Read the FairGrowth white paper, "Taking a Fresh Look at Metro West."

The Fairfax County Planning Commission is an appointed citizen panel whose members provide important recommendations to the Fairfax County Board of Supervisors, who are elected by the voters. The latest version of the Fairlee/Vienna Metro (also known as Metro West) amendment to the Comprehensive Plan can be found at: http://www.fairfaxcounty.gov/dpz/comprehensiveplan/planamendments.htm (opens a new window).

The Planning Commission held a public hearing on an earlier version on July 22nd, 2004. The new version of the proposal was posted at the above web site on October 8th, 2004. The Planning Commission approved the proposal without discussion on October 14th, less than a week after the release of the new version. The Board of Supervisors held a public hearing only four days later, on October 18th. This did not allow citizens sufficient time to consider the many changes in the latest version. Yet another version was released just one day prior to the Board's vote to approve the proposal on December 6, 2004.

Fairfax Citizens for Responsible Growth (FairGrowth) supports the concepts behind Transit Oriented Development. However, a proposal for a site along I-66 at the Vienna Metro was crafted with insufficient public input. On December 6th, 2004, the Fairfax County Board of Supervisors voted to approve a version of the plan that was made public only one working day before the vote. Numerous important questions, listed below, remain to be addressed.

FairGrowth.org will be very active in the zoning phase, and will work to see that community input is more extensive than has been the case thus far. We will continue to pursue the many questions that have remained unanswered or only partially addressed. Among them:

Read the FairGrowth white paper, "Taking a Fresh Look at Metro West."

The Fairfax County Board of Supervisors voted for this proposal on December 6th, 2004. Please tell them that many questions remain about this proposal, and that you want more inclusive community input during the zoning phase. Reference Application Number SO2-II-V2.

FairGrowth believes that the redevelopment of land near Vienna metro should be governed under a process which:

• Allows all concerned communities and parties to participate equally;
• Collects and evaluates full, comprehensive facts on a wide variety of identified questions and areas of concern; and
• Encourages all concerned and affected parties to use the open process to forge a consensus that is based upon facts.

These three principles should be elementary. However, none has been evident thus far in the case of the current proposal. Here is why:

In September 2003, the Fairlee Workgroup was formed to consider the issues surrounding the redevelopment of the former Fairlee neighborhood, which until recently consisted of 61 single-family detached homes, and associated parcels including the temporary Metro parking lot. The Workgroup that was set up to examine the proposal was chosen in a manner which was not transparent and which appears to have been arbitrary. The Workgroup’s meetings were not publicized in a manner to permit interested citizens to attend. Several communities that face severe impacts from the proposal were not even informed of the proposal and the Workgroup’s consideration of it, much less invited to participate on the Workgroup itself. Also, some of the selected Workgroup communities have a financial stake in seeing the proposal approved. The process for a proposal of this magnitude should have been open and inclusive, allowing all interested parties to participate equally. We do not believe that the Workgroup report is an instructive document because the group that developed it was not a representative group. We are concerned that the Workgroup report itself may have been given more weight than it rightly deserves.

The Workgroup spent eight months going over details of the proposed plan amendment. However, in spite of the pleas of some members of the Workgroup, many critical issues remained either un-addressed or under-addressed. Details on each of these items would fill many pages. A partial listing includes, in no particular order:

• A clear explanation of why the county leadership considers it accpetable to force more of our children into "modular" classrooms without corresponding increases in library, cafeteria, and sports facilities;
• Information on how the area's strained public parks would be able to handle the new influx of residents;
• Details of increased stormwater run-off from the proposed development and nearby areas;
• Stormwater outflow maps;
• An independent and comprehensive transportation analysis conducted by the County staff, rather than by the developer’s hired consultant;
• Inclusive cumulative impacts on traffic resulting from other nearby developments and how "nearby" should be determined;
• Effects on I-66, Route 29, Route 50 and all surrounding roads;
• Studies of non-rush hour traffic on surrounding roads;
• Identified sources of funding for Metro rail improvements all agree are necessary;
• An accounting of Metro ridership and capacity constraints during a.m. and p.m. rush hours, to include popular stations in Arlington and Washington, DC (Ballston, Court House, Rosslyn, Farragut West, etc.) as well as Fairfax stations;
• Replacement of Metro parking (650+ spaces) that would be lost under the plan;
• Workable parking solutions for on-site residential and commercial uses;
• Detailed, enforceable Transportation Demand Management (TDM) efforts;
• A strict phasing plan based on demonstrable TDM success, Metro improvements, and clear evidence that infrastructure can support additional growth;
• Details on the viability and appropriate levels of any retail or commercial space;
• Demonstrations that office workers in commercial space would use mass transit;
• Details on the full cost-effects on the quality of education in our schools, including as the development ages;
• Noise mitigation efforts and details of noise studies;
• Correction of the controversial placement of the Vaden Extension road only 50 feet from Circle Woods property (when another County plan requires a 100-foot buffer to established residential neighborhoods), including direct discussions with VDOT;
• Consideration of safety concerns (including pedestrian concerns) in regard to the proposed turn lane from Lee Highway onto Nutley;
• Shadow studies demonstrating the effects of high-rises on nearby homes;
• Specifics about the type and placement of Affordable Dwelling Units (ADUs);
• Effects of this project on other nearby attempted consolidation/redevelopment plans;
• Effects of tree loss on the environment;
• Effects upon the wider community’s recreational facilities;
• Concerns about pedestrian interconnectivity; and
• The arrangement and position of community facilities within the project itself.

Some of these items were not addressed at all and the County staff and the developer seemingly ignored many. Others were noted, but only in passing and with selective data. Still others were deferred with vague expressions of intentions to attend to them at some "later time." Any decisions on a proposal of this magnitude should be based on comprehensive facts that are available to the public. Once the above concerns are considered and addressed, we will be able to discuss what the comprehensive plan should say. At this point, no one can honestly determine a reasonable, intelligent, or "smart" level of density for this project.

 3. The developer declared that there would be "no compromise" on density.

At a community meeting, a resident asked the developer’s representative what it would take to achieve a compromise on density. The representative declared that there would be "no compromise," and stated, "I am going to put in as much as I can on this site." These sentiments were reflected in the county staff’s and developer’s actions in the Workgroup.  While the previous Fairfax County Comprehensive Plan language for this site permitted a nearly 20-fold increase from 61 households to 1,115, the county and developer desire a nearly 39-fold increase to 2,250 households. Rather than attempt to reach a mutual consensus, they refused to seriously consider any alternative. Indeed, the current Staff report contains fewer options than its prior iteration. A better process should be utilized to explore in detail other alternatives mutually acceptable to the County and the surrounding, established communities.

Fairfax Citizens for Responsible Growth asks the Fairfax County Planning Commission and the Board of Supervisors, in the best interest of the citizens of Providence District and the County, to suspend what has been a badly flawed process and have this proposed plan amendment reviewed by a representative body that would examine the impacts upon a larger study area. We urge the production of a comprehensive and independent transportation analysis, and ask the county not to rely upon the limited analysis provided by the developer’s hired consultants. We also ask that the county staff substantively address the many issues raised in the Workgroup and by citizens at the July 22 Public Hearing of the Planning Commission and the December 6 Board of Supervisors hearing that so far have not been answered. As citizens, we hold the County’s elected and appointed officials, including the County staff, accountable and answerable to us for their action (and inaction) regarding this proposed plan amendment. We will seek to inform our fellow citizens through continued distributions of our issues to households and to the media.

To join our mailing list or contact us: fairgrowth@fairgrowth.org

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