Amazon Westphalia: A Case Study in Rogue Zoning

Proposed Amazon Warehouse Building in Westphalia. Image: M-NCPPC.

Rumor has it that Amazon is planning to build a massive four million square foot distribution warehouse in the heart of Westphalia Town Center in southern Prince George’s County, near Joint Base Andrews. This comes as a shock to residents of the developing community, who were promised a walkable, transit-oriented environment with a vibrant mix of offices, stores, and restaurants.

In recent weeks, the Prince George’s County Council has rammed through a series of significant changes to the zoning ordinance to authorize and justify placing a huge industrial building in the middle of a planned suburban town center. The Council enacted these zoning changes without submitting them to the County Executive for approval and without allowing the standard 45-day period for the public to decide whether to petition the ordinances for a referendum, in violation of the county charter.

In addition, because these zoning changes apply only to Westphalia and benefit only its owner, Walton International, and the intended purchaser, Duke Realty, they likely violate state laws prohibiting “spot” or “contract” zoning. Sadly, the potential illegality of these ordinances has not deterred the council members in the least. Rather, it is just the latest example of their rogue method of enacting zoning legislation.

The Developers' and County Council’s Bait-and-Switch

Amazon’s proposed distribution center is five stories and 85 feet high, with a footprint exceeding 820,000 square feet, for a total of approximately 4.1 million square feet of warehouse space. That equates to a land area of about 16 football fields arranged in a 4 x 4 configuration, or about 5 contiguous city blocks. By contrast, the length of each of side of the Pentagon is about 300 feet shorter and the height about 14 feet shorter than this proposed warehouse. Surrounding the building on the 78-acre site will be 1,786 automobile parking spaces, 200 truck loading spaces, and 65 loading docks.

Proposed Site Plan for Amazon's Westphalia Warehouse. Image: M-NCPPC

Anyone reading the preceding paragraph can easily see that Amazon’s proposed building is neither walkable, mixed-use, nor transit-oriented. Yet, the developers and the County Council have colluded to shoehorn this project into this legacy “mixed-use transportation-oriented” (“MXT”) zone by theorizing that Westphalia needs a major employment use to catalyze development and that the county could benefit from the projected 1,500 jobs this facility would bring.

The Council’s zoning amendments create a fancy new term—“merchandise logistics center”—to describe this distribution warehouse, and then allow this industrial use in Westphalia’s MXT zone, despite the land use requirements for this area as set forth in the 2014 General Plan and the 2007 Westphalia Sector Plan.

Incidentally, this flurry of zoning activity is all taking place under the current, soon-to-be-expiring zoning ordinance. The Council passed a comprehensive zoning ordinance rewrite last year, but it has not taken effect yet. Under the new ordinance, which seeks to implement the county’s general plan, Westphalia is contemplated to be designated as a mixed-use “Town Activity Center” (“TAC”) zone. Warehouse uses and excessive surface parking of the kind in this planned Amazon facility are not permitted in the TAC zone. Additionally, the maximum permitted block length in the core of the TAC zone is 600 feet—less than a third of the length of the proposed Amazon Westphalia facility.

The original vision for Westphalia Town Center. Image: M-NCPPC

Thus, even before the new zoning ordinance can take effect, the County Council is already busy at work poking holes in it. The Council is continuing its practice of passing indiscriminate zoning ordinance text amendments to permit things the original ordinance prohibited—adding extraneous definitions and footnotes that create exceptions that allow particular developers to build something that would otherwise be prohibited, or that allow particular council members to bring pet projects to their districts. None of this bodes well for the new zoning ordinance, or for the overall land use and development policies of the county.

What Should Happen With Westphalia and Amazon’s Proposed Warehouse

The County Council and the Westphalia developers are correct to point out that the market prospects are bleak for dense mixed-use office and retail development in that area, which is outside of the Beltway and far away from transit. But that reality is not new. The development concept for Westphalia Town Center has always been a fanciful pipe dream, conceived originally out of developer and county official corruption, then later by developer greed, the parochial interests of multiple District 6 council members, and undisciplined land use policies that facilitate massive suburban greenfield development instead of focusing on developing around Metro stations and in the urbanized inner-Beltway areas of the county.

Rather than continuing to pursue an ill-advised development concept, the county should commence a comprehensive community planning process to revise and replace the 2007 Westphalia Sector Plan. The new sector plan should seek to preserve or restore the rural character and natural resources of the areas that are currently substantially undeveloped, such as the previously planned town center core where the Amazon warehouse is now being proposed.

At the same time, the new sector plan should seek to define a more realistic vision for success in the areas of Westphalia that are currently being developed. The focus should be on walkability and recreational facilities within the residential areas and also multi-modal connectivity between residential and designated neighborhood commercial areas. Smaller scale vertical mixed-use development should be encouraged in the neighborhood commercial areas.

In addiiton, the county should still vigorously pursue the development opportunity for the Amazon distribution center, but instead direct it to a more appropriate location. A prime location (no pun intended) for this facility would be the old Landover Mall site, which is adjacent to the Beltway and has ample transportation infrastructure already in place to support a 24-hour merchandise distribution center.

Aerial view of Landover Mall site, with proposed rail transit station. 

The eastern portion of the site, closest to the Beltway, could be rezoned into the Industrial Employment (IE) zone under the new zoning code. The western portion, closest to Brightseat Road, could be zoned into the Commercial Neighborhood (CN) zone, which would also permit multifamily residential mixed-use and live-work unit development. A bus or future rail transit facility could be placed in the center of the development. Structured parking for the Amazon warehouse could be provided either in the neighborhood commercial area or the industrial area. Of course, these modifications would require a revision to the Landover Gateway Sector Plan.

Weigh In At This Week’s Planning Board Hearing

The Planning Board will meet on Thursday, July 18, at 1:00 pm, in the First Floor Hearing Room at the County Administration Building in Upper Marlboro to consider the Detailed Site Plan application for the Westphalia distribution warehouse. You can review or download the DSP materials here.

If you have concerns regarding the way the County Council enacted these zoning changes, or with the substance of the proposal, this is your time to speak up. You first must register to become a party of record in connection with DSP-19008 Snapper (Westphalia). Then you can appear and speak at the hearing or email your written comments prior to the hearing to Mr. Jeremy Hurlbutt, Master Planner, who is assigned to review this file. You may also mail or fax your comments to him prior to the hearing at: MNCPPC, Urban Design Section, 14741 Governor Oden Bowie Dr, Upper Marlboro, MD 20772; fax: 301.952.3749.

Residents Want to See Development at Deanwood Metro

Deanwood Metro Station Parking Lot. Image by Google Earth.

WMATA held a public hearing last week on its proposal to eliminate the commuter parking lot at the Deanwood Metro Station and offer the 1.6-acre site for potential joint development. The public’s message to Metro was clear: they want to see mixed-use development on that site, but it needs to be the kind of the development that responds to the needs and desires of the current community, first and foremost.

As I discussed earlier this month in my post on Greater Greater Washington, the transit agency attempted to market this site twice before, in the late 1990s, but received no interest from developers. Now, nearly 20 years later, Deanwood is getting a lot of developer interest—so much so that residents are complaining about unsolicited knocks at the doors of their homes from speculators looking to buy their property.

About 75 community members from the District and neighboring Prince George’s County packed the meeting room at the Deanwood Recreation Center to participate in Wednesday’s hearing. WMATA’s public hearing docket describes a possible joint development scenario that would contain 160 multifamily dwelling units and 10,000 square feet of retail space. However, the selected developer would ultimately be responsible for proposing the actual type and scale of development and then obtaining the necessary approvals from the District of Columbia government.

Community’s Vision: Grocery-Anchored Retail and Market-Rate Housing

Based on the residents’ comments at the hearing, WMATA’s initial vision for the redeveloped Deanwood Metro parking lot may be a tad too small. In particular, residents wanted to see a larger retail component than the 10,000 square feet that Metro envisioned. Nearly all of the speakers stated that they wanted to see a full-service grocery store as part of this development, along with other neighborhood-serving commercial uses such as a coffee shop, bank, and perhaps a medical office. Likewise, Ward 7 councilmember and former mayor Vincent Gray has been a fierce advocate for more and better quality grocery stores in the area. According to industry estimates, the median size for a grocery store in 2015 was 42,800 square feet.

Another longtime Deanwood senior citizen resident said it would be nice for the development to have a neighborhood bar/restaurant where younger professionals could gather for a nice meal or a happy hour. At the same time, residents did not want a retail mix that would encourage excessive noise generation in the neighborhood. Also, while most commenters supported the complete elimination of the Metro commuter lot, as Metro is proposing, many felt that DDOT would need to step up its enforcement of neighborhood parking restrictions, to keep street parking available primarily for the use of area’s existing residents and guests.

Most commenters stressed that the residential component of the Deanwood mixed-use development should focus on market-rate housing units, rather than income-restricted affordable housing units. They believe that Deanwood already has some of the most inexpensive market-rate housing in the Washington region and that Ward 7 has seen a number of new mixed-used, mixed-income developments constructed near the Minnesota Avenue and Benning Road Metro stations that primarily consisted of affordable housing units. Including more market-rate housing in this development would support the new retail development that the community wishes to see, commenters said.

My Proposed Development Scenario Largely Parallels the Community’s Vision

As a resident of the demographically similar inner-Beltway portion of Prince George’s County that borders Ward 7, I concur with many of the Deanwood residents’ views and expressed concerns. Accordingly, my written comments to WMATA propose a joint development scenario for the Deanwood Metro parking lot that largely incorporates those ideas.

Jenkins Row - A Grocery-Anchored Mixed-Use Development

Near Potomac Ave Metro. Image by Google Earth.

Like WMATA and the Ward 7 Economic Development Advisory Council, I believe the Deanwood Metro site can support “medium-density residential/low-density commercial” development. The District of Columbia’s Comprehensive Plan defines “medium-density residential” as “midrise (typically four- to seven-story) apartment development,” and “low-density commercial” as one- to two-story commercial uses.” WMATA’s proposed development scenario falls on the low-end of that scale; mine falls toward the upper end.

My proposal would use MU-6 zoning, a medium/high-density mixed-use zone that focuses on residential development but that also allows for up to 139,392 SF of non-residential development on the Deanwood Metro site. That is more than enough room for the 50,000 SF grocery store (with pharmacy, bakery, deli, ready-to-eat foods, beer/wine, and a coffee shop), 17,500 SF of additional retail uses, and 54,000 SF underground parking garage with 150 spaces that I propose.

With respect to the residential component, I echo the community’s belief that the development should focus on market-rate housing units. Nevertheless, I believe that it is appropriate and consistent with smart growth principles to include some affordable housing units near every transit station. Therefore, my proposal calls for 325 total multifamily units, with 20% of them as affordable units—i.e., 260 market-rate units (284,250 SF) and 65 affordable units (63,750 SF). Even with this number of affordable units, my proposal contains at least 100 more market-rate units than WMATA’s original development concept.

Let WMATA Know What You Think Before July 2

WMATA is accepting public comments on its Deanwood Metro joint development proposal until 9:00 am Monday, July 2, 2018. It is important that the agency hear your views.

You can submit public comments online—either in a text box or there is an option to upload a PDF file—or via mail to the Office of the Secretary, WMATA, 600 5th St NW, Washington, DC 20001. Remember to include the docket number (R18-01) in your correspondence.

Seat Pleasant Plans for a Smart and Excellent Future

The small-yet-spunky city of Seat Pleasant, Maryland, located on the District of Columbia border in central Prince George’s County, touts itself as a “Smart City of Excellence.” In keeping with that moniker, city officials are embarking on a master planning process designed to help determine how and where the city should grow and develop over the next generation.

The city recently hosted an impressive community charrette to give stakeholders an opportunity to weigh in with their views on Seat Pleasant’s future. Approximately 60 people came out to the meeting, held on May 9 at the Seat Pleasant Activity Center. About half of the attendees resided outside of the city limits—which isn’t so surprising given the city’s small population (4,700) and small land area (less than 0.75 square miles). There were a mix of older and younger stakeholders present, and everyone seemed invested and engaged in the process. Roger Weber, a senior urban planner in the Washington, DC, office of Skidmore, Owings & Merrill, facilitated the charrette.

Notably, this master planning process is being commissioned by the Seat Pleasant municipal government and not by the Maryland-National Capital Park and Planning Commission (MNCPPC), the bi-county state planning agency that operates in Prince George’s and Montgomery counties. Unlike in other counties in Maryland, municipalities in these two counties do not possess independent planning and zoning authority, so official community plans must be developed by MNCPPC and approved by the relevant county council. Nevertheless some of these municipalities still choose to develop their own independent advisory plans, so that they may better help to shape the relevant MNCPPC community plan. Such “ground-up” planning is especially helpful for communities like Seat Pleasant, where MNCPPC has not updated the official small area (or “sector”) plan in more than 18 years.

A City of Substantial Resources and Daunting Challenges

Founded near the turn of the 20th century as one of the county’s early streetcar suburbs, Seat Pleasant has an enviable array of physical and natural resources. The whole town is within easy walking or biking distance of two Blue/Silver Line Metrorail stations (Addison Road-Seat Pleasant and Capitol Heights). Most of the city’s residential neighborhoods are laid out in a grid, on quiet tree-lined streets with single-family homes. There is a huge park in the center of town and several nearby indoor recreation centers. Two major state highways—Central Avenue (MD 214) and Martin Luther King Jr. Highway (MD 704)—run through the city, and the city’s main commercial corridors are located next to those two highways.

Residents celebrate at Seat Pleasant's Goodwin Park. Image by Author.

Arguably, the city’s most valuable natural resource is its acres upon acres of vacant or underutilized land within proximity of Metro and along the two state highways. This land is ripe for redevelopment and, if properly honed and leveraged, could be the key to the city’s economic prosperity in the years ahead.

At the same time, Seat Pleasant has a number of challenges. It is currently one of the most racially homogeneous and socioeconomically distressed communities in Prince George’s County and the Washington Metropolitan Area. Its population is 86% African American and 9% White, with 12% of the total population identifying as Hispanic. According to the Census Bureau’s 2012-2016 American Community Survey, the city’s median household income ($51,930) is only 68% of the county’s ($75,925) and 55% of the metropolitan area’s ($93,804). Similarly, the city’s poverty rate (15.7%) is 61.9% higher than the county’s rate (9.7%) and 86.9% higher than the metropolitan area’s (8.4%). Median home values in Seat Pleasant ($175,000) are 67% of the county’s ($261,400) and 45% of the metropolitan area’s ($387,400). Finally, the city’s educational attainment rate, as measured by the percentage of the population who have bachelor’s degrees or higher (15.2%), is only 48% of the county’s (31.5%) and 31% of the metropolitan area’s (49.4%).

The age and diversity of Seat Pleasant’s housing stock is also at somewhat of a disadvantage relative to Prince George’s County and the Washington metropolitan area. Of the 1,814 housing units in the city, only 159 (8.7%) have been built since 1980, and virtually none since 2009. Additionally, only 71 units (3.9%) are in large multifamily buildings with more than 10 units, whereas such buildings constitute approximately 25% of the housing stock in the county and the region.

In his introductory remarks at the charrette, Seat Pleasant’s mayor, Eugene W. Grant, identified a couple of other challenges for his city: a lack of new, modern retail and commercial development and an exodus of existing large merchants. It has been more than 30 years since the opening of the city’s most recent and largest commercial development, the Addison Plaza Shopping Center, located just off of Central Avenue about a quarter-mile from the Addison Road Metro Station. Two years ago, that shopping center lost its major anchor tenant, a Safeway grocery store. Although other retailers eventually filled that space, the lack of a convenient grocery store was a huge loss to the Seat Pleasant and Capitol Heights communities.

Seat Pleasant is not alone in its struggles. Indeed, planners at MNCPPC noted in the 2010 Subregion 4 Master Plan for central inner-Beltway Prince George’s County that current socioeconomic conditions in the area placed it at a tipping point of instability. “Unless the cycle of disinvestment is reversed through an intervention strategy,” the county noted, these communities “will not recover.”

The Goal: Shared Prosperity and Non-Displacement

The current master planning effort in Seat Pleasant is part of the city’s intervention strategy for reversing the cycle of disinvestment within its borders. Through the plan, the city hopes to define more clearly where and how it would like the city to grow and redevelop. Presumably, this will also help guide city decisionmaking as to where to direct future municipal infrastructure investments.

Mayor Eugene W. Grant and planner Roger Weber. Image by Author.

Mayor Grant is steadfast in his determination that any future economic prosperity in Seat Pleasant must inure to the benefit of current city residents first and foremost. He noted in his introductory remarks at the charrette that he welcomes the day when a new and demographically diverse group of residents come to call Seat Pleasant home; however, he doesn’t want their arrival to come at the expense of the city’s current inhabitants. In particular, the mayor noted with pride that many of the city’s senior citizens have invested in and contributed to the city for more than 30 years, and that these longtime residents deserve to see a return on their investment.

To be sure, the influx of more affluent residents (of whatever race) and the resulting increases in property values—what people commonly call “gentrification”—can sometimes be a challenge for communities like Seat Pleasant. The fear is that the increase in wealth will drive existing residents out. But the research shows that such fears are typically overblown. The greater risk for communities like Seat Pleasant, as MNCPPC and other researchers have noted, is that the cycle of disinvestment in these communities will continue, and that these communities will eventually wither into intractable concentrations of poverty.

As the comments in the charrette revealed, current Seat Pleasant residents want what most communities want: well-stocked grocery stores, sit-down restaurants, and other crucial neighborhood-serving retail; safe, well-lit, walkable, and bikeable communities; a variety of housing and employment options; and recreational and cultural amenities. To get these things, the city will need to significantly increase its population, provide more modern multifamily housing close to transit, and improve its overall economic demographic profile. There is no reason the city cannot accomplish these things in a manner that doesn’t displace current residents. Indeed, those current residents will be able to share in the city’s new prosperity—and deservedly so.

In a future post, I will explore one particular opportunity site near the Addison Road Metro Station that could be a strong catalyst for Seat Pleasant’s future economic development. In the meantime, the city’s planning contractors will continue to hammer out a broader vision for Seat Pleasant’s future. Mayor Grant stated that he would like the planners to present a full report to him and the city council no later than July.

What are some of your ideas for how Seat Pleasant can best grow and develop in the next several years? What do you think are the best redevelopment opportunity sites in the city? Let us know in the comments!

This post has been updated to fix typos and correct Census data calculations.

When Will Prince George’s Pull the Plug on Dead Development Projects?

If a development project was approved for construction prior to the Great Recession, but it still hasn’t been able to get off of the ground yet, isn’t it time to acknowledge that the project is just…dead? Well, yes, obviously! So why does the Prince George’s County Council have so much trouble letting go of these projects?

Again this year, as it has since 2009, the council has introduced legislation that would prevent approved-but-unbuilt development projects from expiring until at least December 31, 2018. Ordinarily, under county law, most new subdivision plan approvals are valid for only three years, and most site plan approvals are valid for only two years.

Most of the county’s backlog of deadwood development projects consists of large single-family detached residential subdivisions located outside of the Beltway and far away from transit. These are exactly the types of suburban sprawl projects that the county’s own planners have concluded are harmful.

According to planners, this glut of existing and planned low-density residential development makes it harder for the county to develop at the appropriate densities around its 15 Metro stations. That, in turn, puts the county at a competitive disadvantage with both millennial and older homebuyers who are looking for walkable urban development close to transit and with nearby amenities.

Additionally, studies show transit-oriented development (TOD) is a more fiscally sustainable form of development. Thus, the county council would do well to encourage new TOD projects around Metro, rather than clinging to far-flung sprawl projects in places that look like this:

Photo by Payton Chung

Moreover, there is no longer any market need for the county to keep extending the expiration dates on these long-stalled projects. The Great Recession has been over for quite some time now, and housing prices continue to rise in Prince George’s County. Indeed, County Executive Rushern Baker recently celebrated the county’s 61 percent increase in property values since 2010.

Lest you think that there’s no harm in extending the approvals on these dead projects, think again. Keeping old development projects in the pipeline significantly distorts the county’s true development landscape. That’s because the county still has to act as if all of the approved and unexpired development will in fact get built.

This means the county needs to plan and budget for more roads, water and sewer lines, schools, fire stations, and other public facilities to accommodate planned growth that has little possibility of ever happening. It also means new developers might be required to contribute to that new infrastructure, when it may not even be necessary for their particular projects. That puts an unnecessary burden and expense on new and otherwise viable projects, which ultimately discourages quality developers from building in the county.

The council will hold a public hearing on the latest extension bills, CB-97-2017 and CB-98-2017, on Tuesday, November 7, at 10:30 am. Please show up to testify and also contact the councilmembers to let them know your position on these bills.

Is Bias Tainting Prince George's Amazon HQ2 Bid?

Prince George’s County Executive Rushern Baker recently identified three Metrorail station areas as potential locations for Amazon’s new “HQ2” headquarters complex. All of them are in the northern part of the county, even though 10 of the county’s 15 Metro stations are located in the less affluent and more heavily African American portions of the county, south of U.S. Route 50.

One such downcounty site—the Morgan Boulevard Metro station area in central Prince George’s—seems to meet more of Amazon’s requirements. Yet, it didn’t make the county executive’s list. Could implicit bias and structural racism be clouding county officials’ judgment in these types of economic development and land use decisions?

Baker proposed the College Park, Greenbelt, and New Carrollton Metro station areas as potential HQ2 locations. David Iannucci, Baker’s assistant deputy administrator for economic development, stated that these three north county sites “offer[ed] Prince George’s County its best chance to compete for Amazon’s headquarters” based on the factors set out in Amazon’s RFP. In particular, Iannucci touted the locations’ proximity to the University of Maryland campus and the presence of interested developers.

What Does Amazon Want?

As relevant here, Amazon says it needs (1) a huge amount of space (2) with direct access to mass transit and (3) not more than 2 miles from a major highway (4) that is immediately available for development beginning in 2019. The company envisions that its HQ2 site will have 50,000 employees and occupy 8 million square feet of space at full buildout. While the space need not be contiguous, Amazon specifies that recommended sites “should be in proximity to each other to foster a sense of place and be pedestrian-friendly.”

Although Amazon states that it “may consider” sites with existing buildings that could be retrofitted or expanded, it clearly provides that it “will prioritize certified or shovel-ready greenfield sites and infill opportunities with appropriate infrastructure and ability to meet the Project’s timeline and development demands.” The ideal greenfield site would have approximately 100 acres of developable space, according to the company.

Do the North County Sites Fit the Bill?

Do Baker’s three selected north county sites best match up to Amazon’s RFP? Let’s take a look.

College Park Metro Area. Image by Prince George's County.

The proposed College Park site, shown above, is an amalgamation of scattered parcels cobbled together to form approximately 128 acres. Most of the parcels already have buildings with active uses on them, which is clearly not the greenfield development scenario Amazon prefers. Additionally, portions of the site, such as the 25-acre Discovery District parcel in the northwest corner of the picture, are nearly a mile away from the Metro station by foot. That’s well outside the half-mile/ten-minute-walk station area. Finally, the site is more than three miles from the Beltway, which exceeds the maximum two-mile distance stated in Amazon’s RFP.

The Greenbelt Metro station area (not pictured), which the county had recently been marketing for the now-stalled new FBI headquarters project, has an approximately 80-acre surface parking lot that could potentially be available for immediate development. However, while the site is adjacent to the Capital Beltway, there is currently no convenient or direct access from there to the southbound inner loop of the Beltway. The Maryland State Highway Administration is nearing completion of the design phase for a reconstructed Beltway interchange, but it has not been funded or scheduled for construction and, therefore, won’t be ready by 2019.

New Carrollton Metro Area. Image by Prince George's County.

The proposed New Carrollton Station area, pictured above, promises Amazon more than 300 acres of developable space around the Metro/MARC/Amtrak/Bus station. The problem: pretty much none of that space is currently available—including an occupied residential condominium complex north of the station, an occupied office park south of the station, and adjacent WMATA and state-owned property on both sides of the station that is already promised to another developer. Additionally, because the space at New Carrollton is bisected by the Northeast Corridor rail lines, it would require construction of massive and expensive roadway infrastructure over the rail lines to make the area pedestrian friendly. None of those roads has been designed, engineered, or funded.

Thus, while each of these north county sites has great transit-oriented development (TOD) potential, none of them quite meets Amazon’s RFP requirements.

What About Morgan Boulevard?

Now let’s take a look at Morgan Boulevard. According to the county’s own estimate, this area (pictured below) has more than 225 acres of developable land within a 10-minute/half-mile walk of the Metro station.

Morgan Boulevard Metro Area. Interactive Map by Author.

More than half of that land is currently vacant, appropriately zoned for commercial development, and not otherwise committed to another massive project. Moreover, most of the vacant land closest to the station is owned by WMATA, which is actively supporting joint development opportunities with Amazon.

Additionally, unlike the north county station areas that the county recommended, Morgan Boulevard is connected to two Metrorail lines (Blue and Silver), providing direct transit access to downtown Washington, Reagan National Airport (and eventually Dulles International Airport), the Virginia Railway Express, and most of Northern Virginia. It is also within a mile of the Capital Beltway.

In other words, Morgan Boulevard appears to meet all of Amazon’s needs—and certainly does so to more of a degree than the three north county sites.

Is Bias to Blame for the Downcounty Snub?

So why did County Executive Baker not propose Morgan Boulevard for Amazon’s HQ2 site? When first asked, Iannucci simply asserted that the station area “did not rise to the level of” the northern county sites and “did not address enough of the RFP requirements” that Amazon put forth. Those excuses quickly fell apart when Iannucci was asked to identify the specific RFP deficiencies and to give concrete examples of how Morgan Boulevard supposedly did not match up to the north county locations.

Ultimately, Iannucci settled on the nebulous explanation that while the Morgan Boulevard station area met all of Amazon’s RFP requirements, the county nevertheless declined to recommend it as a potential HQ2 site because the Baker administration did not believe the area possessed a strong enough “potential to be transformed into the type of urban complex that Amazon apparently seeks.”

In other words, the Baker administration essentially refused to advocate for the centrally located Morgan Boulevard station area, even though it checked all of Amazon’s boxes, and instead chose to support three north county locations that plainly did not match up as well, if at all.

It’s true that Morgan Boulevard is located in a less affluent part of the county with a larger African American population. But do those socioeconomic and demographic factors trump any specific set of criteria articulated by Amazon and render Morgan Boulevard unworthy of consideration? Apparently so, in the minds of county officials.

When socioeconomic and demographic factors work to rob an otherwise qualified community of the opportunity to compete on fair and equal terms for a prized transit-oriented economic development opportunity, it’s often because the people making the decision are being negatively impacted by the dual scourges of implicit bias and structural racism.

It matters not that Prince George’s County is a majority African American county, or that County Executive Baker is an African American man. Internalized biases can be pervasive and toxic, even when the decision maker is a member of the affected minority or class group.

In order to combat implicit bias and structural racism, one first must be willing to acknowledge their existence, and then not be afraid to call them out if they are present. This is true for county administrators and citizens alike.

We must be willing to question and challenge the bases and motives underlying TOD site selections like these that unfairly exclude two-thirds of the transit station areas in the county, even when many of those stations would objectively meet the applicable site selection criteria.

UPDATE (10/20/2017): According to a press release issued yesterday, County Executive Baker added a fourth north county site in his official Amazon submission. That site, Konterra Town Center East, is a shining example of the county's failed economic development strategy, which often prioritizes outer-Beltway sprawl development over bringing transit-oriented development to the county's 15 Metro stations (again, two-thirds of which are in central and south county). Konterra indeed has the space Amazon may want, but it doesn't have direct access to a Metro station--a major requirement stated in Amazon's RFP for its HQ2 site. That county officials apparently value Konterra over a south county site like Morgan Boulevard, which meets all of Amazon's requirements, demonstrates how strong the north county bias is.

Bring Amazon’s “HQ2” to Prince George’s County

Amazon's Seattle HQ. Photo by Kiewic.

Online retail giant Amazon is shopping around for a second headquarters location in North America that is transit-adjacent and has enough land to accommodate up to 50,000 employees. The Morgan Boulevard Metro station area in central Prince George’s County, Maryland, could be a very viable contender in the National Capital Region.

Amazon’s bombshell solicitation dropped early Thursday morning. The company wants to create a co-equal headquarters—dubbed “HQ2”—in a large metropolitan area with more than a million people and with ample access to a talented technical/professional workforce. The ideal campus site would be adjacent to mass rail transit, within two miles of major highways and arterial roads, within 30 miles of a population center, within 45 minutes of an international airport, and large enough to accommodate 8,000,000 square feet of office space at full buildout. In terms of urban design, Amazon is prioritizing walkability, sustainability, and internet connectivity.

The company plans to invest over $5 billion in the lucky community over the initial 15 years of the project, and it wants to move quickly. To that end, Amazon is prioritizing sites that are already zoned for commercial and mixed-use development and that have the requisite utility infrastructure in place. They also want the permitting process to be quick. And, of course, they also want to know what incentives the jurisdiction is willing to offer for this huge opportunity.

Think Regionally, Not Locally

Naturally, large urban areas across the United States and Canada will all be clamoring for Amazon’s attention. Several pundits, including Brookings, place the Washington Metropolitan Area high in the rankings of possible contenders. Already, several area jurisdictions have expressed interest, but the question is whether and how these jurisdictions will be able to put their parochial concerns aside and advocate in the best interests of the Washington region as a whole.

Amazon has requested that each metropolitan area coordinate with its respective jurisdictions and submit one consolidated RFP response that identifies the best suitable sites that the region has to offer. All proposals are due October 19.

If there is to be any hope of the region’s jurisdictions acting as a team, the Metropolitan Washington Council of Governments (MWCOG) and the Washington Metropolitan Area Transit Authority (WMATA) probably should take the lead in preparing the regional submission to Amazon. These are the bodies usually charged with setting and articulating regional priorities.

Morgan Boulevard Station Checks All of Amazon’s Boxes

Setting aside all the jurisdictional posturing, there are really precious few locations in the Washington region that have existing rail transit access, land area, and proximity to downtown Washington, DC, that Amazon’s HQ2 proposal requires. The Morgan Boulevard Metro Station area in central Prince George’s County is one of them.

Morgan Blvd Station Area. Click for Interactive Map.

Morgan Boulevard easily meets all of Amazon’s location criteria. As you can see from the purple and brown shaded areas on the interactive map linked above, the station sits virtually undeveloped on 56 acres of land zoned for mixed-use development. It is adjacent to one of the county’s major arterial roads, Central Avenue (MD-214) and within one mile of the Capital Beltway. Additionally, the station is only 9.5 miles and 20 minutes from downtown Washington via Metrorail’s Blue and Silver lines.

BWI-Thurgood Marshall International Airport is a short 30-45 minute drive away from Morgan Boulevard. Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport is even closer, and it is directly accessible via Metrorail. Once construction Metro’s Silver Line is complete, Morgan Boulevard will also directly connect to Dulles International Airport.

Across Central Avenue, slightly southwest of the station and within its half-mile walkshed, sits a vacant 27-acre parcel of commercially zoned land that may be developed with mixed uses. (This is the red shaded area on the map.) This area could provide additional expansion capacity for Amazon in future phases of HQ2’s development. And if that’s not enough, the yellow shaded area directly across Central Avenue from the station provides another approximately 54 acres of industrially zoned space that the county’s land use plans envision for walkable, mixed-use, transit-oriented redevelopment.

Image by Tape.

Locally, Prince George’s County has begun to improve its historically labyrinthine permitting process around its 15 Metro stations. Amazon would be able to avail itself of the county’s expedited transit-oriented development procedures.

In terms of financial benefits, Prince George’s County has some of the lowest property values in the Washington region; thus, Amazon would be able to keep its land acquisition costs to a minimum. Also, much of the Morgan Boulevard site is controlled by WMATA or the county, which significantly lessens the need for property assembly. Finally, there are a host of existing incentives available to Amazon from the state and county for developing around Prince George’s inner-Beltway Metro stations.

The Washington region would be hard pressed to come up with potential Amzaon HQ2 locations that provide more of an all-around good deal than the Morgan Boulevard Metro Station area. At a minimum, this area should be included among the top three sites in any regional RFP response to Amazon.

The Purple Line is Not What Prince George’s Needs

Image adapted by author; original from MTA

With 15 Metrorail stations and 8 MARC stations, Prince George’s County already has substantial rail transit infrastructure to facilitate tremendous economic growth, walkable urban development, and regional connectivity. Yet, virtually all of these station areas have remained underdeveloped and poorly utilized for decades.

The solutions to this predicament are multifold, but they certainly do not include introducing 11 new Purple Line light rail stations to the county mix. Instead, the county should invest in a more robust local bus system and in its exiting rail transit station areas.

The Purple Line is a 16-mile, 21-station light rail project proposed by the Maryland Transit Administration (MTA) to provide more direct east-west connections between Bethesda, Silver Spring, College Park, and New Carrollton. Ten of the stations would be in Montgomery County, and eleven would be in Prince George’s. The light rail system would connect to WMATA’s Red, Green, and Orange Metrorail lines, but would not be owned or operated by Washington’s regional transit authority.

Last August and again earlier this month, the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia ruled that the Federal Transit Administration (FTA) could not move forward with awarding federal funds to the Purple Line until the agency conducts the requisite study to prepare a supplemental environmental impact statement (SEIS). Senior U.S. District Judge Richard J. Leon’s orders provide that the SEIS must address what impacts WMATA’s continuing ridership decline (including this year) and ongoing safety issues might have on the Purple Line.

Move Beyond the “Purple Haze”

Maryland Governor Larry Hogan, MTA, and many public officials and citizens in Prince George’s and Montgomery counties were outraged by the court’s rulings, and they fear that the Purple Line project may well be permanently derailed by the delays that an SEIS would cause.

Yesterday, Maryland appealed Judge Leon's decisions to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit. No one knows yet how quickly the appellate court will rule or whether the state's appeal will ultimately be successful.

If the Purple Line is indeed dead, perhaps that is a blessing in disguise for Prince George’s County. The Purple Line has always been more of a “purple haze”—an extravagance and distraction that the county does not need and that diverts essential public resources and attention away from the real solutions to the county’s transit and economic development inadequacies.

Image adapted by author; original by Michael Phams 

This is not to say that light rail is never an appropriate transit solution. Indeed, I have previously enthusiastically supported light rail expansion in my childhood hometown region. But adding a multibillion dollar light rail system in this particular area of northern Prince George’s County—which is already quite well served by WMATA heavy rail, MTA commuter rail, and regional and local buses—is an imprudent use of public resources.

(The nonprofit group Friends of the Capital Crescent Trail and others have offered many reasons why the Purple Line also may not be a good deal for Montgomery County, the bi-county region, and the State of Maryland as a whole; but this post is focused specifically on Prince George’s County.)

Fund a Better County Bus System

If Prince George’s officials are genuinely concerned with improving transit access in the county, the first thing they should do is improve the county’s anemic local bus system. Local and express buses have the capacity to serve even the most densely populated areas in the county that are not already within a half-mile of an existing Metrorail or MARC station. Indeed, buses are better equipped to reach the county’s current scattered population.

Currently, Prince George’s “TheBus” system has only 28 routes to serve its 487-square-mile area. It generates a meager 3.7 million trips per year, or 4 trips per capita, and does not operate in the late evenings or on weekends.

By contrast, in similarly-sized and -populated Montgomery County, the local “Ride On” bus system has 78 routes serving its 494-square-mile area, and generates an impressive 26 million trips per year (with 86,000 trips on a typical weekday), or 27 trips per capita. Even in tiny Arlington County, the “ART” local bus system has 17 routes covering its 26-square-mile area, and generates 2.8 million trips annually, or 13 trips per capita.

Prince George’s annual operating budget for bus transit services is approximately $25 million, as compared to Montgomery’s $125 million. Over the next six years, Prince George’s plans to spend only about $2.1 million in capital expenditures on bus transit, as compared to the $98.2 million that Montgomery plans to spend on buses and bus stops alone over that same period.

Meanwhile, Prince George’s has agreed to pay $120 million over the next six years toward the construction of the Purple Line, which will run only in a small sliver of the comparatively affluent northern part of the county.

Stated another way, over the next six years, Prince George’s County is planning to spend less than two percent of its planned capital investment in the Purple Line on countywide bus transit. This shocking inequity in transit expenditures should have true transit advocates picketing in droves at the County Administration Building in Upper Marlboro.

Image by Ben Schumin

It’s also worth noting that federal funding for buses and related infrastructure is available from FTA, at the same 80% match rate as light rail funding. Thus, if Prince George’s focused more of its attention on developing a robust local bus system, it would likely find a willing partner in the federal government.

Purple Line supporters may rightly argue, “Why can’t we just do both—have the Purple Line and improve our bus system?” Well…we could, in theory. But there hasn’t been much political will over the years to improve the county’s bus infrastructure, so it is hard to see how that resolve would magically appear after the county shells out $120 million for the Purple Line. The better strategy would be to take care of the longstanding countywide need for more and better buses first and then evaluate whether the Purple Line still makes sense.

Manage Sprawl and Strategically Invest in Existing Station Areas

Similarly, with so many underdeveloped rail transit stations around the county (including in the Purple Line corridor), it strains credulity for officials to suggest that the county needs light rail in order to spur economic development. In fact, according to the county itself, the opposite is true: the Purple Line could actually harm Prince George’s economic growth prospects.

The county’s current comprehensive plan, Plan Prince George’s 2035, discusses the somewhat enviable dilemma the county currently faces by having too many mixed use activity “centers,” most of which are located near existing Metrorail stations. The plan contends that having too many centers can actually “undermine economic growth” by spurring scattered development that will make it difficult “to achieve the density, intensity, and form necessary to support successful mixed-use, walkable communities and economic generators” at any one center.

Image by M-NCPPC

Already, without the Purple Line, the county has 28 designated centers, 19 of which are located at existing Metrorail and MARC stations. The county predicts that it will not have enough projected growth over the next 20 years to develop all of those stations. So logic dictates that building 11 new Purple Line stations is actually contrary to the county’s stated land use and growth policies.

One thing the county could and should do to improve its ability to grow its exiting transit station areas is to reduce its pipeline of dead sprawl projects and redirect some of that projected growth capacity to its existing Metro station areas. The county should also take more of a leading role (including financially) in redeveloping and revitalizing its neighborhood-scaled gateway station areas near the District of Columbia border.

Prince George’s future transit prosperity begins not with light rail, but with more local buses—running frequently, on time, seven days a week, and connecting citizens countywide to important county destinations and to the 23 Metrorail and MARC stations already constructed in the county. Likewise, Prince George’s economic development potential does not depend on new light rail transit stations, but rather lies in its existing Metrorail and MARC stations. So instead of brooding over the possible demise of the Purple Line, let's rise up and fight like hell for the county’s true transit and economic development priorities!

BREAKING: Prince George’s Council Wants Its “Call-Up” Authority Back

The Prince George’s County Council is asking the local county delegation of the Maryland House of Delegates to pass a bill that would allow the council to resume its destructive practice of interfering with the county Planning Board’s decisions on individual development projects. A subcommittee is holding a another hearing on the bill tomorrow, February 12, at 4:00 pm on February 18 at 9:00 am in Annapolis, to consider the bill and possibly move it forward for the full delegation’s consideration.

This bill seeks to overturn a recent unanimous decision by Maryland’s highest court, which held that the County Council is only permitted to overturn Planning Board decisions if they lack evidentiary support or are arbitrary, capricious, or otherwise illegal.

The court held that the Planning Board—part of a bi-county planning and zoning agency formally known as the Maryland-National Capital Park and Planning Commission (M-NCPPC)—has the legal authority and responsibility to render final decisions on individual development projects. The County Council, on the other hand, is responsible for appointing the Planning Board members and setting the general zoning and land use regulations that the Planning Board must interpret and apply.

Prior to last summer’s decision by the Maryland Court of Appeals, county council members would routinely use a discretionary “call-up” procedure to force a review of the Planning Board’s rulings on individual development projects, even when no one else complained about them, or even if there was nothing legally wrong with how the Planning Board decided the case. During these reviews, council members would often impose additional conditions on developers, even if those decisions were not required by the Zoning Ordinance, and even if those conditions contradicted the Planning Board’s analysis.

Sometimes council members used the “call-up” procedure in response to complaints from constituents or citizen groups who were dissatisfied with the Planning Board’s decisions. Other times, council members would unilaterally call projects up if they didn’t like them, for whatever reason. And all too often, corrupt council members have historically used this power to exact campaign contributions, political favors, and even under-the-table cash payments from developers, as part of an insidious “pay-to-play” scheme.

Council “Call-Up” is Bad for County's Development Prospects

Whatever the reasons for its use, the “call-up” procedure renders the county’s development review process arbitrary, uncertain, and usually more expensive—which is the exact opposite of what should be happening if the county wants to attract quality development, particularly around its Metro stations. Many respected developers have refused to consider development opportunities in Prince George’s County because they don't want to be subjected to the political whims of individual council members. And why would they, when they can just go to the adjoining county and have a much more certain understanding of how a development application will be processed?

Prince George's County Council

The only people who win under the old “call-up” regime are the greedy and power-hungry County Council members, who unfortunately cannot seem to look beyond themselves and make decisions that are in the best interests of moving Prince George’s County forward. Even if the council were motivated solely by a desire to respond to constituents’ concerns about particular developments (which is totally not the case), it’s still a bad idea to reinstate the “call-up” procedure, because of the politicization and arbitrariness it brings to the development process.

If council members really want to help out constituents and developers alike, they should focus on making the zoning rules clearer, simpler, and easier for the Planning Board and the county permitting office to administer. (This, by the way, is the goal of the Zoning Rewrite Project that M-NCPPC is currently engaged in.)

Hopefully Prince George’s County Executive Rushern Baker will speak out on this and urge the county delegation and/or the legislature to kill this awful bill. Bringing back “call-up” review certainly won’t help his efforts to bring more transit-oriented development to the county’s largest Metro stations, or anywhere else for that matter.

The county delegation needs to hear from you if you oppose this bill—and you should definitely oppose it! Please reach out to the subcommittee members and the full county delegation and tell them to reject Local Bill No. PG/MC 111-16 (HB 1025).

Prince George’s Should Allow Dead Sprawl Projects to Rest in Peace

Photo by Seamoor on Flickr

Ever since 2009, the Prince George’s County Council has continually extended the approval periods for unbuilt development projects, mostly consisting of single-family residential subdivisions located outside of the Beltway and away from transit.

Now, council members are considering legislation that would give these long-dead projects yet another two-year extension, through the end of 2017. It’s time for the council to give up the ghost on these projects.

Originally, the council granted these extensions to provide temporary relief to distressed developers in the wake of the Great Recession. But the recession is over. And while housing prices continue to rebound in Prince George’s, there is no current market demand for massive new single-family subdivisions outside of the Beltway. Indeed, buyers are still able to garner great deals on many spacious suburban homes that went into foreclosure during the housing bust.

These Zombie Projects Are Clogging the County's Pipeline

As I noted in 2013, it makes no sense for the council to extend the approval windows for these types of scattered sprawl projects. County planners have already concluded that such development is unhelpful for the county because it makes it “difficult to establish a critical mass of high-density development around any existing Metro station, as envisioned by the General Plan.”

More importantly, planners note that the county’s continuing lack of focus on high-quality mixed-use transit-oriented development puts it “at a continued disadvantage relative to its neighbors when it comes to attracting residents and employers who value the connectivity and amenities that other such communities provide.”

Despite those exhortations against sprawl development, the existing pipeline of approved-but-unbuilt projects outside of the Beltway led planners and the council to conclude in its current General Plan that the county actually has “too many” Metro stations, even before taking into account the future Purple Line light rail stations, and that developing all of them would “undermine economic growth.”

But if the council would instead just allow these old projects to die a natural death, the projected pipeline of residential development would dramatically decrease, and the county could readjust its long-term growth projections to include more transit-oriented development inside the Beltway. In particular, the county could decide to direct some much-needed attention toward its gateway neighborhoods and Metro stations near the D.C. border.

TAKE ACTION: The council’s Planning, Zoning, and Economic Development (PZED) Committee will consider the latest extension bills, CB-80-2015 and CB-81-2015, on Wednesday, September 30, at 1:30 pm in Room 2027 of the County Administration Building. You can use this link to address your comments to PZED Chair Andrea Harrison, with copies to committee director Jackie Brown and committee administrative aide Barbara Stone.

Court Limits Prince George’s County Council’s Role in Development Review

Judges of the Maryland Court of Appeals

In a striking 100-page decision issued earlier this month, Maryland’s highest court ruled unanimously that the Prince George’s County Council lacks the legal authority to decide for itself whether individual development projects should be approved or disapproved.

Rather, the council must generally uphold the decisions of the Planning Board in development review matters unless those decisions are unsupported by substantial evidence or are otherwise arbitrary, capricious, or illegal.

To borrow a phrase famously uttered by Vice President Joe Biden in 2010, this case is “a big f***ing deal!”

This landmark decision by the Maryland Court of Appeals strengthens the hand of the Maryland-National Capital Park and Planning Commission (MNCPPC), the state-created planning and zoning agency that operates in Prince George’s and Montgomery counties.

According to the high court, Maryland law gives the Prince George’s County Planning Board (one of two subcomponents of MNCPPC) broad legal authority to act in a variety of local land-use matters that affect Prince George’s County, including approval of subdivisions, assignment of street names and numbers, preparation of comprehensive plans, and review of development proposals.

The authority of the Prince George’s County Council (known as the “District Council” when it acts in a land use capacity) is more discretely defined under state law, but still quite significant, according to the court. For instance, in addition to appointing the members of the Planning Board, the council possesses the legislative authority to approve and amend the county’s zoning ordinance and zoning map, including any rezoning of land in the county. The council must also approve and amend the comprehensive plans that are initially drafted by the Planning Board.

Nevertheless, the council’s authority over individual development plans and projects has been significantly curtailed by this recent decision.

The Basic Holding: The County Council Cannot Second-Guess the Planning Board

The decision significantly reduces the amount of political influence that the Prince George’s County Council can exert over developers and individual development projects. Traditionally, the council has liberally used its discretionary authority to “call up” a case decided by the Planning Board for further review, even when the developer and opposing parties of record choose not to challenge the Planning Board’s decision.

In those discretionary “call-up” reviews, and in any appeals of Planning Board decisions initiated by the parties, the Prince George’s County Council always purported to exercise “original jurisdiction,” meaning that it could choose to ignore the Planning Board’s reasoning and come to a different decision based on the evidence developed during the Planning Board hearing.

The Court of Appeals, in upholding two lower court decisions, determined that the Prince George’s County Council had misinterpreted the scope of its authority in these types of second-tier administrative reviews.

The court said the council was not authorized to exercise original jurisdiction when reviewing Planning Board decisions, whether on an appeal initiated by the parties or in a discretionary “call-up” review. Rather, similar to the judiciary, the council could only exercise “appellate jurisdiction” in these matters—which means that it could overturn the Planning Board’s determinations only if they were not supported by evidence, or if they were legally erroneous.

In other words, the council could not substitute its own judgment for that of the Planning Board, even if the evidence would allow for both results.

Notably, unlike Prince George’s, the Montgomery County Council does not have a second-tier administrative review process for individual development review applications decided by the Montgomery Planning Board. Instead, all such disputes are resolved directly by the courts.

How We Got Here: An Epic Battle to Build a CVS

Photo by JeepersMedia on Flickr

This lawsuit arose out of a nearly 10-year effort to build a retail center with a CVS pharmacy on a 4-acre parcel of land known as the Edwards Property, located in Adelphi, Maryland. The Court of Appeals described the ensuing struggle as “a battle of almost epic proportions” waged by the various litigants.

In 2004, the property owner applied to the District Council for a rezoning of the Edwards Property from Rural-Residential (R-R) to Local Activity Center (LAC), a mixed-use floating zone that allowed for small-scale retail development. The owner included the required Basic Plan setting forth a general description of future land uses on the property. The council approved the rezoning request, subject to a list of conditions which were included in the ordinance approving the rezoning.

In 2011, Zimmer Development Company submitted simultaneous applications for a Comprehensive Design Plan (CDP) and a Specific Design Plan (SDP) to the Planning Board for review. These plans set forth in more concrete detail the developer’s plans for developing the Edwards Property. MNCPPC staff reviewed and recommended approval of Zimmer’s plans, and after a public evidentiary hearing, the Planning Board approved the plans with a list of conditions, finding that the applications met the requirements of the LAC zone approved by the council.

Although no one appealed the Planning Board’s decision, the council nevertheless “called up” the decision for review. After hearing oral arguments, the council remanded the decision to the Planning Board for reconsideration of three specific issues regarding whether Zimmer needed to provide additional mitigation to lessen the impact of the proposed retail center on the surrounding community. The Planning Board held another hearing in 2012 and essentially reapproved Zimmer’s application on similar conditions, making specific findings in response to the three areas of concern noted by the council.

As it did with the first Planning Board decision, the council “called up” the Planning Board’s post-remand decision, even though nobody had appealed it. This time, the council unanimously voted to disapprove Zimmer's application after the council member in whose district the Edwards Property lay spoke against it.

The council’s unanimous denial of the development project is an example of another well-known and much-derided practice called “council courtesy,” whereby council members effectively exercise unilateral veto power over development projects in their districts, regardless of the merits of the proposal.

The council's resolution listed 14 reasons for its denial of Zimmer's development application, including failure to comply with various conditions of the original LAC zone. None of those reasons related to the three issues the council first complained of in its original "call-up" review and remand. Zimmer's appeal of the council's denial in the courts ultimately resulted in the high court decision earlier this month.

The case is County Council of Prince George’s County v. Zimmer Development Co., No. 64, Sept. Term, 2014 (Md. Aug. 20, 2015).