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Business & Tech

A View of Wheaton, From Ithaca, N.Y.

Real Estate management class studies B.F. Saul project, downtown Wheaton for a capstone course.

Redevelopment efforts in Wheaton will get input later this spring from an unlikely source:  teams of real estate, landscape design and regional planning graduate students from upstate New York.

Members of Cornell University's Real Estate Project Workshop last month toured the Wheaton sites that are slated for redevelopment through a public-private partnership headed by Bethesda-based property management company B.F. Saul.

The program includes students in three disciplines who, as their final project in May, will present to concepts to Saul for how the sites might be developed. The parcel currently open to Saul includes the bus bays next to the Metro entrance, the mid-county regional services center and parking lot 13 -- the main county lot between Triangle Lane and Grandview Avenue. 

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"It's doable to really create something exciting in Wheaton that capitalizes on its history," said Mark Foerster, a professor in the program and executive vice president at Northern Capital Group, a real estate investment and consulting firm based in Pittsford, N.Y., who made the trip to Wheaton with the students. "When a community wants density and success, that's great to hear. The challenge is to accomplish that in a way that's unique to Wheaton."

The students aren't examining , nor how those plans are being received by Wheaton residents and businesses and by the local and county planning authorities.

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Instead, they are tasked with taking a fresh look at Wheaton and coming up with their own ideas for how a redevelopment scheme could be financially successful while improving Wheaton's economy and retaining the community's eclectic characteristics and small businesses.

One challenge, said Foerster, is coming up with an urban planning design that will convey a striking image of Wheaton that, right now, doesn't really exist.

"Wheaton's an interesting place," said Foerster, who is familiar with the area, having previously worked for a firm that owned a stake in Tysons Corners. "It was interesting to me because it is eclectic. But in many ways, it's nondescript from an architectural and urban design standing."

In other words, Foerster says there's no identifier that tells visitors they're in Wheaton.

"Our goal is to sort of create this sense of place for Wheaton," said Ian McKay, a student in the workshop working towards a master's degree in real estate finance and development. "It's got a lot of great sort of culture but no real center."

Foerster said even simple improvements like awnings and trees would help unify the businesses lining the sidewalks around the parking lot. The mall should be better integrated into the rest of the business district, he said. And the community could capitalize on the existence of landmark businesses such as on Veirs Mill Road.

Foerster said Wheaton isn't likely to get as densely developed as downtown Silver Spring because it is more sprawling and, so, better suited for a dense core of development that quickly tapers out into surrounding streets. He also doesn't believe Wheaton will turn into a replica of Bethesda, because its clientele is too different.

"One of the challenges is to reinvent that downtown area so that it capitalizes on that [Wheaton] brand image and changes it, [but] doesn’t destroy what was already there," Foerster said.

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