Week in Comments: Questions Arise About Development on Silver Spring Church Lot

Our readers had a lot to say this week; the comments mainly surrounded the The First Baptist Church of Silver Spring moving forward with their redevelopment plans for the church after the historic preservation commission of Montgomery County Park and Planning voted against making it a historic designation. Readers wrote in their perspective on the issue. Here is what they had to say: 

Jag writes: Here's hoping construction gets started sooner rather than later!

Joseph Smith writes: I agree that this project is well overdue. The church has been laboring toward an imaginative solution to its own problems and making a constructive contribution to the community for a long time, well before the 2007 leak problems. My own eyes tell me that there is nothing architecturally significant about the appearance of the present building, nor does it really make sense to call a pastiche of mid-20th-Century buildings "historic." How may we who are supportive of this project lend our voices to the approval of the text amendment that is now needed?

lilkunta writes: 

So is the building gonna be bullddozed? Then rebuilt on a 2nd level atop retail on the 1st? What about parking for the church? Across the street parking is hard as hell for StMichaels Church bc it is next door to FreshFieldsWholeFoods.

Jag writes: 

Here's the latest info/site plans, lilkunta.

http://www.thayeravenue.com/2011/03/01/essca-recap-wayne-fenton-development/

lilkunta writes: 

jag: Thanks. I asked my same questions before and was directed to thayeravenue.com. I still dont have an answer. The development is all gonna happen on the church property? The citgo corner and the mechanic corner arent getting touched?

When is that safeway gonna be revitalised? 
Put underground parking, stores, and a new safeway.

Jag writes: 

The safeway was refurbished only about 2 years ago. They certainly won't be bulldozing in the next decade, at least.