Landy Development Slims Down

City leaders got their first look at a revised redevelopment planned for Belcrest Road that could change the shape of Hyattsville, literally, through a proposed annexation. 

Representatives from the Marvin R. Blumberg Company, which has been trying to develop the Landy property near Northwestern High School since 2007, presented a new design for a 400-unit apartment complex in the easternmost part of the property. 

The new design eliminated a massive, Instead, the new proposed structure would house all of its parking underground in a massive terraced parking garage taking up nearly the entire footprint of the building. 

According to the city's website, the original plan was remanded back to developers by the Prince George's County District Council with requests that developers improve storm water management and reduce the size and mass of the building. 

The revised plan presented to the city council last night features an apartment complex with wider areas of open space between the building wings. The underground parking garage would have three vehicular entrances plus a service entrance as well as three pedestrian entrances. The garage would be accessible by a ring road that would run around three sides of the development. The fourth side would face Belcrest Road. 

Gordon Ingerson, principal of KPN Architecture, said that the development would also include ample bicycle storage areas. 

The garage would only be accessible with card readers to open roll-down metal-grill doors. 

Developers, having already had the apartment complex go through public review during the last go-round, are trying to have the revised plans reviewed administratively, bypassing another approval vote from the district council. But this can only be done if the revised site plan is deemed an improvement over the previous one. That's a detail still being worked out, according to Chip Reed, lawyer representing the Marvin R. Blumberg Company.

As is currently proposed, one of Hyattsville's western borders in the Adelphi Road corridor would bisect the development. During last night's discussion, Mayor Marc Tartaro pressed developers to petition to be annexed entirely within the city. Reed said that this would occur.

The Hyattsville city council took no action on the proposal.