Metro has reached a new agreement with the developers of the Dunn Loring Metro station area after the recession killed the project’s financing. In the agreement, approved by Metro’s board of directors, the agency is selling 5 acres of its parking lot at the station to developer Mill Creek Residential Trust to build up to 720 apartments and a Harris Teeter grocery store.
In exchange for the land, Mill Creek has agreed to build new busbays, garage parking and pedestrian and bicycle paths for commuters on the remaining 10 acres of Metro lot. The rebuild will add two bus stops and increase parking capacity to 2,000 spaces.
Mill Creek also is building 60,000 square feet of retail space on Metro’s land that the developer will lease back from Metro. That money will go toward transit infrastructure improvements.
Chad DuBeau, managing director of Mill Creek’s east offices, said the deal was slated to close by the end of the summer. The residential project is expected to open within five years.
DuBeau said the Dunn Loring-Merrifield area has lots of potential with defense contractor Northrop Grumman moving its headquarters to Fairfax County and with several federal offices located near the station. Merrifield is undergoing a revitalization and town center development.
“It’s in a great county already but it’s also on a Metro stop and there’s a tremendous amount of job growth around it,” DuBeau said.
After the Fairfax County Board of Supervisors approved the project more than five years ago, it went dormant as the commercial real estate industry crashed.
According to Metro Director of Real Estate Steve Goldin, last week’s deal restructuring came from the need to get new financing and because the project’s original developer, Trammell Crow, had created spinoff Mill Creek for its development projects.
