice, in the mid 1970s. At that time, I was under the impression that Wedgewood was even nicer.
I wonder why these places have changed so drastically?
I have no idea when Wedgewood apartments were build. I knew a couple that use to live there back in the 90’s. It seemed nice then. Now, I think the county owns it and they are section 8 housing.
I am sure they have had dumbsters on the property before now. Depending which way the wind blows you can smell it.
As for parking, the people that live at the apartments or their visitors will come and park in our residential streets over night vs parking at the apartment complex. Overnight parking on the residential streets requires a parking pass that the county gives to the home owners. The apartment complex enforces their parking, but the county doesn’t enforce the parking zones. As a home owner I have to call the police to get it enforced!!
We do.
Faifax county is large county. They can put more apartments in different areas of the county. It doesn’t all have to be in Annandale.
Nah we need as much housing as possible and turn Annandale away from impermeable roads and parking. More mixed use projects like this to promote multimodal options and a town center. Annandale needs to be more diverse and have housing on all those vacant parking lots, put some civic plazas too!
Will this be replacing the Goodwill shopping center as well?
I think it will eventualy replace everything.