First phase The $78 million project was developed by Bancroft Construction, headed by Herschel and Marvin Blumberg, who had originally purchased the site in 1954. The Blumberg brothers also developed the area of nearby
Silver Spring, Maryland, now known as the
Rock Creek Woods Historic District. The original $5.5 million, Federal office building (now known as Metro 1) was occupied in 1963 by the
U.S. Department of Agriculture. Architect Stone referred to the development as a "Rockefeller Center in the countryside." Other original buildings were the high rise apartments Plaza Towers West and Plaza Towers East, located at Toledo Terrace and Belcrest Road. The Metro 2 office building was completed in 1968 and the Metro 3 building in 1971. The original concept for the New Town Center was for it to be "a planned residential, commercial, employment and social complex which, as yet (1963) has no equal in the Baltimore-Washington area." NCHS had previously been a tenant in one of the original office buildings and moved to its new headquarters in 2002 in the building named Metro Four. In August 2006, a 16-story student apartment with 910 beds opened at the site providing housing for students from 11 local colleges and universities. In 2007, a new main street dubbed America Boulevard opened, as did a 14-screen
Regal movie theater complex, a variety of dining options, and two condominium buildings. Also located at University Town Center is a
satellite campus of
Prince George's Community College. A
Safeway supermarket, with space for additional retail outlets, opened at University Town Center on April 6, 2016. The development that restarted in the 2000s has been dubbed "the realization of a half-century old dream to counter the patterns of
suburban sprawl." ==References==