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Tall Oaks outlook improves
A new tenant for Tall Oaks Shopping Center's anchor store, left empty in November with Giant's closure after 27 years, may be announced in the near future.
KLNB Retail's Julie Cyphers, who oversees the leasing of Tall Oaks, said she “anticipates there being [an announcement] soon,” but would not elaborate because nothing has been signed.
With that store filled, Cyphers said she is optimistic about the remaining vacancies in the shopping center, which combined with the Giant space total 49,366 square feet of empty space, double the amount of occupied 24,634 square feet.
“We're talking to a number of folks,” she said about the center's other vacancies. “I feel like we'll probably pick up speed once the anchor store is in.”
Tara Coonin, a nearby resident, led a postcard campaign earlier this year to convince Bloom grocery stores to lease the space, but according to the Reston Association's CEO Milton Matthews, that comes with complications.
At the board's most recent meeting Matthews said the RA has sat in on several meetings with Tall Oaks' management company and potential stores.
“There are some hurdles with Bloom,” he said. “They would possibly want changes to the interior and exterior.”
Furthermore, Bloom's negotiations for new locations typically last a year, Matthews said.
“We don't want to wait a full year,” he said.
Coonin said she hopes above all else that any new tenant in Giant's old space would indeed be a grocery store.
“As long as it's a grocery store, we don't care. That's just my worst nightmare because that space would be perfect for a large gym,” she said.
Architect Mike Miller, a consultant hired to improve Tall Oak's visibility from Wiehle Avenue, and the management company appeared before the RA's Design Review Board about potential signage solutions on Tuesday evening.
Coonin said negotiations with Bloom raised this concern as well, with Bloom concerned that the center simply wasn't visible enough.
“You can't blame them – the reality is you don't realize there's a shopping center,” she said.
Part of the solution may be removing some of the trees behind the stores on Wiehle Avenue, a move that the RA would likely support.
“The association owns a lot of easements, we're committed to them getting more visibility to the stores in there,” Matthews said.
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