Federal Realty’s Mixed-Use Project Earns Prestigious LEED Designation

NORTH BETHESDA, MD—Federal Realty Investment Trust’s Pike & Rose mixed-use project has achieved LEED Neighborhood Development v2009 Stage 3 Gold certification from the U.S. Green Building Council.

The Rockville, MD-based equity REIT states that Pike & Rose is the only LEED ND Stage 3 certified project owned and developed by a US REIT and one of only 10 LEED ND Stage 3-certified projects in the nation as well as only the 18th worldwide.

Pike & Rose is a transit-oriented development located six miles north of Washington, DC. The 24-acre project consists of 379,000 square feet of retail, 765 apartment units, 99 condos atop a 177-key hotel, and an 80,000-square foot Class A office building with an additional 212,000 square feet of office under development.

LEED ND certification was engineered by the US Green Building Council to inspire and help create better, more sustainable, well-connected neighborhoods and looks beyond the scale of buildings to consider entire communities.

The surrounding neighborhood is also home to one of the Mid-Atlantic’s largest rooftop farms, a 17,000-square foot green space above a residential building that produces fruits and vegetables that are sold directly to tenants on site, local farmers markets, and neighboring restaurants on the property.

“Earning this important certification demonstrates Federal Realty’s commitment to improving performance and creating a more resilient and sustainable future by minimizing our environmental footprint through energy and resource-efficient buildings,” says Ronald J. Becker, CRX, CSM, director, national property operations & sustainability of Federal Realty. “As leaders in the industry, we believe we have a responsibility and an opportunity to positively impact our communities, employees, investors, tenants and the environment, which are all critical components to long-term success.”

Federal Realty notes that it completed its annual sustainability reporting through the Global Real Estate Sustainability Benchmark and was awarded a Green Star recognition with four out of give stars. The firm ranked first among its peers in the Health and Wellness category. In addition, Federal Realty reduced energy consumption by 11.4% year-over-year and also reduced water consumption by 3% year-over-year, which equates to 7.7 million gallons of water.

Federal Realty was previously recognized as a Green Lease Leader Gold by the Institute for Market Transformation and the US Department of Energy Better Buildings Alliance for high-performance leasing practices that drive shared energy savings and sustainability benefits in buildings.

The firm also generates 16.7 megawatts of roof top solar power installed at 30% of the trust’s properties. Other green initiatives include the trust’s partnership with Up Top Acres to operate rooftop farms at its Bethesda Row and Pike & Rose properties that combined produce almost 30,000 pounds of produce annually. Produce grown at both farms is sold to local restaurants and at local farmers markets. At Pike & Rose the produce is also sold directly to the tenants of the residential building through the Up Top Acres membership program.

Federal Realty also partners with Freight Farms, a Boston-based company that retrofits shipping containers with vertical farming technology, to repurpose unused parking spaces within its shopping centers as a place to locally and sustainably grow acres’ worth of produce in a fraction of the space of traditional farms.

The REIT owns retail-based properties located primarily in major coastal markets from Washington, DC to Boston as well as San Francisco and Los Angeles. It has also developed urban, mixed-use neighborhoods such as Pike & Rose, Santana Row in San Jose, CA and Assembly Row in Somerville, MA. Federal Realty’s 105 properties include approximately 3,000 tenants, in approximately 24 million square feet and more than 2,600 residential units.