Via Gateway DC.

It’s been over a year since Mayor Vince Gray’s administration opened the Gateway pavilion on St. Elizabeths East. The pavilion, which was the first step of a planned redevelopment of the 183-acre campus in Ward 8, hosted a number of events—including an ice slide, free movies, Broccoli City Festival, and more—to draw visitors, but the development of the rest of the campus has been slow moving ever since it opened.

Now, just days before he leaves office, Gray announced that a development team has been selected to redevelop the first phase of the campus. In a release, Gray said that the development team of Redbrick LMD-Gragg Cardona has been selected to redevelop the approximately 1.6 million square feet of land near the Congress Heights Metro, to make it a “technology-focused, transit-oriented community.” Those redevelopment plans include “business, research, higher education, and residential uses in a collaborative environment.”

In July, Catherine Buell, executive director of St. Elizabeths East, told DCist that, while the Gateway D.C. Pavilion has been successful, drawing in more than 20,000 visitors in its first nine months, the biggest lesson learned about the continued development is patience. “You are going to see progress over a number of years,” she said. “It’s not going to happen overnight.”

According to a release, the Redbrick LMD-Gragg Cardona team was selected because of their experience on “large-scale projects” and a strong plan to redevelop the campus in a way that meets D.C.’s policy goals for the area.

“By opening the Gateway D.C. Pavilion and the R.I.S.E. Demonstration Center, we were able to reintroduce St. Elizabeths East to the community and lay the groundwork for what is possible on this historic campus,” Gray said in a statement. “By selecting a master developer, we can move even closer to realizing that vision and creating an innovative space that’s unlike any other in the District of Columbia.”