The three-day family festival ViVa! Vienna! returns to the Town of Vienna for Memorial Day weekend.

Attendees can enjoy live entertainment, amusement rides and items from more than 160 vendors during the free festival, which kicks off on Saturday (May 25) and ends Monday (May 27) at 245 W. Maple Avenue.

Some of the activities during the festival include the semi-finals for Vienna Idol, a blood drive on Sunday and Monday, more than two dozen entertainers performing on three stages and a Memorial Day Tribute at 1 p.m. on Monday.

ViVa! Vienna! is set to have 24 different amusement rides. Tickets for the rides cost $1 each. Rides for small children require three tickets per ride and major rides require three to five tickets.

Ahead of the event, the Town of Vienna has tweeted some black and white photos of previous ViVa! Vienna! attendees.

Started by the Rotary Club of Vienna more than three decades ago, the annual event donates all of the proceeds to charities.

This was taken three years ago at ViVa! It's the time to create memories so you can look both back and forward at a weekend some would call the birthplace of summer. Hope they're both back for this one. ViVa! Vienna! takes you to that time starting 10am this Saturday #nostalgia pic.twitter.com/4Q74nmohEa

— Town of Vienna, VA (@TownofViennaVA) May 22, 2019

Video via YouTube

Music lovers looking for free concerts can head to McLean on Sundays this summer.

McLean’s returning summer concert series plans to feature a variety of musical styles, including Latin, brass, jazz, Americana and rock.

The concerts run from June 16 to July 29.

June lineup:

• Alphabet Rockers — hip-hop beats for kids
• Jazzy Ash and the Leaping Lizards — New Orleans-style jazz and favorite jazz standards
• Sonia de Los Santos — Latin American family music

July lineup:

• DuPont Brass — a brass band that plays jazz, hip-hop and R&B
• Frontiers — a Journey tribute band
• Justin Trawick and the Common Good — a band led by D.C.-based songwriter Justin Trawick
• Slippery When Wet — a Bon Jovi tribute band

Sponsored by The Alden at the McLean Community Center, the concert series takes place every Sunday afternoon at 5 p.m. in the gazebo of McLean Central Park (1468 Dolley Madison Blvd).

Photo courtesy McLean Community Center

Updated at 8:45 a.m. — Corrects the picture of the building and its address.

Passersby the McLean Medical Building would never know that the building is connected to the first doctor in the nation who gave children the Salk polio vaccine.

Denice Dressel, a heritage resource planner for Fairfax County, recently unearthed the building’s ties while working on a heritage study to identify potential significant sites as downtown McLean prepares for a new look.

Her research revealed that the building (1515 Chain Bridge Road) was constructed in 1964 and first owned by a group of doctors that included Dr. Richard Mulvaney, who is credited with being the first doctor to give the vaccine to kids with the crippling disease.

Mulvaney died at the age of 88 in 2006 at Inova Fairfax Hospital, according to a Washinton Post obituary.

The building does not have any markers or plaques indicating its connection to Mulvaney, Dressel said.

Dressel’s finding flummoxed some members of a task force made up of McLean residents working to revamp the downtown area during a Monday (May 20) meeting.

“Who determines whether or not that is an architectural gem or a building that could use some substantial demolition and work?” Kim Dorgan, the chair of the task force, asked. “A quick point — I think many of us are surprised to find that building on this list.”

Dressel said that there are no regulations to preserve the buildings on the list, which might affect the fate of the McLean Medical Building.

“While I was conducting the fieldwork, a redevelopment proposal was submitted for the site, which proposes to raze the building,” Dressel said, adding that redevelopment is in the very beginnings of review.

Image via Department of Planning and Zoning

The Sunrise Senior Living Facility proposed for downtown Vienna received approval from the town’s Planning Commission last night (May 22).

The senior facility has faced a myriad of concerns around its parking, retail space and location at the corner of Maple Avenue and Center Street.

After public hearings, dozens of residents and some of the planning commissioners said they are worried that the parking spaces might not accommodate all of the visitors, employees, shoppers and roughly 100 residents.

Recent modifications that the Planning Commission OK’d last night dropped the number of units from 83 to 82, removed the mezzanine, reduced the retail to 2,264 square feet, altered the fence height and removed the grand staircase inside the facility — changes the developers said addressed town residents’ previous criticisms.

The changes mirror a solution proposed by Planning Commissioner Mary McCullough at the May 8 meeting to reduce the retail space to free up the parking spaces that retail employees and shoppers would use.

“The improvements are a true reflection that you listened,” McCullough told the developers last night.

While most of the planning commissioners said they thought the modifications improved the project, Commissioners Sharon Baum and David Miller said they still had reservations.

Baum said that she wanted to see more retail space instead of less, while Miller brought up a concern about the senior living facility’s placement.

“Is this the use we want at this corner?” Miller asked, questioning how many of the older residents would visit nearby retail and restaurants. Miller said that he would rather see apartments or condominiums, hinting at younger residents.

Ultimately, the Planning Commission approved the modifications and the proposal.

“Is it perfect? No,” Michael Gelb, who chairs the Planning Commission, said. “I haven’t seen a perfect project yet.”

Next up, the proposal has a Vienna Town Council meeting scheduled for June 3. Town Council has until Aug. 2 to make a decision.

Rendering via Town of Vienna

Could a desire for more park space make McLean less attractive to developers? That was the question residents pondered at a meeting earlier this week.

Currently, a task force made up of McLean residents and civic group members has been working with Fairfax County to revamp the McLean Commercial Business Center (CBC).

While the Fairfax County Park Authority pushed for more parks at the task force’s Monday (May 20) meeting, some of its members worried that an emphasis on more parks might push developers away.

Ryan Stewart, a senior planner for the Fairfax County Park Authority, said that a long-term vision for green space in McLean would move toward a mixed-use model, possibly emulating Fairfax Corner, Reston Town Center or the Mosaic District.

Population size determines countywide park facility service level standards, Stewart said.

With projected population changes that could have McLean see nearly 3,000 more residents and 1,500 fewer employees, the Park Authority recommends an additional 4.25 more acres of urban park space, a new playground and another sports court at full buildout in McLean.

“Any development scenario should consider how these needs will be met within the CBC or nearby,” a Park Authority presentation slide said.

The immediate area of the CBC has several parks, including McLean Central, Lewinsville, and Bryn Mawr.

Stewart stressed that urban parks provide a variety of benefits, including social connections, urban cooling and air and water quality improvement.

Kim Dorgan, the chair of the task force, supported a common sentiment among the task force members for more greenery.

“We all want trees,” she said, adding that McLean already has a green space deficit. “We are already 2.5 acres under where we ought to be in today’s standards in terms of green space,” Dorgan said.

While members of the task force said that adding more parks is important, they also expressed concern that developers might balk at more green space requirements.

“I’m all for green space, but stick it to a developer and say you need to give me an acre is going to be challenging,” one task force member that Tysons Reporter was unable to identify said.

Dorgan suggested finding a “creative” way to improve access to the McLean Central Park as a possible way to avoid the trade-off between more green space or more development.

“If we do nothing and there’s nothing that happens in McLean, we are still not where we want to be,” Dorgan said. “We need the change to get where we want to go.”

Canadian shoe retailer Aldo and two sister stores of an Italian fashion brand have new spots in Tysons Corner Center.

The shoe store moved from its spot by the Lord & Taylor on the second level to a space neighboring the Lego store on the first level on Thursday, May 9.

Upstairs next to Aldo’s former spot, sister stores Calzedonia Italian Legwear and Beachwear and Intimissimi opened last Friday (May 17).

Calzedonia sells socks, leggings and beachwear, while Intimissimi, which is also a part of the Calzedonia family, focuses on Italian lingerie.

Currently, shoppers at Calzedonia can buy one bikini and get 20 percent off of a second bra or buy two bras and get one for free at Intimissimi.

Two more bidders are now vying for a Tysons property poised for redevelopment and new owners.

McLean-based Tepe & Hisar LLC submitted a bid earlier this month to buy the property for $19.5 million, while Virginia Beach-based Cobalt Real Estate Solutions LLC offered to pay $30.4 million for an adjacent office building, the Washington Business Journal reported.

Shortly after Fairfax County OK’d the redevelopment project near the corner of Leesburg Pike and Gallows Road in the Old Courthouse district two years, the developer filed for bankruptcy.

The approved plans for International Place (8201 Leesburg Pike), which were submitted by a limited liability company as a project of the Stafford-based Garrett Cos., would add one main new building and five secondary mixed-use structures.

The Washington Business Journal previously reported that the LLC arranged a May 7 hearing to seek permission to sell the property to a Middle Eastern real estate developer who chairs the United Arab Emirates-based Nobles Properties.

While neither of the new deals is final, a bankruptcy judge authorized the new purchase agreements on May 10, the article notes.

Now, the stalled development may face a decision on new ownership at an upcoming June 4 hearing.

“Representatives for the debtor filed a motion with the court seeking authorization to reject an earlier purchase agreement stuck with Thallium so the office building at 8133 Leesburg can instead be sold to Cobalt,” the Washington Business Journal reported.

Image via Fairfax County

The Town of Vienna is no stranger to landing on lists for prime spots to live.

For the second year in a row, Vienna nabbed the #1 spot for “The Best Places to Live in Virginia” list by HomeSnacks, which uses data from the Census, FBI, OpenStreetMaps and other sources to rank areas around the country.

HomeSnacks analyzed 62 places around the state and determined that Vienna’s low unemployment rate, “very stable household median incomes” and low crime rate made it stand out.

HomeSnacks used several criteria to evaluate its national “Best Places to Live” list this year, including high population density, low unemployment rates, median income adjusted for the cost of living, low housing vacancy rate, high expenditures per student, low student-teacher ratios and low crime.

So what do you think? Which of the following criteria do you think makes Vienna so desirable?

Bicyclists and drivers can expect new lane markings on Greensboro Drive by The Boro development early next month.

Last week, a self-identified cyclist questioned on Twitter when the road would get new striping.

“The new asphalt is nice, but total chaos,” the May 14 tweet said. “[The] eastbound bike lane, second travel lane, and center turn lane [are] all obliterated. And it’s been a few weeks.”

Jennifer McCord, a spokeswoman for the Virginia Department of Transportation, told Tysons Reporter that the roadwork is being completed by a developer under permit.

The developer gave this update on Greensboro Drive via the VDOT spokeswoman:

VDOT approved a temporary striping plan to allow bicycle traffic to share the southbound lane of Greensboro Drive between Westpark and Solutions until improvements to Greensboro, Westpark and Solutions have been completed. Currently, there are bicycle “sharrows” between Westpark and Silver Hill. Prior to Greensboro being milled and overlaid between Silver Hill and Solutions, a sharrow was installed and a remaining sharrow will be reinstalled.

In addition to the shared lane marking, the signal at the intersection of Westpark and Greensboro drives will be modified and new signals will be installed at Greensboro’s intersection with Spring Hill Road and Solutions Drive, the spokeswoman said.

“The contractor plans to mill and overlay Greensboro and Westpark the weeks of May 28 and June 3; then pavement markings will be placed relative to the bike lane from Westpark to Solutions,” McCord wrote in an email.

Drivers and bicyclists can expect temporary markings until the signal construction is complete. Once the work on the signals finishes, Greensboro Drive will then welcome new permanent markings, McCord said.

Hey @VaDOTNOVA is there a striping plan/timetable for Greensboro Dr in #Tysons? The new asphalt is nice, but its TOTAL CHAOS. Eastbound #bikelane, 2nd travel lane, and center turn lane all obliterated. And it's been a few weeks. Thanks! pic.twitter.com/B0oFCbUOEh

— Chris French (@chrislfrench) May 14, 2019

A Fairfax County grand jury indicted Veronica Youngblood Monday (May 20) with two murder charges after she allegedly shot both of her daughters, according to news reports.

Youngblood was arrested in Loudoun County and charged with murder after police found two girls with gunshot wounds in their Tysons apartment last year, Tysons Reporter previously reported.

The 5-year-old was pronounced dead at the scene, and the 15-year-old died at the hospital.

The incident happened after a custody dispute between Youngblood and her divorced husband, WTOP reported.

The 33-year-old mother was previously charged with the murder of the younger daughter and wounding the older daughter — the indictment was the first time she was charged in the 15-year-old’s death, WTOP reported.

Photo courtesy FCPD