Important Neighborhood Alert
The Bowie City Council holds the final public hearing for the Marketplace Apartments project this Tuesday, January 3rd at 7:00 PM. The meeting will be in the Council Chambers Room in Bowie City Hall at 15901 Excalibur Road. Please help us stop this oversized, ill-conceived development.
If you wish to speak at this key hearing just come early and sign in, email mbaird@cityofbowie.org, or call the Department of Planning & Economic Development office at 301-809-3047 to be added to the speakers list. Time is limited to 3 minutes per speaker. You do not need to speak to make an impact. Your attendance alone will be a great help to our effort. If you attend the meeting you will get an overview of the developer’s current plans for a 4 and 5 story, multi-family unit apartment building of almost 300 units on the small open area at the back of the updated Marketplace Shopping Center.
The developer is set on maximizing profits, which he should as a good business man. So, he shows little concern about: dumping more traffic on our overcrowded streets; departing at will from the 2006 Bowie Master Plan (Bowie Main Street); or meeting a written agreement with the city that Marketplace development will not adversely impact the character of existing neighborhoods.
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The 2006 Bowie and Vicinity Master Plan envisions a mixed-use activity center which includes the Marketplace. The plan paints an attractive picture with active commercial and residential components. It also sets forth a policy that “…development of Bowie Main Street not adversely impact the character of the existing residential neighborhood.” A key strategy of the plan is to “…transition in building density and intensity from more intense uses located at the core of Bowie Main Street along MD 450 to less intense uses along the edge, adjacent to residential neighborhoods. Well they had 10 years to get it right, they got it wrong, and the developer plans to make it worse.
We only have one or two chances in a century to impact real change on a site like the Marketplace. So far we have lost out on the appealing Bowie Main Street vision of an upscale destination with “unique character and sense of place.”
The developer agreed in writing with the city to “… redevelop the Marketplace in accordance with … concepts contained in the Master Plan.” The developer elected to ignore key components of the Plan in development of the commercial component of the Marketplace and plans to do the same for the residential elements.
The Bowie Planning Department will come to the City Council with recommendations to disapprove the Conceptional Site Plan, Preliminary Plan, and Detailed Site Plan for the proposed residential component of the Marketplace. It is well thought out and comes up with correct decisions involving:
1) Excessive density for both the available space on-site and the proximity to the adjacent residential neighborhood
2) Excessive vehicle traffic on city streets that do not meet current City and County maximum service volume, and
3) Excessive scale, mass and bulk of the proposed building being incompatible with both the existing detached residential homes and the new Market Place retail buildings, which will adversely impact the character of existing neighborhoods
You can provide the crucial citizens input needed to stop this unacceptable development – please support your City Planning Department and your neighbors – Thank you!
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