In addition to Rushmark and The Reserve at Tinner Hill construction projects underway inside Falls Church City, there are three developments currently under construction just outside the City on its borders. Two of the developments are intended for mixed-use and the other was originally planned as an apartment complex, but is now being built as a storage facility.
The two mixed-use developments are in the Falls Church section of Fairfax County – one is across the street from Mary Ellen Henderson Middle and George Mason High Schools and the other is near Seven Corners. The third development is on the edge of Arlington County.
One of the Fairfax County developments is a 16,000 square-foot office-retail complex called MetroWest, located at 7121 Leesburg Pike. The complex was originally scheduled to be completed in the fall 2014, but is now expected to be completed in March 2015. According to Walt Peter, CEO of MetroWest, LLC – the company developing the land – a well was found on the site that the company did not know was there previously.
Peter said the company had to remove the well, which set the development project back four months. He said that permitting issues also held up construction, but that the main hold up was removing the well.
Despite the holdups, Peter said that there are tenants lined up to lease the retail spaces on the complex’s lower level. “We’re almost fully leased and the town will like the tenants, I think,” Peter said.
Conte Bikes, a high-end bike shop from the Tidewater region, will occupy a roughly 2,200 square-foot space facing Leesburg Pike. Peter said that he couldn’t reveal the other leasers since the ink hasn’t dried yet on those contracts.
But he confirmed that the store next to Conte Bikes will occupy a 1,089 square-foot space, with a 1,200-1,500 square-foot lobby to serve the second-floor office space on the other side of it.
The smallest retail space, at 1,010 square feet, will be on the south side of the lobby, with the largest retailer, occupying 3,000 square feet, on the southern most side of the building.
Peter said that “60 – 65 percent” of the second-floor office space, which is 7,625 square feet in total, has been sold or will be sold soon. There are seven or eight units available in that space.
The other Fairfax County mixed use development is located at 6406 Arlington Blvd on the southeastern border of the City. That 257,560 square-foot parcel is being developed by JBG under the name Arlington Boulevard Development, LLC. The company is planning to lease 14,800 square feet of the land out to retailers, which was reduced from 18,000 square feet after community input.
The rest of the land will be developed into parking spaces and a large residential community, which includes town homes and apartments. The projected completion date for that development is May 2016.
Silverwood Companies, the owner and developer of the third of the three developments bordering Falls Church, originally planned to use the space it purchased on the edge of Arlington County near I-66 and Lee Highway for an apartment building.
But those plans were stalled out by Arlington’s planning commission, forcing the developer to turn the space, located at 6873 and 6875 Lee Highway into a storage company called Shreve Self Storage, LLC. That building is set to be completed by March 2015.
A five-story storage facility is currently being built at 6875 Lee Highway. The physical location of the building is a short distance off of Lee Highway despite the address, but a one-story office space where the storage facility staff will work is being built at 6873 Lee Highway. The office will be directly adjacent to Lee Highway.
