Sandy Spring-Ashton Rural Preservation Consortium

The SSARPC (PreserveAshton.net)

supports development in Ashton that conforms to the Master Plan.

We are pro-Master Plan, not anti-development.

On Tuesday, August 7, 2007, Fred Nichols and Phil Perrine, representatives of Ashton Meeting Place (AMP) held a public meeting presenting their new design for AMP. 

Some historical perspective:  On June 28, the Montgomery County Planning Board denied approval for the developer’s then current design.  Afterwards, representatives of the developer met with selected members of the community, including SSARPC Steering Committee representatives, and developed a new, substantially different conceptual design.  More detail was later added to the conceptual design and it was presented to the public on August 7.  Public meetings are required by the Montgomery County Park and Planning Commission before a developer can submit plans for consideration.  The AMP developers plan to submit their design to the Montgomery County Park and Planning Staff very soon. 

Mr. Nichols said that the design is based on the conceptual design presented during the SSARPC testimony before the Planning Board by Miche Booz, a local architect who is on the SSARPC design committee.  Mr. Nichols indicated that changes to the details of the design are being made rapidly and that he would especially like to have input from the community during this phase.  The short time frame is needed in order to keep the State Highway Administration’s funding for improvements to the Route 108 and New Hampshire Avenue intersection.  The AMP designers will continue working with the SSARPC design team as further details are developed.  This meeting was the first time that the SSARPC saw the more detailed concepts for the building designs.

The new design is described below.  SSARPC’s design committee reviewed the plan and had a number of concerns about the details of the new design:

• The bank as a suburban-style site separated from the corner green by drive aisles
• The bank’s “Victorian” architectural style with a tower
• The preponderance of brick
• The back of the grocery store as a blank wall (the grocery store is now in the interior of the site)
• The lack of landscaping and “rural” materials in the parking structure

Since the public meeting, the SSARPC design team has discussed these issues, as well as pedestrian paving, landscaping and the design of the green space, with the developer’s design team, and is encouraged by several possible solutions that evolved during that meeting.

We encourage you to let the developer and Montgomery County Park and Planning staff benefit from your ideas at this early stage of the design.  Contact information is found at the end of this article.

The New Design

The new site plan can be seen by clicking here.  The design includes a green space (approximately one-fourth acre) on the corner of Route 108 and New Hampshire Avenue. 

• East along Route 108 there will be a restaurant.  The next building, to the east of the restaurant, will be a retail store.  The Route 108 entrance to the parking area (at the back of the shopping area) will be east of the retail store. 

• South along New Hampshire Avenue will be the Sandy Spring National Bank and, to the south, another restaurant connected to a retail store, which will have a coffee shop with outdoor seating.  South of the coffee shop will be the entrance from New Hampshire Avenue. 

All of the buildings are two stories, with the second story being office space; there are now no condominiums.  All stores face onto the main highways.  Parallel parking (subject to State Highway Administration approval) is planned along both roads. There will be a buffer between the parallel parking and the traffic lanes. 

The “anchor” store will be a grocery store, located inside of the shopping area.  It has been reduced to about 18,000 square feet from the previous size of 30,000 square feet.  For comparison, the new Roots on Georgia Avenue is about 16,000 square feet.  There will be some offices on top of two of the sides (west and south) of the grocery store. 

In the interior of the shopping area there will be a two-level parking area.  There is a major slope of the land that makes the design challenging.  The parking area has a flat top level and an underground parking garage.  People can walk directly, on level pavement, into the stores that have entrances on the parking area, including the grocery store.  There will be elevator access to most of the stores from the underground parking garage.  Landscaping for the area has yet to be determined.  There are two entrances and exits for the parking areas.  This design also meets the ADA criteria for handicapped access. 

At the rear of the shopping area will be a road that circles between New Hampshire Avenue and Route 108.  Because of the elevation considerations, there will be a stone wall on one side of the road.  On the other side of the road there will be three single family homes near New Hampshire Avenue and another three near Route 108.  The homes will have detached garages, and will be different sizes (although the site plan shows the homes as all one size).  In between the homes are the wetlands and wetlands buffer and the stormwater management system.  There will be no encroachment on the wetlands and wetlands buffer.  The six homes are allowed on the R60-zoned land; the denied plan had commercial parking on the R60-zoned land, which is not allowed.

There will be pedestrian access from the streets and sidewalks throughout the development.

Mr. Ted Connor, from Chesapeake Watershed Solutions, plans to improve the wetlands area by planting a variety of seedlings and grasses to create what he hopes will be vibrant wetlands.  He plans on removing some of the invasive species and to make the area more pleasing to the eye.  The water quality will be maintained.  Mr. Connor will be maintaining the area.  He lives a few doors away from the development, has lived in Ashton for a long time, and looks at this project as a centerpiece for the development.

A variety of materials will be used in the buildings.  There will a lot of brick, but the brick will be different colors in different buildings, ranging from white to maroon to red brick.  Some of the buildings will also have stucco and stone.  Roofs will use a variety of materials, including tin and slate-like shingles. 

Awnings will be used where appropriate.  There will be an awning on the restaurant next to the green space and on the coffee shop, providing space for people to sit outside.

The back of the grocery store will face the houses, with the front of the grocery store facing the parking area.  There will be curved coverings over a place to walk. 

Questions and Answers

Q:     What is the size in comparison to the AMP plan that was denied by the Planning Board?

A:     The June 28 design was nearly 100,000 square feet.  The new design is 74,000 square feet of commercial space.  This does not include the residential homes, which will each have a footprint of no larger than 2,000 square feet.

Q:     How many cars will be able to park in the parking area?

A;     There will 80 to 90 parking places above ground, and 250 parking places underground.

Q:     Does the design meet the minimum parking requirements, even if some or all of the parallel parking is not allowed by the State Highway Administration?

A:     Yes.

Q:     Will there be a queuing problem in the parking area?

A:     The plan includes two places to enter and exit, so it is anticipated that there will not be a problem.

Q:     Underground parking can be dangerous.  Will there be a way to get into the buildings from the parking lot?

A:     All buildings will be accessible from the above ground parking lot.  The parking lots will be well lit.  You will also be able to get into a number of the buildings, including the grocery store, from the underground parking area.

Q:     Will there be a way to move between the buildings during inclement weather without getting wet?

A:     Yes, most of the buildings will have elevators to the underground parking area.

Q:     Will there be parking under the buildings?

A:     There will be some parking under some of the buildings for the employees. 

Q:     Are there any stop lights?

A:     There will be only one stop light – at the intersection of Route 108 and New Hampshire Avenue.

Q:     Have decisions been made about signage?

A:     The signage will be the same as discussed for previous designs.  This includes signs attached to the building with gooseneck lighting.  There will be a major sign identifying the area at the entrances.

Q:     What about lighting?

A:     There will be street lights along the sidewalks.  The lighting needs to be good enough for safety, but should not cause light pollution.

Q:     One person expressed the idea of, instead of having single family homes, working with the Montgomery County Parks Division to create a park-like area with a place for outdoor meetings, dedicating the area as a community-useful zone.  He felt that the isolated homes would not feel integrated into a community.

A:     This would require a special exception and it isn’t clear that the county would consider taking on the responsibility.  Some others attending the meeting felt that there will be a number of people who would love living in the houses.

Q:     Would the bank consider moving to be next to one of the entrances (probably the entrance on Route 108)?  This would make the traffic flow much better for the bank and also would reduce the amount of asphalt.  The way the bank is situated in the new plan, everyone will have to drive through the whole parking area just to get to the bank.

A:     The bank has expressed a strong preference to be near the corner.

Q:     What will be the height of the tower on the bank?  It doesn’t appear to fit into the rural design. 

A:     The tower will be about 40 feet.

Q:     It is hard to envision how the shopping center will look.  Is it possible to have a 3D model?

A:     The developers will try to make some type of 3D model available, either a paper model or an electronic version, once the design has been developed more.

Q:     Is there a landscape architect part of the development team?  What about water running off the impervious surfaces?

A:     Yes, there is a landscape architect as part of the design team.  Currently, the water from the street just goes into the grassy areas.  Water will be collected in a stormwater management area and the developer will make sure that clean water is fed into the wetlands.

Q:     What about the existing trees – is there any way to save them?

A:     The trees in the green space, the wetlands and the stormwater management area will be saved.

Q:     What is the status of the Northeast Corner?  Is there still going to be a Sheetz gas station?

A:     There will not be a Sheetz, but there are plans for a gas station.  The plans have been updated and filed with Park and Planning.  The developers plan to go forward to the Planning Board with both the Northeast Corner and AMP at the same time.  Both developments depend on the road improvements from the State Highway Administration.

Contact Information for Comments

If you have comments that you want to submit in writing to the Planning Staff, please address them to:

Joshua Sloan

Attn:  Ashton Meeting Place

8787 Georgia Avenue

Silver Spring, MD 20910

Email:  joshua.sloan@mncppc-mc.org

The AMP website indicates that comments to the developer should be sent by email to rfuller@nicholsmanagementinc.com .

The SSARPC Steering Committee would like to receive copies of letters and any other comments you may have.  Please address them to:

SSARPC

Box 518

Ashton, MD 20861.

Email: ssarpc@preserveashton.net

You can let your views be known to the community by sending a letter to the Gazette.  The letter must be limited to 200 words, and include your name and address.  Letters received by Friday noon will be considered for the following week’s paper.  Letters should be sent to:

The Gazette

Editorial Department

1200 Quince Orchard Road

Gaithersburg, MD 20878

Email: letters@gazette.org or to gmacdonald@gazette.net .