County Board Greenlights Met Park and Crystal Houses
December 17, 2019 PROGRAM NEWS:
On December 14, the Board approved a plan to transform 6.2 acres of Pentagon City’s Metropolitan Park from abandoned 1950s-era warehouses and surface parking into the first phase of Amazon’s new headquarters.
The approximately 2.1-million sq. ft. mixed-use project will be built at 1232-1450 S. Eads Street and 501 and 525 15th Street S. Two 22-story towers will front on S. Eads Street and on an expanded public open space within Met Park.
The project will yield significant community benefits, including a $20 million contribution to affordable housing in Arlington —the largest contribution to date from any office development in Arlington.
Also on the 14th, the Board approved a plan to add 819 new housing units, two new public parks, and a small amount of ground-floor retail space to Crystal City’s 17-acre Crystal Houses site. The developer will convey to the County a part of the site, which can provide at least 105,000 sq. ft. of gross floor area (or at least 81 units) for affordable housing, and will contribute $1.65 million to the Affordable Housing Investment Fund (AHIF).
The Crystal Houses mixed-use redevelopment will add four new apartment buildings and three rows of townhouses along the edges of the two-block site at 1900 S. Eads St., which already includes two 12-story apartment buildings.