Activity At The Capitol Riverfront Continues At Breakneck Speed

On a windy Wednesday morning, Capitol Riverfront Business Improvement District president Michael Stevens stood at the rooftop bar at the new Hampton Inn on 1st Street SE to discuss growth and progress on the 500-acre lot north of the Anacostia River. 

"We're going through our biggest building boom in the neighborhood's history," Michael tells Bisnow. "What's exciting about the neighborhood is its relationship to the river and that retail is responding."

Among the retail already in place is a 50k SF Harris Teeter, a 28k SF Vida Fitness, 32 restaurants, and an Unleashed by Petco. A 35k SF Whole Foods is under construction at WC Smith's 800 New Jersey Ave SE, with perhaps 10 more restaurants opening over the next 16 months, Michael says.

Michael says there's no shortage of residential properties either. And of course there's the Navy Yard Metro station. "As of two months ago, we had 10 residential buildings under construction with over 3,100 units."

Skanska USA is constructing an 11-story, 220k SF, Class-A office building on 99 M St, which will feature two restaurants, the 5k SF Circa and the 3,400 SF Open Road, both opening in 2018. The office building is still waiting on an anchor tenant, but Skanska expects one to sign before the $55.7M project opens in two years.

This 196-room Homewood Suites on 50 M St developed by KCG 50 M, according to the Capitol Riverfront BID website, will open in 2016 with 4,900 SF of retail space. Along with a 170-room Residence Inn on 1st Street and the Hampton Inn on which we stood, there will be three new hotels in the neighborhood.

This Jair Lynch 460k SF mixed-use project will roll out in two phases, the first of which includes 310 apartments and about 55k SF of retail. Planned for Phase 2 are a boutique residential building and more retail along N Street, across from Nationals Park.

But newest to the Capitol Riverfront is the rooftop bar at the 168-key Hampton Inn, developed by Perseus Realty and the Buccini/Pollin Group. It provides a full view of the baseball field at Nationals Park, the only one in the neighborhood so far.