JK Land Holdings, Chuck Kuhn’s real estate investment company, has the 225-acre Waterside property in Sterling under contract with plans to submit a new proposal for the long-stalled mixed-development project on the site of a quarry about 1 mile from the Innovation Center Metrorail station. The pending deal, first reported by the Washington Business Journal, could add to the momentum for the development of the Urban Policy Area at the northeast corner of the Route 28-Dulles Greenway interchange.
Rivana, another long-stalled mixed-use plan that has gone through several iterations over more than decade, broke ground earlier this year after the Board of Supervisors approved the latest version of the project, located immediately south of the Waterside site. County supervisors have in recent years pointed to the potential for large-scale mixed-use developments near Metro stations as the best chance to lessen the county’s reliance on taxes from data centers and residential real estate.
“(T)he JKLH team is prepared to move forward quickly with this project,” an Aug. 5 statement from the company said.
The current zoning approvals for the Waterside project date to 2015, when the Board of Supervisors approved up to 3.8 million square feet of urban-like office, commercial and residential buildings — including 2,200 multifamily housing units — around a 54-acre lake created by filling the now-disused quarry. Seventy-six acres of the project area north of Old Ox Road were later peeled off and developed with data centers, leaving about 225 acres.
The 2015 approvals include 521,000 square feet of floor space that may only be developed as offices, with another 1.6 million square feet of non-residential uses that may include offices, the Washington Business Journal reported.
JK Land Holdings said in a statement to the Times-Mirror that there is an “over-planned amount of office space for the project and immediate vicinity.” The statement said that through a “collaborative visioning process,” the company plans to “identify the right mix of uses blended with the right mix of amenities to create a regional destination with employment, entertainment, residential and commercial activities.” That will likely include going back to the board to request updates to the 2015 approvals, the statement said.
The site has over the years been proposed for Amazon’s HQ2 and a professional football stadium complex, though Amazon opted to build its new headquarters in Arlington, and speculation about the Washington Commanders’ new stadium has recently focused on sites in Washington, D.C., and Maryland. The Washington Business Journal previously reported that The Gudelsky Group, which owns the Waterside property, rejected an offer from the Commanders to buy the site in 2022.
Kuhn, through a spokesman, said he is “Always willing to listen, yet hopeful the (C) commanders will return to Washington DC.”
Chuck Kuhn, of JK Land Holdings, addresses the Loudoun County Planning Commission in 2023.
Supervisor Koran Saines (D-Sterling), who represents the area, also said he is still open to the idea of a professional sports stadium at the site. He pointed to The Star District in Frisco, Texas, a mixed-use development built around the Dallas Cowboys training facility and headquarters, as an example to emulate.
Regardless of the details, he said, he will support a “true mixed-use” development plan for Waterside, with housing, retail, and offices along with flex-industrial buildings that could house “a small business, a gym — a whole mix of uses.”
But data centers, he said, are out of the question in the Urban Policy Area, echoing comments he made about the nearby Innovation Gateway proposal that would build data centers next to an apartment building with below-market-rate units.
“I do not want to see — and will not approve — any data center at this location,” he told the Times-Mirror, adding that he hopes JK Land representatives will “read the county’s policies” on the 2019 Comprehensive Plan’s vision for the Urban Policy Area. He said he has met with JK Land representatives to share “our thoughts and vision” for the development.
Asked whether the new proposal might include data centers, the spokesman for JK Land said it’s “too early in the planning stages at this point to comment.”
The company has not disclosed the dollar amount of the pending deal.
