Downtown Silver Spring in Silver Spring, Maryland, is a 22-acre mixed-use suburban downtown revitalization project. "Silver Spring’s core was at one time a non-descript area of parking lots, aging retail, office buildings, and boarded-up storefronts. It is now a thriving, mixed-use town center within an arts and entertainment district," writes John Marcolin, a Montgomery County planner.
Developed from Maryland’s Smart Growth policies, the “first ring” suburban project is the result of a public-private partnership. It involved the creation of retail, entertainment, office, and public spaces and multi-family housing units, as well as four vibrant, revitalized main streets that are safe and pedestrian-friendly.
The Rudy Bruner Award for Urban Excellence 2005 selection committee stated:
"Downtown Silver Spring project worked with the architecture of the Discovery Center and its public park, the commons, and the Veterans Plaza on axis with the transit center."
Totaling $1.3 billion in investment, the revitalization has resulted in more than one million square feet of retail space including movie theaters and restaurants in a restored historic Art Deco building. The American Film Institute and the world headquarters for Discovery Communications are housed in newly developed office spaces. Located adjacent to a Metro stop, the project provides a transit-oriented model of redevelopment in a suburb serving a diverse population.
Similar Projects
Storrs Center #thisisCNU
Mansfield, Connecticut
For a town with a major educational institution—the University of Connecticut—Mansfield was surprisingly short of urban amenities until a few years ago.
TLC: An Approach to Activate Downtown Rockford
Rockford, Illinois
After decades of abandonment, downtown Rockford is finally coming back. Rockford, a mid-sized city in north-central Illinois about 90 miles northwest of Chicago, is not unlike many other Midwest cities its size.
Hampstead
Montgomery, Alabama
DPZ CoDESIGN has been at the forefront of New Urbanism since its beginning, and in 2003 the firm (then called Duany Plater-Zyberk & Company) led the creation of the SmartCode.