If the $3.7 billion deal to bring the Washington Commanders back to the District gets the green light from the D.C. Council, it will bring five new and distinct districts to the 180-acre RFK Stadium campus.
The districts would become housing, restaurants, retail and more, according to City Administrator Kevin Donahue.
“I think people have to get out of their minds what they see now, which is hard to do because it’s been there for generations,” Donahue said.
Among the districts is the anchor itself, the stadium, which Donahue said would have the smallest footprint, only 15% of the site, and would have a roof that lines up with the Lincoln Memorial, the Washington Monument and the U.S. Capitol. He said in addition to football games, they expect some or all of the stadium to be used 200 times a year.
“Think about football games, concerts, international soccer games, and then about 100 to 150 other uses — that’ll be, think convention center uses — conventiongoers coming to the stadium, activating it for private events, for public events,” Donahue said.
To the south of the stadium would be the Riverfront District, which Donahue said would convert an abandoned parking lot into residential housing, retail and restaurants close to the protected area near where the Anacostia Trail runs. But it won’t be on the water.
Behind the stadium would be the Plaza District, which Donahue said would be similar to what exists along Half Street outside Nationals Park, with restaurants and entertainment spots for people to hang out before and after games. Donahue said this would be different from the games many remember at the old RFK stadium, when thousands of fans would only leave the stadium and head to their cars or Metrorail.
“You have people mingling in over the course of two hours before a game starts, then afterward, particularly if it’s a Thursday, Friday, Saturday game, you have people mingling and staying afterward,” he said.
Closer to Benning Road, an abandoned parking lot would become the Kingman Park District, and Donahue said the city intends to provide long-term leases to developers who put apartment style housing along Oklahoma Avenue. Of the rental properties, 30% would need to be affordable housing.
“There’ll be many affordable opportunities for people to make it their homes and make it places that they live, that they raise their children, access the local schools. And for the folks who live adjacent to RFK right now, they’ll have neighbors, and their neighbor won’t be a big parking garage,” Donahue said.
However, this district would also include two parking garages. Donahue said those will be tucked closer toward the stadium.
Next to the Kingman District at the site currently known as the Fields at RFK, Donahue said the soccer and baseball fields would stay but what would be called the “Recreation District.” It would also include a state-of-the-art sportsplex, which would provide parents and athletes with a location for events, such as cheerleading, gymnastics and other indoor activities.
“Think of the sportsplex as being a recreation center, except it has the recreational activities that you really can’t get at our wonderful rec centers around the city,” he said.
Also, in the Recreation District, 30% of the land would remain green space, he said.
Finally, 30 acres of land, which will be known as Anacostia Commons, is home to the Anacostia River Trail, which will not be developed.
“That won’t be touched; it’ll be restored. There will be public access, so it will not be cut off by private development,” Donahue said, referring to the nearby waterways.
Handling car and foot traffic
Planning the layout of the stadium campus is a big task, according to Donahue, because there is a lot of space to work with.
“If you live in D.C., if you’re familiar with Catholic University campus, a big campus, it’s about as large as this campus is. If you think of the Glover Park neighborhood, an entire neighborhood with a school in it, it’s about the size of this campus,” Donahue said.
Donahue said the campus would look totally different because it would be redesigned with fewer instances of people and car traffic coming together.
“It’ll be a pedestrian-friendly design,” he said.
People could soon be crossing main streets by going over or under them, and they plan to make the stadium more accessible to people walking or biking from areas farther down the river, including Navy Yard.
“We really want to not have this be an island of development and residential housing separate from both this adjacent community,” Donahue said.
Some on the D.C. Council have been critical of the absence of funding for Metro in the plan, but Donahue is optimistic that by the time the stadium is open, the infrastructure, including transportation, will be in place to accommodate the crowds.
“There is a Metro station that is around the corner that people used, millions of people used, over the course of the lifetime of RFK when it was activated,” Donahue said.
He said when it comes to other transit investments — among them the needs of people who will work, live and come to the area to indulge at the retail and restaurants — the needs there will need to be studied down the road.
“We have these unanswered questions that we need to study properly, and then we will invest. This is no question,” Donahue said.
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