Developer's Book Exchange Plan Remains Largely Unchanged

The developers for the project will present a proposal to the county’s planning board on Thursday that is nearly identical to the plan it presented a month ago.

Developers hoping to build a six-story retail and student housing complex where the Maryland Book Exchange currently sits was originally up for a vote before the planning board last month, but were granted a 35-day continuance.

City planning staff expected the developers to use the time to revise the plans, taking into account the concerns of residents and city leaders, planning director Terry Schum said. But developer Ilya Zusin instead used the time to reach out to the community, , he said.

“The city and the county had comments on the plan. We didn’t change the plans as a whole, but we incorporated a few of the comments, but not enough to change the plan,” Zusin said.

According to the county staff report, it will recommend that the planning board disapprove the application, a decision that City Planning Director Terry Schum said she would support.

“[Developers] didn’t submit revised plans. That says to us they’re just digging in their heels and saying we have a good design. Approve it,” she said.

The College Park , after listening to the testimony of more than a dozen residents, wary of more than 1,000 students living in that part of town. Residents also said the complex would be too big for that area, and it wouldn’t fit in with the historic design of the neighborhood.

Schum said the size and design are the main concerns of city staff.

“I don’t think many people are going to say no student housing there, because that’s not a good argument frankly,” Schum said.

But Zusin isn’t buying that.

“At the end of the day, I strongly believe they don’t want students in … that part of town,” Zusin said.

Both Schum and Zusin have said in the past that the main area of disagreement comes from differing interpretations of the new Central U.S. 1 Corridor Sector Plan, which makes recommendations pertaining to land use, zoning and development along Baltimore Avenue.

While the city’s planning staff and council, and the county’s Historic Preservation Commission and planning staff have said that the developer’s plan does not conform to the Sector Plan, Zusin maintains that it does.

He said the handling of this development will set an important precedent, as it’s the first project to fall under the new Sector Plan.

“By the way [the city is] behaving, they’re really hurting the economic development of the whole corridor. People go where officials follow laws, and I feel here the city isn’t following their own plans,” Zusin said.