You can see the first floor along Water Street, which is the south end of Arris, Forest City's 327-unit apartment building at the Yards--and here's What It Shall Be from the same angle (albeit overhead):

In other words, get ready for that block to look and feel really different when the building is completed, probably in early 2016. And yes, there's ground-floor retail--about 20,000 square feet of it.

Meanwhile, the Lofts at Capitol Quarter, the 195-unit mixed-income apartment building at 7th and L is on quite a hill, so the west end (left) is starting at ground level while the east end (right) is just now coming out of the ground. And these two photos, which don't make it easy to discern exactly what's going on with the construction, do at least give an indication of the length of the building.

Both my Arris and Lofts at CQ project pages have more photos, renderings, etc.

Also, I hope everyone enjoys the Lofts photos taken from Nats Lot W, because when I left there and walked across M at Hull to take pictures TO THE NORTH of the construction TO THE NORTH, a Navy Yard guard approached me and asked to see my photos, to ensure that I was up to nothing nefarious. This even though I had never pointed my camera anywhere close to the direction of the Navy Yard gate--I had even very theatrically held up my camera with its lens clearly pointing in the opposite direction as I crossed M--and even if I had taken photos of the gate, I was on public property the entire time.

"We have to ask, ma'am," he said; "No, you don't," I replied, so really it's a wonder I didn't end up getting thrown into the back of a Suburban and detained. But there's always next time--I told him that they'd better get used to me being there. At least this time they didn't call the DC cops and have one chase me down a few blocks away like they did a few years back.

#PhotographyIsNotaCrime

So let's compare the site as seen back in June, and then yesterday (click to enlarge, as always):

Or, heck, let's go from an ugly day in December 2005 to June 2014 to November 2014 to what it should look like when built:

(And now you know why I try to always wait for the most glorious of sunny days to take photos. Also, thank heavens for the Teague pier vantage point, allowing me to shoot northward-facing photos instead of just ones from Potomac Avenue.)

Ground was definitely being moved on Saturday, as you can see in these not-really-full-of-action action photos:

Construction of this first phase is expected to take about two years. And it should include a plaza and ground-floor retail alongside Diamond Teague Park. You can actually see in the pattern of the digging in the photo at top right the building footprint versus the plaza footprint--the project was required to keep the view from the ballpark's grand staircase out to the river.

Plus, if you stand in the middle of the south end of the block these days, you get one heck of a panoramic view of the new Near Southeast, as evidenced by the eight (!) photos stitched together to create this image.

From this spot, you can see almost so many of the buildings that have gone up in the neighborhood since 2000--the now-topped-out Hampton Inn, 55 M, 1015 Half, 80 M, Velocity, 100 M, the almost-bricked Park Chelsea, Capitol Hill Tower/Courtyard by Marriott, 1100 New Jersey, USDOT, the Boilermaker Shops, Twelve12, the Foundry Lofts, and even the tower crane for the soon-to-sprout Arris. (I'm kicking myself for not swinging enough to get some portion of the ballpark.)

Before long, the interim phase of this location should start to appear--a public park on the north end, a parking lot in the southwest corner, and a spot in the southeast corner at New Jersey and Tingey for the Trapeze School, if they desire it.

Now, for my next item--anyone who accuses me of going overboard on minutiae probably should stop reading here. But for the rest of you, here's a little item from the intersection of 4th and Tingey, where street signs have recently appeared (left). But, then look a little more closely.....

Are we supposed to be voting? Or perhaps it's like A/B testing for web sites, with DDOT trying to determine which one will leave drivers less bewildered as to their location....

Snark aside, my photo archive indicates that the west-side "Fourth" sign was put up sometime in late summer, with the east-side "4" sign appearing within the past month or so. The numeric version is in fact DDOT's current style (ick), so perhaps this was a corrective measure of sorts.

(And, be forewarned, I took a lot of photos on Saturday. Much more to come.)

Madison Marquette, the current owners of the Blue Castle, put it on the market about a year ago, after purchasing it in 2007 from PREI, which had bought it in 2005.

WBJ reports that the sale price is expected to be between $25 million and $35 million, with the church benefitting from a $4.5 million donation to help fund the purchase, along with income from existing leases for the Castle's remaining tenants to help cover the $1.5 million-a-year mortgage.

As you may recall, NCC went on a Lower 8th buying spree back in 2010 and 2011, snapping up 10 lots on the block bounded by Virginia, 7th, 8th, and K, including the old Miles Glass building at 8th and Virginia, which was demolished in 2012. (Their holdings do not include the lot on the corner of 8th and L, where "The Brig" beergarden is going to go.) The church also owns and operates out of the former People's Church a few blocks to the north, on Barracks Row.

When making the Square 906 purchases in 2010 and 2011, it was with an eye toward perhaps some combination of coffee house, performance space, and church offices, though no designs or plans have ever publicly begun moving forward.

The church's Virginia Avenue lots are also right on the front lines of the CSX Virginia Avenue Tunnel project--and back in August the Post quoted NCC head Mark Batterson as saying, "It’s been difficult to take the first step because we don’t know exactly what or when CSX will build and how that will affect us." Which, alongside today's news, does make one wonder about the NCC-related future of those properties.

WBJ says that Batterson told his congregation that the church "hopes to tack on several new floors" to the building--though I have no doubt that that will be a festive trip through the historic preservation review process, along with the Navy giving the stink-eye from across M Street.

The $65 million construction loan for the project was announced on Oct. 8, as was an expected delivery date of September 2016. I've been told there will be an official groundbreaking in the next few months.

It should also be noted that this is the first residential project in the neighborhood actually being built right on the west bank of the Anacostia River.

This building is now part of a frighteningly long list of apartment projects underway: the Park Chelsea (430 units), River Parc (277), Arris at the Yards (325ish), the Lofts at Capitol Quarter (195), 800 New Jersey/Whole Foods (336), and the Gallery at Capitol Riverfront (aka 1111 New Jersey, 324 units).

That's a smidge over 2,230 units in all, and close to 2,450 if you add the recently completed 220-unit Twelve12.

And that tally of non-single-family residential units begun since 2012 is a bit more than double the 2,340 units that were built in the neighborhood between 2004 and 2011. So get ready for a lot of new high-rise neighbors!

Having written more than 100 posts on Florida Rock over the years, I think I'll skip yet another full rundown other than to say that the entire project is designed as a four-building 1.1-million-sq-ft residential/office/hotel/retail project, with no timeline as yet for the rest of the development.

The construction now underway will also expand the plaza by Diamond Teague Park directly across from the grand staircase at Nationals Park, adding ground-floor retail there and along an extension of the Anacostia Riverwalk Trail that will eventually run all the way to the new Douglass Bridge.

All of which looks a little different from these views of the Florida Rock footprint, seen first in August 2005 before the construction of Nationals Park (left) and in January 2012 (right), after the concrete operations were removed and demolished:

It's been a long time coming. And I can't wait for all the steps I'll get trudging down there to take pictures.

More photos through the years and drawings are on my Florida Rock project page.

UPDATED 11/2 with what appears to finally be a definitive unit-count for the building--321 units in a 9-story building . There will also be 18,650 square feet of retail and 286 parking spaces on two below-ground levels. And the amenities will include "grand lobby with onsite leasing presence, ground floor level club/game room with billiards, bar area, and gaming, state of the art health club, rooftop swimming pool, Wi-Fi service and storefront business lounge, conditioned storage, bike storage, 24 hour front desk service and fully access controlled building." All of these tidbits from the MRP Realty page for "The Riverfront."

The proposal apparently is to exchange both the L Street building and its land for various streetscape and construction improvements to be performed by the District along of Martin Luther King Avenue adjacent to St. Elizabeths. "In return, the District would own 49 L Street SE in fee simple with full rights and ownership over the property."

Quoting the quote from the EHN release: " 'This exchange takes GSA further with work necessary to complete the DHS headquarters,' Norton said. 'In the process of moving a DHS priority, GSA has found a way to dispose of the long-underutilized 49 L Street SE by exchanging it for construction services from the District.' "

This is the building that residents have eyed as possibly becoming the Half Street Market, envisioning the building as a "public venue for a food market, restaurant, and flexible community space." (The group recently posted a new video rendering of their reimagining.)

As the release says, this is still in the negotiations stage, and even if the city does get the building there will then be I imagine a process about how to handle the site, but it's the first sign of movement since the flurry of activity about the building and the market idea back in 2013.

The building, as yet unnamed and generally just referred to by some variation of the oh-so-attractive "Square 769N Residential" moniker, is planned for the northern part of the block bounded by 2nd Place, 3rd, L, and M, next door to the recently discussed 250 M Street office building. It will be 11 stories, and will include 34 units of public housing in its 171 rental units. There will also be about 4,100 square feet of ground-floor retail. (The above image shows the block as seen from Canal Park, with the apartment building at left and 250 M at right.)

This funding is not enough to get the building's construction jump-started, but a) it's better than no funding at all and b) it probably helps move the process toward full funding forward.

It has already spent plenty of time in Zoning Land, having received its second-stage PUD approval back in 2009 followed by time extensions in 2011 and 2013.

This is one of four** large mixed-income apartment buildings still to be built as part of Capper's redevelopment, with two more planned for the other blocks along the east side of Canal Park plus one on the old trash transfer site at New Jersey and K.

* For sticklers, this award is part of the 2014 Notice of Funding Availability (NOFA) awards from the Housing Production Trust Fund.

** It could be five, since the Housing Authority is looking at splitting some units out from one planned mixed-income rental building (not this one!) into a second market-rate condo building. But there has been no public indication of movement one way or the other on that, and a planned Zoning hearing this fall has been pushed back to at least early 2015.

Move-ins are being billed as starting around Dec. 1, at least if you go by the Craigslist ads for low-floor units posted in the past few days. The base prices as published give the rate for 1 BR/1 BA units as being between $1,970 and $2,165, going up to 2 BR/2 BA ranging from $2,385 to $3,485. The Craigslist ads include two studios priced at $1,600 and $1,770, and on all units advertised there are showing a current one-month-free deal. (Parking and storage units extra.)

The building isn't open for tours yet, but there's PDF floor plans on the official web site.

However, if you're looking for something a bit more three-dimensional, they've created virtual tours of five upper-floor units (hence the killer views depicted): a studio, a junior one bedroom, a one bedroom, a one bedroom/den, and a two-bedroom penthouse.

You can also virtually tour the roof and the ground-floor amenity spaces. And check out the new twilight-time building rendering.

The office, in the trailer across from the building on the southeast corner of 1st and K, is open seven days a week.

(By the way, this is the first rental apartment building in DC for Toll Brothers.)

BALLPARK SQUARE: Grosvenor and McCaffery Interests, developers of this hotel/residential/retail project along the west side of 1st Street north of N Street, say that they hope to start construction before the end of the year, though at this point the building permits are still pending. The 325-unit apartment building and 170-room hotel (operator not yet announced) are expected to take about two years to complete once construction gets underway. Their "intention" is to construct at the same time the separate two-story retail pavilion nestled between the arms of the Hampton Inn on the corner of 1st and N, with an eye toward completing it before the 2016 baseball season, though no tenants have been secured at this point.

Once construction begins, the existing sidewalk will be blocked, with pedestrian traffic expected to be moved to a covered structure in the 1st Street parking lane (and bike lane), though the final configuration is still under negotiation with DDOT, with the Nationals offering input as well, given the site's location just north of the ballpark.

Also, note that the 99 M Street office building planned for the north end of this block is being developed separately by Skanska and is on its own schedule, separate from these projects. (Building permits are filed, not yet approved.)

250 M: WC Smith is asking the Zoning Commission for a second third extension to the second-stage PUD for its long-planned 230,000 square foot office building, which was originally approved in 2007, then revised in 2008, and given its first extension in 2010 (and another in 2012). This would push the required date to file for a construction permit to Sept. 2016, with construction being required to commence by Sept. 2017. WC Smith's representatives noted the current state of office development basically requires a building to be 70 percent leased before financing can be procured, but that recent activity in the office leasing market "gives us hope" (especially with about 33 million square feet of GSA leased space turning over in the next few years.) Smith's Brad Fennell said that the company is "committed to the site," feels that office space "is the right use for this spot," and has been working hard to find potential tenants. (All of which is laid out in more detail in the zoning filing.)

The ANC supported the request for an extension 6-1, with Roger Moffatt voting against.

Fun fact for readers who haven't been around for this building's history: it is actually part of the Capper/Carrollsburg Planned Unit Development. It would only occupy about half of the block bounded by 2nd Place, 3rd, L, and M--the north end of the block is slated to someday be a Capper mixed-income apartment building.

(In other WC Smith-related news, I was told that the company hopes/expects to begin pouring the slab at the bottom of 800 New Jersey/Whole Foods in two months or so.)

1244 SOUTH CAPITOL: JBG came to the ANC looking for its support for this project's Capitol Gateway Overlay Review, which I wrote about in detail a few weeks back and which is scheduled for Nov. 13.

There have been some small tweaks to the design, along with now an additional variance request to have two 20-foot and two 30-foot loading bays, since original plans to have a 55-foot bay and two smaller bays has run afoul of the teensy width of the block's alley and of Van Street, where the bays will be located. Otherwise, this remains designed as an apartment building with 290ish units and about 26,000 square feet of retail.

The ANC voted to support the project 7-0.

The early questions from the commission centered mainly around Peter May's contention that granting this density--which the applicants refer to as an additional 1.0 FAR but which May was happy to always refer to as "264,000 square feet"--was akin to "incentivizing something that's going to get built anyway." May expressed that the additional height and additional density were "perfectly appropriate" but that he was "not seeing the greater good that comes out of this," i.e., what Forest City would be providing in return.

Initially May zeroed in on proposed language he felt was too weak, that the eventual review of any building proposed along the Yards West M Street frontage would ensure that its design and site plan would "facilitate the provision of a public entrance to the Navv Yard Metrorail Station" on the southwest corner of New Jersey and M. (He also mentioned as an aside concerns he said he had heard recently that the explosion in residential development in the neighborhood instead of office projects was restricting the amount of available evening and weekend garage parking for stadium events.)

But then ANC 6D chair Roger Moffatt testified, noting that while the ANC voted 6-0 to support Forest City's request, it did so while strongly encouraging the Zoning Commission "to require units have more than two bedrooms as a condition of this added height and density." He continued: "ANC 6D supports growing DC into a larger population, but we don't want to exclude families who have children from being able to live in our section of the District. We believe this is an issue whose time has come and we hope that Zoning will take a step in the right direction here tonight."

A light bulb then seemed to go on, with each commissioner supporting May's request that Forest City work with the Office of Planning and the Office of the Attorney General to come up with stronger language not only on the Metro issue but on a "greater mix." Marcie Cohen spoke of families being pushed out of the city, and that Forest City needs to offer "compelling evidence" that there is no market and will be no market for units with more than two bedrooms. Michael Turnbull discussed how if a family has a boy and a girl "you are looking at a three-bedroom unit to make things work" and that "two children is not unreasonable for a lot of families."

While agreeing with the desire to have the language of the proposed text amendments looked at, commissioner Robert Miller did say that the board shouldn't treat lightly that granting the additional density would result in an additional 350 residential units to the area beyond what's already allowed, 70 of which would be affordable housing units, which is "something we need."

Finally, chair Anthony Hood admitted that the commission hasn't concentrated on the issue of units with more than two bedrooms ("I don't call it derelict because I'd call myself derelict"), and that it is something that the board needs to "start looking at this in other projects across the city." However, he seemed a bit skeptical that anything could really come of taking the extra time for the Office of Planning to work on the language in this particular case to achieve that end: "Let's see what happens. Make me wrong."

This case is scheduled to be back in front of the commission in late November.