Malls · Virginia

Ballston Commons

From the authors' mapRedevelopedRegreenedPartly retrofittedArlington, VA

Opened 1951. Partial Redeveloped · Regreened in 2013. · from the fields below

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Solid = from the authors' map · outlined = public source · dashed = model-written, not yet reviewed by a person. Tap any value's source label to see where it came from.

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Site profile18 elements · what this retrofit is built with · tap a chip for the evidence

Finance and pipeline

On Facebook

This site: …https://www.facebook.com/643339542474496 overture · all sites with this

Website alive

This site: …https://www.ballstonquarter.com/en?cmpid=lc_yext_yext_other_o_none&utm_medium=lo overture / http check · all sites with this

Place

15-minute neighbourhood (5+ of 6 daily needs within 800 m)

This site: 6/6 openstreetmap · all sites with this

200+ tax-credit housing units within 1 km

This site: 1,775 units in 11 properties hud-lihtc · all sites with this

3+ other atlas sites within 10 km

This site: 31 within 10 km computed · all sites with this

Bike network nearby

This site: 98 ways openstreetmap · all sites with this

County lost 10%+ of retail establishments since 2012

This site: -20% census-cbp · all sites with this

County typical rent $2,000+

This site: $2,680/mo zillow · all sites with this

Grocery within 800 m

This site: 5 stores openstreetmap · all sites with this

High-income tract ($100k+)

This site: $162,697 census-acs · all sites with this

Low social vulnerability tract (SVI ≤ 0.25)

This site: 0.03 cdc-svi · all sites with this

National Register place within 500 m

This site: Al's Motors nps-nrhp · all sites with this

Renter-majority tract

This site: 100% census-acs · all sites with this

Strategy

Redeveloped

This site: Partial redevelopment: mixed use Partial regreening: park arcgis-webmap · all sites with this

Regreened

This site: Partial redevelopment: mixed use Partial regreening: park arcgis-webmap · all sites with this

New use

Mixed use

This site: Partial redevelopment: mixed use Partial regreening: park extraction · all sites with this

Park and open space

This site: Partial redevelopment: mixed use Partial regreening: park extraction · all sites with this

Retail (continued)

This site: …new_use field extraction · all sites with this

All elements and lists · Trends

From the authors' map

VA, Arlington: Ballston Commons/ Ballston Quarters, 2013
• Partial redevelopment: mixed use
•
• Partial regreening: park

Now

Status	Partly retrofittedauthors' map
Strategy	Partial Redeveloped · Regreenedauthors' map
New uses	retailextracted, unreviewed
What is there now	Partial redevelopment: mixed use Partial regreening: parkauthors' map
Retrofit year	2013authors' map

Securitised debt and public filers

Filings (2001 to date) that name “Ballston Commons” and “Arlington” (1 hits, first 1 sampled). No commercial-mortgage trust names this mall in the sample, which does not rule out a securitised loan. Text matches, not a title search. Open the search · all trusts.

Kind	Filer	Filings	Dates	Forms
Public owner (weak)	FOREST CITY ENTERPRISES INC	1	2015-11-03 to 2015-11-03	10-Q 1

Site context

FEMA flood zone	X · AREA OF MINIMAL FLOOD HAZARDFEMA NFHL
EPA-regulated facilities within 500 m	50: 4000 NORTH FAIRFAX DRIVE; 624 N GLEBE RD; AGFA DIVISION MILES INC; ALS MOTORS INC; AMERICAN SERVICE BODY SHOPEPA FRS
Census tract 51013101408	800 people, 19,563 per sq mi; median household income $162,697; median gross rent $2,520; 100% renters; 7.5% vacant units; 12.9% commute by transitACS 2023 5-year
Within a 10–15 minute walk (800 m)	6 of 6 daily needs: 5 grocers, 6 schools, 45 parks or playgrounds, 27 health, 8 civic, 82 food and drink; 98 cycleway segments, 362 sidewalk-tagged segmentsOpenStreetMap
Opportunity Zone	noHUD
National Register places within 500 m	1: Al's MotorsNPS
Housing permits, Arlington County (VA), 2024	429 units in 5+ unit buildings, 2 in 2–4, 190 single-family; 2023: 1,054 in 5+Census BPS
Social vulnerability (CDC SVI 2022, tract)	overall percentile 0.03; socioeconomic 0.19; housing and transport 0.35; 8% below 150% of poverty; 28% of households with no vehicleCDC/ATSDR
Other atlas sites nearby	31 within 10 km, 61 within 25 km: Parkington Shopping Center (0.1 km); Cherry Hill Apartments (1.9 km); Pentagon Centre (2.7 km); Fillmore Gardens Shopping Center (2.8 km); Colonial Village (3.0 km)computed
Overture Maps	place Ballston Quarter (shopping_mall, confidence 0.92, from Overture, Overture-signals, meta); building footprint 22,599 m², 16.224058151245117 mOverture (CDLA-Permissive 2.0)
Website and social	www.ballstonquarter.com (alive); archived 2015–2019 (Wayback) · social: facebookOverture / Internet Archive
Attention: Wikipedia page views	40,460 since 2015; 3,684 in the last 12 months (-14% vs the prior 12); peak 2018-10 with 833Wikimedia
Tract change 2013–2023	tract boundary changed between the 2010 and 2020 census; no 2013 comparisonCensus ACS
Natural hazard risk (FEMA National Risk Index, tract)	very low overall (score 0.5); expected annual loss $121,169; community resilience relatively moderateFEMA NRI
Tax-credit housing within 1 km	11 LIHTC properties, 1,775 units: Historic Ballston Park (512 units); Gates Of Ballston (464 units); Carlin (162 units)HUD LIHTC
Retail trade in the county, 2012 to 2023	484 establishments (-20%); 7,601 jobs (-19%)Census CBP
Housing market in the county	typical home value $802,232 (+1% 1 yr, +11% 5 yr); typical rent $2,680/mo (+1% 1 yr), 2026-09Zillow Research
Traffic on the busiest road within 600 m (2024)	23,302 vehicles a day on 120 (principal arterial, 6 lanes); 810 trucks; 30 counted segmentsFHWA HPMS

Similar sites

Tysons Corner Center, Tysons Corner, VA · Malls · same strategy: redevelop; also in VA; 10 km away
Tysons Galleria, Tysons Corner, VA · Malls · same strategy: redevelop; also in VA; 11 km away
Seven Corners Shopping Center, Seven Corners, VA · Malls · opened 1956; same strategy: redevelop; also in VA
Northgate Mall, Seattle, WA · Malls · opened 1950; same strategy: redevelop, regreen

Elsewhere on the web

Pages with photos

Meridian at Ballston Commons Photos & Visual Gallery meridianballston.com
Furnished Apartments for Rent, Arlington VA, Ballston corporateapartments.com

Search images: Google · Bing · Commons · references: ULI case studies · Google Scholar

Multifamily screen

retrofit already built
median rent $2,275

Inputs: record fields (size, status) and county Census ACS 2018–2023 figures (growth, rent). How the points work. Not a recommendation.

History and original facts

Now called / also known as	Ballston Quarters
Opened	1951extracted, unreviewed
County	Arlington County
Census division	5 · South Atlantic

Not yet recorded: acres, GLA, original developer. Know it? Tell us.

Background

Ballston Quarter is one of the first major suburban shopping centers built in the Washington metropolitan area. It opened in 1951 as Parkington Shopping Center and was the nation's first shopping center built around a multi-story parking garage. It is located at the intersection of Glebe Road and Wilson Boulevard in the Ballston neighborhood of Arlington County, Virginia, two blocks from Ballston–MU station on the Washington Metro's Orange and Silver lines. It was remodeled as Ballston Common Mall in 1986 and again in 2019 as Ballston Quarter.

Excerpt from Wikipedia (authors and history), CC BY-SA 4.0. May be older than the record above.

Timeline

1951 Opened as Parkington Shopping Center
1986 Remodeled as Ballston Common Mall
2013 Retrofit: redevelop, regreen
2019 Remodeled as Ballston Quarter

Sources

Wikipedia: Ballston Common Mall · supports: year opened
4 quoted sentences
It opened in 1951 as Parkington Shopping Center
It opened in 1951 as Parkington Shopping Center
It was remodeled as Ballston Common Mall in 1986 and again in 2019 as Ballston Quarter.
It was remodeled as Ballston Common Mall in 1986 and again in 2019 as Ballston Quarter.
Retrofitting Suburbia Interactive Mall Map (ArcGIS web map ce33ab26…) · 2021-01-20

Cite

Retrofit Atlas (2026). "Ballston Commons, Arlington, VA." Record m-8f2803bc32, from the authors' map. Built on the public Retrofitting Suburbia map (Dunham-Jones and Williamson) and the sources listed. https://retrofitatlas.org/malls/va/arlington-ballston-commons/ (accessed 2026-10-20).