Historic parking garage tied to Watergate to be demolished

WASHINGTON -- If walls could talk, even some of Washington’s most inconspicuous buildings would have juicy tales of political history to share. But one — the Rosslyn, Va., parking garage where Washington Post reporter Bob Woodward met his crucial Watergate source “Deep Throat” — may soon be history itself.

Real estate firm Monday Properties plans to tear down two office buildings in the Washington suburb of Rosslyn, one of which houses the parking garage that helped take down President Nixon, according to the Washington Business Times. Under the plan, submitted to Arlington County last week, the site would be redeveloped into 1 million square feet of residential and commercial space.

Though the company recognizes the historical significance of the garage, Monday Properties Executive Vice President Tim Helmig told the Washington Business Times it “is at the end of its useful life, and with the redevelopment the configuration of the garage itself is going to change.”

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In 2011, Arlington County placed a historical marker outside the parking garage. Helmig has said that Monday Properties will try to find a way to preserve the legacy of the secret meetings between Woodward and the FBI’s Associate Director Mark Felt.

“We obviously view the whole Watergate situation as a significant event in the history of our country,” he told local blog ARLnow. “It would be our hope that we preserve that plaque and incorporate it in our redevelopment.”

Those who want to visit the place where Felt leaked information about the White House’s involvement in the Watergate break-in still have time. The site plan process will take several years and Helmig told the Washington Business Times he does not expect construction work to start until 2016 or 2017.

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alexei.koseff@latimes.com