Senior officials with the District and the Washington Nationals reached an understanding Monday to construct three aboveground parking garages adjacent to the new Southeast ballpark, The Examiner has learned.
The informal pact between Nationals owner Ted Lerner, Democratic mayoral nominee Adrian Fenty and others would result in two garages on the north side of the stadium site, totaling 925 spaces and one 300-space garage on the south end, according to officials familiar with the morning meeting.
The $36 million project would provide the required 1,225 spaces by Opening Day 2008 — within reach of the $611 million cost cap. It would also kill, at least in the immediate future, any hope for revenue-generating mixed-use development within the stadium footprint.
But Lerner, who has long sought freestanding garages, agreed to reconsider his opposition to retail and residential development a couple years down the road, sources said, which would likely require razing any existing structures.
Any aboveground parking will require nine of 13 council members to back a zoning exemption. And legislators have so far been unwilling to support freestanding garages.
“They’ve left it open to the executive branch to resolve this issue,” Fenty said after a recent council meeting, when a similar proposal was rejected. “And in January, we’ll have control of the executive branch.”
Sources familiar with the meeting spoke on condition of anonymity, citing ongoing negotiations and the evolving nature of the discussion. Meeting participants included Lerner, Fenty, incoming D.C. Council Chairman Vincent Gray, Ward 2 Council Member Jack Evans and Chief Financial Office Natwar Gandhi.
Outgoing Mayor Anthony Williams was not represented. But last week, Williams said he was resigned to freestanding garages, with the hope that “everybody will come to their senses in two, three, four years and do the right thing.”
