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Politics & Government

Work Session Attempts to Tackle Resident Concerns

The mayor presented guidelines to revitalize Kensington over a 20 year period.

During a design guideline meeting on Wednesday, the mayor and residents discussed revitalization options for Kensington.

Close to 50 Kensington residents attended the town design guideline session to hear Mayor Peter Fosselman outline a civic improvement "master plan" that is being developed for the town over the next two decades.

Ten guideline strategies were presented at the meeting to maintain or improve a high quality of life in Kensington. Some of the guidelines included are to assure the long-term economic vitality of the town, to establish a pedestrian district and to design and construct streetscape improvements throughout Kensington to encourage residential uses adjacent to and in the town center and pedestrian districts, all while maintaining the historic character of Kensington.

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The current revitalization plan replaces a 1978 plan; the current plan was presented by Fosselman at the town hall, and the bulk of the session contained a video slide show of proposed Connecticut Avenue improvements and a feedback session where citizens were asked for opinions of other area business developments and architecture renderings. 

"The turnout was phenomenal; we had tremendous public feedback," Mayor Fosselman said. "The biggest point that was made tonight is there is a true misunderstanding of the FAR - the Floor Area Ratio versus density and height. I think after the explanation tonight, people got it."

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Floor Area Ratio is the ratio of the total floor area of building on a certain location to the size of the land of that location. Some citizens attending the session raised concerns over building sizes and dimensions during the slide show and the question-and-answer period. The current Kensington Floor Area Ratio ranges from 1.0 to 2.0 depending on a certain town sector.

Meeting attendee Sandy Wilkes presented his opinion that one photo presented by the mayor that contained a multi-level retail/apartment development seemed to be fine, but moving forward with revitalization could take many months off the calendar.

"I hope that these pictures are right around the corner, but what we are talking about is building economics," Wilkes said. "If I'm operating a [business] there has to be a motivation to redevelop that property or to sell that property to someone who would like to redevelop it. If that business is robust, and if that development potential to that site is restrained, it could be years and years and years before the stars line up and you get something that looks like that [picture]."

Kensington businesswoman Laura-Leigh Palmer said her main worry was in regard to pedestrian traffic and street safety.  

"I can't cross the [busy] streets; I'm not kidding about that," Palmer said. "I can't cross the street safely. We talked about over-bridges, under-bridges and I think jetpacks [would work]," Palmer said with a laugh on possible solutions. "People have to be supportive of that. I've been working for years to get elements of the town to work together. Right now, it [the town] is not living up to its potential; there's so much more that can happen in this area."

The Connecticut Avenue and Knowles Avenue revamping includes narrower driving lanes, wider sidewalks and a wider median which would serve as a pedestrian haven. The wider median would also include additional trees and landscape. Mayor Fosselman also informed the crowd that the town--in unison with Montgomery County--is working to solve the flooding problem with Silver Creek.

"Silver Creek flooding is a number one issue in the sector plan," Fosselman said. "We have to solve this issue. The creek has increased in velocity in the south part of town. This isn't something we can wait for twenty years to fix."

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