Bowser Outlines Downtown Rescue Plan, Including 7M SF Of New Residential
In the second week of her third term as chief executive of the nation's capital, Mayor Muriel Bowser released her plan to dramatically remake Downtown D.C. by adding 7M SF of net new residential space in the neighborhood.
As part of her five-year economic development plan released Monday, Bowser put forth the goal of remaking the area with one of the lowest residents-to-jobs ratios in the District into a mixed-use center, housing 15,000 new residents by 2028 in the process.
“One of the lessons we learned during the pandemic is that mixed-use communities are more resilient in the face of adversity, and right now the downtown is very, very heavy in commercial,” Bowser said at a roundtable hosted at the Studio by Tishman Speyer coworking space near Farragut Square on Monday. “We know we need a better balance.”
The plan was announced a week after Bowser was sworn into a third term; during her inauguration speech, she spoke about the need to transform D.C.'s struggling downtown, which she acknowledged has served as the economic engine of D.C.'s growth over the past two decades.
The economic development plan, which was published online ahead of Monday's roundtable, estimates that 92% of downtown D.C. is commercial space and about 8% is residential space. The plan calls for an initial increase of 15,000 residents by 2028, but Bowser said her ultimate goal was to create conditions for 87,000 new residents to call downtown home in order to achieve the ideal residential-to-commercial ratio.
The Office of the Deputy Mayor for Planning and Economic Development is tracking 1M SF of office-to-residential conversions that could contribute toward that total, but notes that an additional 6M SF would be necessary in order to meet the mayor's five-year goal.
The mayor isn't solely focused on replacing obsolete office space, however. In addition to her downtown residential goal, Bowser is also pushing to add 35,000 new jobs in high-growth sectors, including life sciences, technology, hospitality and education.
Bowser announced that the new Vitality Fund, a $7.5M fund passed in last year's budget, would offer performance-based incentives for businesses looking to relocate, expand or remain in D.C.'s central business district and create jobs.
The first recipient of that fund, Virtru, signed a 17K SF lease in November at 1801 Pennsylvania Ave., more than doubling its office footprint.
John Ackerly, the co-founder and CEO of Virtru, told Bisnow in February that he was planning to double the company's headcount its his most recent funding round. At the press conference Monday, Ackerly said Bowser's support allowed his firm to create a cybersecurity "engagement hub" in Pembroke's downtown office building.
"As much as we like to think sometimes that we're the only place in the world, people and businesses have choices," Bowser said. "They want to locate here and they have to sometimes make it make economic sense or logistical sense, and tools like the Vitality Fund help us do that."
Other priorities included seeing through Bowser's goal to add 12,000 new affordable housing units between 2019 and 2025 and adding grocery stores to underserved neighborhoods.
On the latter point, the deputy mayor's office is tracking three stores scheduled to open soon: Muki’s Market in Fort Davis and Fresh Food Factory in Kenilworth, both scheduled to open in 2023, and Capitol Gateway Marketplace scheduled to open in 2024. The office said two or three more grocery stores would likely be needed in areas east of the Anacostia River in order to ensure every resident lives within a mile of a grocery store by 2028.
