Birchmere Music Hall in the Works for Silver Spring

SILVER SPRING, Md. - A renovated department store in downtown Silver Spring would be the site of a new Birchmere music hall under a partnership that Montgomery County officials are finalizing.

The site would be the second in the Washington area for the Birchmere, which operates a popular venue for musicians across the Potomac River in Alexandria, Va.

Under the proposal, Maryland and Montgomery County would each provide $4 million over two years to build the music hall in the former JCPenney building on Colesville Road at Fenton Street. It would be near the AFI Silver Theatre and Round House Theatre, two fixtures of Silver Spring's newly revitalized downtown.

Montgomery County Executive Douglas Duncan, a driving force behind rebuilding Silver Spring, said the new Birchmere "would be one of the final steps to making that vision a reality."

About 9,000 square feet of land would be donated to the county by the Lee Development Group Inc. The Birchmere would lease the building from the county and make "a significant investment" in the project, according to county officials.

Birchmere owners said the Montgomery location interested them because traffic makes it difficult for Marylanders to go to Virginia for concerts. A group of residents also pressured the county to bring the Birchmere to Silver Spring.

"People are starving for this kind of entertainment," said Dan Cohen, who helped create the citizens' group Silver Spring Forward.

The new theater is expected to open in 2009, although negotiations are still in the final stages.

(Copyright 2006 by The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved.)