Where New Deal Vision Meets 21st Century Science

President Franklin Roosevelt wanted to prove something with Greenbelt: that thoughtfully designed communities could improve lives while putting people to work during the Depression. The Resettlement Administration, led by Rexford Tugwell, created three ‘greenbelt towns’ – and Greenbelt, Maryland became the flagship. Eleanor Roosevelt helped lay out the plans, and FDR himself visited in 1936, declaring the actual sight exceeded anything he had dreamed.

The original 885 units were designed around radical principles: homes faced interior pedestrian walkways with garages and streets behind, children could walk to school without crossing traffic, and all businesses operated cooperatively. When the federal government sold the housing in 1952, residents formed a cooperative – Greenbelt Homes, Inc. – that still operates today as one of the largest housing cooperatives in the country. The GHI co-op homes are distinctive: wood-frame, brick, and block row houses built in Art Deco and Streamline Moderne styles, clustered in superblocks with central green spaces.

Roosevelt Center remains the community hub, featuring the restored Old Greenbelt Theatre (city-owned), the New Deal Café (live music, poetry, and cooperative spirit), the Greenbelt Arts Center for live theater, and a cooperative grocery store. The Greenbelt Museum preserves one of the original units as it appeared in 1937. The historic district achieved National Historic Landmark status in 1997 – significant recognition for a planned community.

NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center sits adjacent to Greenbelt, employing approximately 10,000 civil servants and contractors who build spacecraft, instruments, and technology to study Earth and the universe. Hubble Space Telescope operations run from Goddard. The James Webb Space Telescope was developed here. This is serious science concentrated in one location.

The really big news: the FBI is consolidating its headquarters operations to Greenbelt, with a massive complex planned near the Metro station that will eventually serve 7,500 staff. This represents transformative federal investment in the community.

Greenbelt’s housing spans from the historic GHI cooperative units (often $150,000-$300,000 with monthly cooperative fees) to conventional single-family homes in newer sections to large apartment complexes like Greenbelt’s 3,000-unit development. The Metro Green Line provides rail access to DC, and MARC’s Camden Line offers commuter service. Greenbelt Park, managed by the National Park Service, preserves 1,100 acres of forest within the community.

The honest trade-offs: GHI cooperative housing works beautifully for those who embrace the model – shared maintenance responsibilities, community governance, below-market entry costs – but it’s not conventional ownership. Some find the cooperative structure constraining. The community definitely leans progressive politically. And while Old Greenbelt maintains its distinctive character, surrounding development has encroached on the original greenbelt of forests that gave the town its name.