The Southwest D.C. Neighborhood Guide
D.C.’s smallest quadrant has been making an outsized impact on the city’s commercial real estate market.
Since so much of its land area is dedicated to military bases, parks and memorials, Southwest D.C. has only about half a square mile of developable area. But within that little arc between the Potomac River and the National Mall are Buzzard Point and The Wharf, two of the fastest-growing districts in the Washington metropolitan area.
Buzzard Point, once an industrial backwater, is seeing a burst of interest thanks to the opening of Audi Field, the new home of D.C. United, Washington’s Major League Soccer club. The area benefits from its proximity to Nationals Park and developers, who have owned much of the land on Buzzard Point for years, finally seem ready to build.
Meanwhile, to the north, The Wharf is setting records. The waterfront development has secured Washington’s largest-ever construction loan for its second phase, which is set to deliver 1.15M SF, including apartments, hotel rooms, condominiums, public piers, parks and recreational areas.
With some of the Smithsonian’s most popular museums on its north edge and the Jefferson and Martin Luther King Jr. memorials to its west, Southwest D.C. has always drawn in tourists. The next decade will determine how the area is able to redefine itself not simply as a showroom, but as a thriving residential and office neighborhood.
