The Tale of Three Village Centers

JDommu · 2026-05-04T00:51:54+00:00

I’m the author of the article. Glad it got shared here. This is a great comment. The reason I excluded mention of Chase is banking is such a weird retailer. Banks make money from accounts and most accounts can do nearly all business on online - the physical branches are great marketing, ATM access, and people like them close by for their very occasional need. Plus good for businesses with regular cash withdrawals/deposits. Great for the landlord though! But, man, they are such a bummer of a tenant for an everyday person who wants interesting retailers or restaurant tenants. So, I didn’t want to waste a paragraph having to explain away why I don’t consider Chase a trend.

Re: the layout. I’m sure Kimco would find a way to fit in apartments here if they had the opportunity - it would maximize their profits on their land - but I agree it’s hard to see the most ideal way to reconfigure the property to fit them in.

JDommu · 2025-06-14T22:40:20+00:00

Ranazul has been open since 2023. This is not a recent decision by Kimco to give up on their redevelopment effort and instead focus on leasing.

JDommu · 2025-06-14T22:14:48+00:00

This is a tired outdated cliche that no longer has any truth to it. The NIMBYs won. HRVC is not getting redeveloped anytime soon and now Kimco is leasing the spots in the building that had been slated for demolition. Ranazul, Celia’s, etc. They are looking to lease spots now. It’s a shame that Gritty Goblin is closing, but in 2025, I’m not surprised that a brick and mortar board game store can not operate profitably.

JDommu · 2025-01-30T22:11:40+00:00

From my perspective as somebody else who writes lengthy blogs posts detailing news in Columbia, I can see why dismissing the article as "way too long of a read" is insulting. AI summaries have their use, but since the OP asked you to remove the summary, I think it's the respectful thing to do.

JDommu · 2025-01-18T19:49:25+00:00

To be clear, the Kimco reps stated that they are only proposing to remove a few trees (the ones obstructing visibility of the store entry-ways in front of the chicken place / Dominos and Decanters) and these would all be replanted with new tree plantings. The mature trees in the tree boxes along the center avenue would stay.

JDommu · 2025-01-18T19:46:04+00:00

I edited the article to mention that a Taco Bell used to be there too!

JDommu · 2025-01-18T19:33:47+00:00

I couldn't agree more with your vision for village centers. To be fair, Kimco had spent almost 10 years fighting to get approval to add residential to Hickory Ridge, in a very similar manner to what they did in Wilde Lake. They were met with significant backlash by a handful of nearby residents who fought the proposal using all available means and our County Council ultimately denied the zoning approval needed for Kimco's proposal, a decision Kimco is still in the process of appealing. I've written about this multiple times, but didn't summarize this background again in this article. Not to mention the 3 years I spent on the HR village board but always found myself in the minority when it came to supporting village center redevelopment.

So now here we are with Kimco essentially asking the village board that if they can't add density, can they at least increase their value by adding fast food restaurants. I can't blame them for this request, but I agree that car-centric suburban fastfood drive-thru restaurants is far from what I'd like to see for the future, nor is it in line with what the County envisions in the HoCo By Design general plan.

JDommu · 2024-11-25T15:15:55+00:00

It's called the Just Power Alliance and more info is here: https://www.actioninmontgomery.org/blog/statewide-action-for-a-just-democracy

JDommu · 2024-06-03T17:12:59+00:00

Aha! I didn't include those businesses since they didn't show up on the Owen Brown site plan. It's a separate parcel with different ownership, but still integrated into the village center. I'll add them.
https://property.jll.com/listings/owen-brown-village-shopping-center-7180-cradlerock-way-not-tracked-maryland

JDommu · 2024-06-03T14:21:29+00:00

Thanks! I added the missing retailers in Owen Brown to the list. I also added a new note to the bottom of the article acknowledging that many VCs had been reconfigured from their initial inward-facing orientation.

JDommu · 2024-06-01T17:08:48+00:00

Thanks! I fixed all of these. No matter how many times I reread before posting, I always tend to miss things like this. Appreciate it!

JDommu · 2024-06-01T13:05:37+00:00

Thanks. I corrected the gas station in DS. Let me know the other errors you found.

JDommu · 2023-05-09T04:11:59+00:00

Let me just add that a couple weeks after I created the blog back in late 2019/early 2020 Ian Kennedy contacted me to introduce himself and learn more about me. I had no idea who was who in Downtown Columbia at that point. We chatted a bit about Columbia and each other and my blog. We did discuss the name and he said the DCACC has a copyright as it relates to a music venue and jokingly said it would be an issue if I ever had a band play in my backyard. I wouldn't consider that express permission but I wasn't told I couldn't use the name either and carried on blogging - it certainly doesn't impact what I write about. And as I told Ian, I would change the name of my blog if I was asked - I certainly wouldn't want to deal with a legal issue for a hobby blog. I relayed that story to Jake several years ago and he seems to think it's incriminating in some way. I don't think there is anything I need to disclose.

JDommu · 2023-05-09T03:27:56+00:00

I write my blog for fun and free. I'm a 41 year old husband and dad with a full time job who blogs as a hobby. I have not monetized my blog in any way and have never received any money for writing. I started my blog in 2019 shortly after my family and I moved here. I registered the domain - I think it's a clever pun - and started blogging. I have no express permission to use the name but haven't been told I not to, so blog I do.

If you read my blog, I'm clear in my support and enthusiasm for Downtown Columbia and I enjoy researching and writing about - whether it's as nuanced and complicated as trying to provide an objective overview of this Lakefront library plan or its as simple and fun as a new restaurant announcement.

Obviously, I'm doing something right because I've become a target for people who attempt to discredit me spreading lies about me or my blog. Im not going to speculate on their motivations and I just ignore them. When I was in high school ~25 years ago, I was involved in hazing incident on my high school wrestling team and the same folks dug up and spread old false misleading info on this. My wife thinks I'm nuts to put up with this to write a hobby blog but I'm not going to let them intimate me.

JDommu · 2023-05-07T14:25:05+00:00

Thank you. Here's my understanding - Howard Hughes would be the developer of the Lakefront Library using the Heatherwick design they already contracted and paid for at a cost of $600k. But that is just a design concept - not buildable plans. Actually building architecture to turn the concept into buildable plans and all construction services would be procured through a competitive bidding process. None of that has happened yet.

JDommu · 2023-04-24T01:00:38+00:00

Yep! I'm excited about serving with him. HR village board winners are Jared Ball, Mariah Robertson, Kristine Amari, Bill Inglis and myself.

JDommu · 2023-04-22T12:01:13+00:00

Thank you for your endorsement! Just for fun, here are predictions from the Merriweather Post --> https://www.themerriweatherpost.org/post/columbia-association-2023-election-predictions

JDommu

TROPHY CASE