Construction Begins on New Braddock Metro Place Project

Braddock Metro Place Investors LLC has lined up $50 million in financing for a 99-foot-high, 10-story rental apartment building on Madison Street, according to a Washington Business Journal Report.

The 165-unit, 43,000-square-foot complex, which was approved by Alexandria City Council in April 2012, will be located about 500 feet east of the Braddock Road Metro Station.

See: City Council Approves 10-Story Rental Building by Braddock Road Metro.

Construction on the site was planned to begin last week and could be completed as early as December 2014, according to the report.

“We pretty quickly got [financing] interest out of the gate from the parties we were interested in,” said Andrew McAllister, executive director of MAC Realty Advisors LLC, which gathered the financing for Braddock Metro Place Investors from unnamed life insurance businesses. “A very strong development team in a good location is going to get strong interest from the capital markets.”

The bulk of the apartments in the new complex are expected to average about 767 square feet, with an average rental price of $2,100 per month, according to the report.

In April, city staff had recommended that council approve an alternative plan for an eight-story, 77-foot-high building, but council largely decided to go with a second plan because it included 10 units of affordable housing “to remain affordable for 40 years,” according to plan documents.

The Braddock Metro Neighborhood Plan establishes a maximum height of 77 feet on this site, but a section of the zoning ordinance allows an increase in height as an incentive to include affordable housing.

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The complex will have a 151-spaces parking garage, a party area with a swimming pool and other amenities.

The plan includes about 10,000 square feet of open space “designed as a passive park, with pedestrian paths, an oval-shaped lawn landscaping, pedestrian-scale lighting and seating areas," according to city documents.

The site, located at 1261 Madison St., formerly housed part of Parker-Gray High School, which became a middle school in 1965 and later closed in 1979.