The Peterson Cos.’ Avonlea Town Center project in Loudoun County looks to have suffered yet another setback, in part due to the coronavirus pandemic’s impact on the economy.
The developer could soon be forced to slice off a 48-acre chunk of the 76-acre project, set to become home to hundreds of apartments and a senior living facility, as a development agreement with the owner of those parcels has fallen apart. That’s according to a recent constituent newsletter from Supervisor Matt Letourneau, R-Dulles, who represents the area where Avonlea is located on Route 50 near South Riding.
Peterson struck a deal with Toll Brothers, which owns a shopping center near the Avonlea site, to buy those 48 additional acres in 2016. That would’ve allowed the developer to more than double the size of the project, originally planned as a retail and commercial campus anchored by a movie theater south of Route 50 and east of Pinebrook Road.
For now, at least, Letourneau wrote that those Toll Brothers Inc. (NYSE: TOL) parcels, located closest to the Home Depot-anchored shopping center, are “no longer part of the project.” He noted Peterson had trouble luring retail tenants to Avonlea long before the pandemic struck, and he expects Covid-19’s devastating impact on that sector contributed to Toll Brothers’ decision to pull back.
