WHICH GROCERY STORE IS COMING IN?  WILL THERE BE STARBUCKS COFFEE?

There isn't a plan yet -- so no rental to grocery stores yet either.  The developer is supposed to be finished by 2010, but the new plans don't look promising since they are missing a lot of parking and the county is unlikely to allow such a huge deficit, so either the amount of retail needs to be reduced or there needs to be more parking provided in the retail area, either of which means a modification to the plans as submitted.  The current plan retail amount isnt 265,000 s.f., it's about 150,000 with about 85,000 taken up in two stores -- the grocer and a pharmacy.  One thing more about the parking -- without adequate parking, there won't be restaurants -- that's why there is a Mattress Discounters across the street -- not enough parking and it can never be anything other than a furniture store. I wish the developer would stop jerking the community around and just do what they said they would -- build the center with enough parking and enough retail for it to be a town center for 50,000 people.  Enough already!

I guess the Newland builder's employees lack planning skills and should be replaced with more competitive staff. More delays would cost more money to the builder. I have been living in Clarksburg for almost six years and have only seen empty promises so far.

We're thinking of moving into the community in less than a year. Good idea or bad idea? Is there anything we can do to influence those "in charge" that we want a retail center with more than a grocery store, a drug store, and a mattress place? I certainly would want restaurants of different types too!

Clarksburg Town Center is a great community and certainly the market conditions favor buyers right now.  There is the Clarksburg Chamber of Commerce which is active in trying to make good things happen in Clarksburg, as well as, the Clarksburg Civic Association.  I think the important thing for everyone is to remember to be positive and to keep moving forward learning not dwelling on the past events.

Clarksburg is a wonderful place to live. I have lived in Arlington/ Rockville/Gaithersburg and other great areas of DC but there is nothing compared to Clarksburg. It is truly a dream city with excellent family life. In the past, the little trouble was caused by the acquisition of Terrabrook builder by Newland communities, but I guess now things are heading in the right direction and it's a thing of the past.

Clarksburg has a perfect balance of everything and I don't think there is any other city of DC area that comes close to it in comparison. Clarksburg has excellent schools and neighborhood. My kids used to go to top private schools in Rockville/Gaithersburg area but I found the Clarksburg public schools to be much better than the top private schools in all aspects and many parents concur with me on this. Clarksburg is surrounded by excellent parks and other amenities. The neighborhood is exceptionally good, very helpful, caring, closely knitted and kids sensitive. Everything is new in Clarksburg including roads, stores, communities, parks, etc., there is a different kind of freshness in the air. It has its own class and is truly a DREAM city of DC area.

I have heard that the new retail center plan is very beautiful and proposes multiple class-A restaurants including a two story grocery store. The builder has big plans for the Murphy Grove Pond too with walking/jogging trails around the water. I think it's just a matter of time before Clarksburg surfaces as the most desired city in Montgomery county.

I just moved in Clarksburg with my family a month ago. The biggest problem we face after moving here from Gaithersburg is lack of grocery stores, shopping, and restaurants around here. Driving back and forth to Neelville shopping complex for everything is a real pain. I agree that we need more than a grocery and pharmacy store in Clarksburg. This will be a town with 50,000 people in future and we need more retail stores and restaurants with enough parkings. As I see, the retail town center plan is in big trouble and plans are getting delayed. This problem needs to be solved sooner than later.

Good point Rob.  There is no way there will be "multiple class A" restaurants with hundreds of missing parking spaces...no wonder Newland is pushing "furniture stores" and "corner" restaurant spaces -- there isn't adequate space for all the necessary stuff without a second garage.  They're trying to convince us that we really don't want shops and restaurants that need parking by pointing out selected spaces as "possible" restaurant locations rather than delivering a center that works for the town. 

Hundreds of residences will be built on top of and near the shops -- and most of those residents will need to use the surface lots for their primary parking because they will have no personal garages.  There is no separation of the two types of parking -- and we'll all be jockeying for space all the time unless there's a second garage (there is not enough land to go horizontal, we have to go vertical).  Who wants to go where you can't park and it's like being in a traffic jam in a parking lot every day of the week.  No thanks, not me -- I'll go back to Germantown to shop, it'd be easier and faster and far more pleasant.  No one will make a trip out to the center more than once to shop if there's a continual parking issue.  That will cause the retail shops to fail, and we'll have the dreaded "empty strip mall" syndrome -- blank storefronts, odd shops, with the occasional desirable one that hasn't left yet.  

We can't be so focused on "build it now" that we miss the opportunity to "build it right", which means adequate or better parking.   Lose a garage, lose major amounts of retail.  Lose major amounts of retail, lose restaurants and small shops.  Lose those, lose the desirability and the entire point of a town center.  Lose that, we all lose money on our homes and the town suffers too.

The problem has been solved, it was solved by a famous team of urban planners -- they put in multiple garages because that's the only way the plan works properly.  The garages were/are supposed to be open to the sky at street level, so it's not like you'd be driving "around and around" or even inside the garage when you'd go to shop.  You'd drive in from the street at the top level and walk directly into stores, just like you do in a flat lot.  Except there'd be sheltered parking underneath for the residents with a second garage, which is also more desirable to those who will have to park there every day, rain or shine.

Want it faster?  It's simple.  Hold Newland to their obligation now.  Don't let them delay and wait out the real estate market to gain more money by cleverly submitting unworkable plans that will delay and delay and delay; don't ask for the impossible, just enforce the requirements and move forward.

Clarksburg is a great place to live, and it should stay that way, not be known as an empty, failed and unleasable town center because there isn't enough parking with no way to fix it.  The saddest part is, we'd have only ourselves to blame if that happened because we were so focused on getting the grocery store that we lost sight of the town center and so lost the heart of the town.

We have to be little patient with the development and stay united to ensure that Newland delivers the urbanist retail center as promised. Below is an excerpt from an article in Washington post that highlights the sluggish approach of Newland communities.

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How hard Newland tried to find retailers is at issue in the court filings. Some letters in the file suggest that a walkable retail core is viable. For example, developer Joseph Alfandre wrote to Presley that he was interested in the project but that the company did not appear to be seriously examining his plans. Alfandre, who is also a candidate for the Planning Board, developed Kentlands, in Gaithersburg, one of Montgomery's first "new urbanist" communities.

"I spent six months working to get a contract with Newland. I got a response letter back that looked to me like they either already had the lots sold, or they were just 'shopping' our application for other purposes," Alfandre said in the letter to Presley.

The file also shows that Newland had trouble making some deadlines to produce maps and drawings of proposed changes in the plans

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The Town center is the heart of Clarksburg, no doubt about it. Newland is playing a game with not only the Town center home owners but also homeowners in other communities in Clarksburg. Our home values are falling, we are paying extra taxes, and driving more to fulfill our everyday needs. Parking is key and customers won't visit shops, restuarants and stores if there are no adequate and convenient parking. Look at Washingtonian Center as an example and did you see the multi-level parking garage they constructed? We must not lose patience and let Newland built an "ordinary" shopping center because in the long run that won't work for us. We want to see Clarksburg as the "new" and the "best" urbanists community in this area. That's why I bought a house here and brought my family to live here. I will rather drive and buy grocery in Neelville Gaint but won't comprise the quality of the retail town center as promised by Newland. I thus request all be more patient and don't let Newland cheat us and deceive us.

Back in Arpil of 2007, Newland publically announced that the Plan of Compliance they agreed to (as a penalty for all the violations they committed) was an "excellent" plan. At that time, they said they had eight developers who already expressed interest in developing the retail center according to that plan.

Fast forward to April of 2008: Newland submitted a set of modifications to the Plan of Compliance that alters key features of the plan, and significantly reduces their cost to build it. Newland says that they could find no developer interested in developing the Plan of Compliance as it was written, and that the modificatons are needed in order to make the Plan "viable."

How did we get from the point where Newland and eight retail developers were excited about the Plan of Compliance in 2007, to the point where Newland says the plan is not viable and can find no developer to work on the project?  I'll tell you how: it's called the Clarksburg Town Center Development District. Back in 2007, Newland assumed that the Clarksburg Town Center Development District was going to be created. This Development District would be a tax on the residents of the Town Center (estimated at approximately $1,500/year for each home, for 30 years) and would reimburse Newland with about $17 million of tax money. During the latter half of 2007, challenges to the creation of the Development District occured and, somewhat unexpectedly, the possibility gradually began to emerge that the Development District may not occur. If this happens, it obviously would put a much greater financial burden on Newland. With this threat to their bottom line, Newland took a reasonable step to control their costs by submitting a scaled-back, more affortable modification to the Plan of Compliance, while simultaneously starting a disingenuous campaign to discredit the original Plan of Compliance--which, you remember, they agreed to only a year earlier.

I moved to the Clarksburg Town Center from Gaithersburg over 5 years ago. Despite all the developer delays, I'm still looking forward to the realization of the concept of the Town Center that sold me on moving here in the first place. Until then, I've almost gotten used to hoofing it 8 miles roundtrip to Germantown to get groceries!

I think montgomery county is also equally responsible for the delays as much as the builder. I don't understand why the county does not have the funding to support the projects in Clarksburg if the city was planned long time back then why the allocation of funds was not considered at that time. If the Clarksburg residents have paid money to build the infrastructure in other areas of the county then now it's time for the county officials and residents to support the development in Clarksburg and stop cutting corners.

I think Clarksburg residents should start raising their voices and attract attention of the mainstream politicians into it. Maybe the Clarksburg residents should express their united disappointment to the county officials and should do a POWERSHOW. LET'S INVITE ONE OF THE PRESENDENTIAL CANDIDATE TO CLARKSBURG. This will bring the city into limelight and might compel county officials to start thinking about Clarksburg more seriously and start streaming money for the infrastructure required by the city. Attached links reflect the county's officials attitude towards the critical infrastructure required by Clarksburg. They are just keeping every plan for the Clarksburg infrastructure development aside by saying that they don't have funding. I think it's SHOWTIME for Clarksburg residents. Who's going to take the initiative? Let's have a Yahoo group created for all the Clarksburg residents so that we can cohesively discuss these problems and have an united awareness of the development. It's time for all the Clarksburg communities residents to unite and show it too.

http://www.montgomerycountymd.gov/mcgtmpl.asp?url=/content/exec/clarksburg/index.asp

If the County Council really wanted to take steps, they could and should.  Why are they continuing to provide building permits to the builders or continue to advertise through their salespersons the future Town Center.  Its like bait and switch tactics 

I wonder if the county is going to do anything with the traffic jam created by 355N- W.Old Baltimore Rd bottleneck.  It looks like the least that they can do (w/o widening 355N to 2 lane road) is to add some space - just enough for a vechile to pass those trying to turn left onto W.Old Baltimore.  I live in Toll Brothers community and it really is terrible every day during evening rush hour.  Does anyone know how to approach the issue?

Linda,

The only thing I am aware of is that there is a plan to add an exit to I-270 leading to Newcut Road (which is nearby the intersection you mention) but I don't know what the timetable is. Other than that, the only other relief you might get would be when Observation Drive is extended, parallel to I-270, from Germantown through Clarksburg.

 The Master Plan of Highways map shows this:

http://www.mcparkandplanning.org/transportation/documents/MPH_2005.pdf

Yes Paolo the master plan shows all the future roads in Clarksburg area but the two you mentioned here would years if a decades to built. Just check out the incomplete abandoned Stringtown road and Snowden farm pky and activities for the past 1 year. While the 355N-Old Baltimore 2 lane widening project is a much smaller one but I don't see any progress will be made any time soon.

The completion of Stringtown Road was scheduled to be well underway by now. But Newland appears to be delaying it based on the outcome of the County Council decision on whether to create Development Tax districts in Clarksburg (which would reimburse Newland for building roads and other infrastructure improvements they are obligated to provide). [As an aside, one of the major bills regarding Development District approval in the county (Bill 36-07) is on the Council agenda for Tuesday's council meeting.]

There is definitely a risk that Newland may have more patience than many of the Clarksburg residents. As they continue to delay work, I find that more residents are showing signs of a "let's just get it built attitude," which of course plays right into Newland's hands; they will win in the end if we can't match their patience. In last week's Gazette there was a front page story saying that Newland asked for (and was granted!!!) another 90-day delay with respect to their developoment obligations for the Town Center Retail District. Oddly enough, as Newland continues to ask for and receive delay approvals, and despite the fact that all the delays are in their own interests, they seem to be pretty good at attributing the responsibility of these delays to others (such as the County or CTCAC) and they have been amazingly successful in avoiding any consequences--i.e. they have never (as far as I know) faced any fine or penalty of any kind for the delays they have caused!

I am already paying $800 or so per year as soem kind of development tax after buying a house in Clarksburg village community. Newland playing tactic game and we all are loosing patience but what the county officials are doing? Why Newland being granted extension after extension without any consequence?

We need to put pressure on county so that they abide to their commitment and not ignore Clarksburg in their planning. I had sent an email to county regarding the need of new lighting on 355 and other areas in Clarksburg including the stringtown road but didn't see much progress despite their promise. I think it's time to join forces.

I think we should setup a Clarksburg Residents Union (CRU) and have some represantatives who communicate with the county on a periodic basis regarding the development of Clarksburg and other issues faced by residents.

Here is the status of Clarksburg retail center plan.

http://www.mc-mncppc.org/community/plan_areas/I270_corridor/clarksburg/private_projects/clarksburg_town_center.shtm

This weekend, I just received a surreal postcard request from Newland Communities. (I assume everyone in Clarksburg Town Center has received the same postcard.)

The postcard asks all residents to urge the County Council and Planning Board to fast track the developement of Clarksbur Town Center, to ask that they do whatever it takes to speed things up. What is bizarre about this request is that, in September, Newland asked for (and was again granted!!!) another three month development delay. Why is Newland asking the County to hurry up while they are dragging their feet--my assumption is that whatever this so called "fastest track to development" that Newland has currently placed on the table is, it is likely NOT in the best interest of the residents of the Clarksburg Town Center.

Please come and raise your Clarksburg development concerns with county executive. See the attached flyer. Please distribute it to as many Clarksburg residents as possible. 

http://www.montgomerycountymd.gov/content/exec/clarksburg/pdfs/clarksburg.pdf

Thanks