College Park officials attend the demolition of the Koons Ford dealership on Route 1 on Tuesday morning.
A 156-room hotel, a CVS and a restaurant will replace the Koons Ford dealership on Route 1, College Park officials announced Tuesday.
Demolition work began Tuesday morning at the site of the dealership, and officials expect the hotel will be completed in early 2017.
The hotel will join the forthcoming Hotel at the University of Maryland, a nearly 300-room luxury hotel and conference center slated to open in January 2017.
This is the next step in the gradual and strategic redevelopment of the city, a process in the works since 2007, said Miriam Bader, the city’s senior planner. A declining economy stalled those plans for a number of years, Bader said. But now, with sufficient funding, major changes are underway.
“This is the start of a new era of construction,” Bader said.
She described the destruction of the Koons Ford building as a significant leap in the direction of the city’s “long-term vision” for long-awaited revitalization.
The demolition also marks an important milestone for the College Park City-University Partnership, a nonprofit local development corporation composed of board members from both the city government and this university, said Cole Holocker, the council’s student liaison.
“It’s indicative of the level of cooperation taking place between the city, university and city-university partnership,” Holocker said.
Guiding this partnership is the 2020 University District Vision, the cohort’s development plan to transform College Park into a vibrant, sustainable top-20 college town by 2020, said Eric Olson, the partnership’s executive director. The partnership seeks to implement “a lot of employment opportunities, arts and cultural developments, local stores and a lot of activity year-round,” Olson said.
“It’s going to be transformed more for residents, more for visitors, more for students and more for the community,” Olson said. “This is a really great day in College Park, and we have a nice redevelopment coming.”
Olson said he hopes College Park will rise to equal college towns such as Berkeley, California; Chapel Hill, North Carolina; Madison, Wisconsin; and Cambridge, Massachusetts, among others, and not only attract more visitors, but also draw the university’s faculty and staff to inhabit the area with their families, he said.
“Developers are taking notice of the improving housing and more diverse options,” Holocker said. “By bringing in multifamily housing options and making them affordable, we’re clearing the next step to getting higher-income people to live there.”
A number of other projects — some to be announced later this summer — will soon span most of Route 1, Olson said. Farmers markets, bike-sharing stations, restaurants and coffee shops might soon dot the new face of College Park, Olson said.
“A whole bunch of construction is leading to a new phase,” Bader said. “College Park will be more walkable, more bikeable with wider sidewalks and more of them. It will increase pedestrian friendliness and provide for better, more accessible public transportation.”
City officials and planners eagerly anticipate the addition of the Purple Line, a 16-mile light-rail line, Olson said. It would connect parts of Prince George’s County to New Carrollton, Silver Spring and Bethesda and would draw more visitors to the latest additions up and down Route 1, Olson said.
“We’re definitely looking at it to be more of an arts space,” Olson said. “It will be a nice transformation for the community to see.”
Though still in its early stages, the city’s redevelopment process is quickly gaining traction, Bader said.
“Things are looking good. We’re working with [the university], and they’re on board with us,” Bader said. “People should stay tuned.”
