Montgomery County’s ‘science city’ project moves forward 

Posted: 8:25 pm Wed, April 14, 2010
By Danielle Ulman
Daily Record Business Writer

The Montgomery County Council voted Tuesday to approve several points of the planned expansion of the Life Sciences Center into a major scientific community, but scaled back the maximum developable space.

The vote on key issues of the plan means the Science City project will move forward as long as the council approves changes to language supporting the revised plan, which is expected in the next two weeks.

Under the agreement, development will be halted at 17.5 million square feet, instead of the proposed 20 million square feet, to accommodate the wishes of area residents, who worried that the project as proposed would cause major traffic headaches.

Councilmember Phil Andrews, who represents residents of Rockville and Gaithersburg who live in neighborhoods surrounding the existing Life Sciences Center and planned expansion areas, said development will happen on a first-come, first-served basis.

“It will be essentially who gets there first and it depends on when people are ready to go,” he said.

That means that the Johns Hopkins University, which owns the Belward Farm, a 107-acre parcel of land about a mile away from the Life Sciences Center, could still build out 4.5 million square feet of development as allowed in the draft of the plan. The agreement calls for the profiles of the remaining farmhouse and other buildings on the property to be protected as development goes up around them.

“We look forward to continued collaboration with the County government, the University System of Maryland, Adventist [Hospital], our community leaders and others to create the best science center possible within the framework proposed during Tuesday’s Council session,” said Scott Zeger, vice provost for research at Johns Hopkins, said in a statement.

Andrews said some other changes to the Montgomery County Planning Board’s draft proposal allowed him to vote for the project, including keeping the allowed number of cars per lane at 1,450 per hour, instead of increasing it to 1,600. By keeping the number stable, the county will ensure that once traffic increases above that level, it will trigger improvements to the roads and intersections.

The agreement also called for the county’s Planning Board to work with neighbors on the project’s traffic issues as it is built.

The County Council voted 8-1 to tentatively approve the project, with Councilmember Marc Elrich voting against the proposal.

The project is meant to create a live-work community with 5,700 additional housing units, retail space and a proposed transit project. The largest tenants would be academic, biotechnology companies and government agencies, allowing for collaboration among them.