It’s one day after Halloween and Tysons is already getting into the Christmas season.
Santa will be coming to both Tysons Corner Center and Tysons Galleria this fall. “Santa HQ” will be located on level 1 of the Tysons Corner Center near the Nordstrom, where guests are invited to take pictures with Santa and participate in an augmented-reality “Magic Mirror”.
Santa HQ, which is sponsored by cable channel HGTV, will run from Sunday, Nov. 11 to Christmas Eve (Dec. 24). Reservations for a photo with Santa can be made online (warning for those at work: the site auto-plays a loud video).
The Santa events kick off next Thursday, Nov. 8 with Snappy Hour With Santa. The event is a networking opportunity for professionals around Tysons (and the North Pole), running from 5-7 p.m. at Santa HQ before it officially opens.
On Dec. 2, the Tysons Corner Center will host its 2018 Santa Breakfast. The event will run from 8-10 a.m. outside the AMC theaters. Guests are encouraged to arrive early.
Admission to the events is free with an unwrapped toy to donate to the Holiday Giving Toy Drive. This year the drive will be benefiting Second Story, a local youth shelter.
Santa Claus is also scheduled to make an appearance at the mall’s Thursday, Nov. 15 tree lighting ceremony, which will be emceed Lance Bass from *NSYNC. More on that from the Tysons Corner Center website:
Come celebrate Wash-FM’s Kick off To Christmas and the annual lighting of Tysons Corner Center’s signature 51 foot Christmas Tree on The Plaza emceed by Lance Bass from *NSYNC!
Join Tysons Corner Center, Lance Bass from *NSYNC, 97.1- WASH-FM’s Chili & Toby, Chief Meteorologist Bill Kelly, and Tysons very own Santa Claus as they light the tree, followed by a very special holiday performances by the The Kintz-Mejia Academy of Ballet, The District, The Shiloh Baptist Church Choir, and Mahi Gudi.
Pre-event, guests also are invited to make a reservation to explore the immersive, engaging Santa HQ, the digitally enhanced visit with Santa presented by HGTV. Post-Event, have a warm beverage at Earls Kitchen & Bar, Shake Shack, or Barrel & Bushel, all located on The Plaza.
Meanwhile, the Tysons Galleria, the Santa’s Workshop will open on Friday, Nov. 16 for professional photoshoots with Santa.
Maggiano’s Little Italy in the Galleria will also be hosting its annual Breakfast with Santa on Dec. 15. Tickets are $25 for adults and $35 for children.
Photo via Facebook
A few good volunteers are needed to roll up their sleeves and help clean up Vienna.
This Saturday (Nov. 3), the Town of Vienna will host its biannual Town Clean-Up Day. Volunteers will help pick up trash, remove invasive plants, and spruce up areas near the Town Green and several local creeks.
“Community service is alive and well in Vienna,” said John King, Vienna’s parks maintenance superintendent, in a press release. “It brings a closeness — volunteers get to know our staff, and we get to know them. There’s a lot of bonding when you’re expending elbow grease together.”
Organizations, business, families and individuals are all encouraged to come out and help clean the town.
Volunteers are requested to wear full-length pants and long sleeve shirts no matter the weather conditions, as some of the cleanings could take place in underbrush near the creeks. Those with trash pickers are encouraged to bring them, while the Town of Vienna will supply gloves, trash bags and other necessary equipment.
Volunteers will meet at 9 a.m. at the Town Green, rain or shine.
Those interested in volunteering should email King at [email protected].
Photo via Facebook
(Updated at 12:45 p.m.) A new five-house cluster subdivision is set to be built at 7327 Georgetown Pike, just south of Scott’s Run Nature Preserve, after the project’s approval at the Fairfax County Board of Supervisors yesterday (Wednesday).
Whether a new trail planned for the site will go forward is still up in the air.
The project includes 1.45 acres of open space along Georgetown Pike, providing a buffer between the homes and the busy street. But what had many at the meeting concerned was a six-foot-wide paved trail planned through this open space.
Attorney Keith Martin, representing applicant Peter Fitzgerald Jr., said neighbors feared the addition of a trail would add to the problem of people parking along Georgetown Pike to access Scott’s Run.
Dranesville Supervisor John Foust confirmed that residents he met with had shared those concerns. Foust said construction of the trail would be postponed until either the parking problem could be worked out or the trail could be connected to a broader network.
“This is a community inundated with parking,” said Foust. “It’s become a parking lot for Scott’s Run. The community is very concerned that this will be even more of an invitation to come in… It’s very unsafe and not something we want to encourage.”
But the postponing of the trail spurred a brief but tense standoff between Martin and Foust.
“If the trail never gets built, does my client get the money back?” Martin asked.
According to Foust, the agreement between Fairfax County and the developer was that up-front funding would be obtained for the trail, but Martin said he has seen proposals like this before that never went anywhere and the money for the project was “sucked into a black hole.”
“Not according to the proffer,” Foust answered. “This is not the time to be talking about this, to tell you the truth… Wow.”
The development was unanimously approved, but not before Chairman Sharon Bulova double checked with Martin that the proffer terms were agreed to.
With the new Capital One headquarters as a central spine, a panel next week will examine how the Tysons East neighborhood will evolve over the next few years.
The panel will be hosted by the Tysons Partnership next Thursday (Nov. 15) from 7:30-10 a.m. at 1600 Capital One Tower Drive.
Tickets to the panel are $55 for Partnership members and $65 for non-members if ordered before Nov. 5, after which the price increases by $10.
Representatives from companies like Capital One and public organizations like the Fairfax County Department of Planning and Zoning will discuss the latest projects underway in the area.
Tysons East is the neighborhood of Tysons bordering the Beltway to the west and the Dulles Toll Road to the east. The completion of the Capital One Tower earlier this year has kick-started development in the area. Professor Stephen Fuller, Professor of Public Policy at George Mason University, said the still-growing Capital One complex is going to become an anchor for new development.
There are projects in development on every side of the McLean Metro station at the heart of Tysons East. The Highland District is planned to be a residential and retail hub just southwest, while to the east Scotts Run North and South are a planned pair of mixed-use developments to include offices and a 200-room hotel.
In addition to private development, a new Fairfax County Fire and Rescue station is scheduled to be built in Tysons East sometime over the next few years to relieve the overburdened Station 29.
The Balls Hill Road and Old Dominion Drive intersection can be a headache for anyone driving through McLean, but plans are underway to make major changes to the troublesome conjunction.
A meeting is scheduled for Thursday (Nov. 15) to update the public on the Balls Hill Road and Old Dominion Drive Realignment Project.
Currently, the road faces substantial queuing during rush hours, caused in part by poor intersection design and insufficient sight-lines for drivers at the intersection. Between 2010-2015 there were 29 total crashes in the vicinity of the intersection.
Two new by-right developments approved in the area, Mehr Farms and Summerstone, are likely to add more traffic to the already congested streets.
The improvements are part of a broader series of traffic projects underway across McLean.
The meeting will be held at 7 p.m. in at Cooper Middle School (977 Balls Hill Road).
According to the Fairfax County Department of Transportation, there are several traffic alternatives being considered for the site:
- T-Intersection: This would solve queuing issues at the site while having a relatively small footprint. But this shift could also have an impact at the Balls Hill Road intersection with Dulany Hill Drive nearby.
- Roundabout: This would allow the intersection to maintain the historic look of the intersection and maintain the state standards of design at the lowest cost. But roundabouts have been shown to have a substantial learning curve for drivers. The intersection would also have to undergo significant topographical changes and it would impact three homes currently under construction at the Mehr Farms development.
- Dedicated Left Turn Lanes: This would be lower in cost than the T-Intersection and have a smaller footprint than the roundabout, but the turn onto Old Dominion Drive would be a quasi U-turn. The new turn lanes would also significantly impact the nearby Korean Presbyterian Church and the Mehr Farms development.
The design is expected to be finalized this fall, with design and right-of-way acquisition occurring between 2019 and 2023. Construction on the traffic alternative is scheduled to start in spring 2023 and continue until fall 2024.
Veronica Youngblood, accused of murdering two children in Tysons, is scheduled to go to trial this Friday (Nov. 2).
Youngblood was arrested in Loudoun County and charged with murder after police entered an apartment in the 1500 block of Lincoln Circle and found two children with gunshot wounds.
One, a five-year-old girl, was pronounced dead at the scene. The other was taken to the hospital where she later died.
While authorities did not release the names of the victims, in accordance with Virginia law, it was widely reported that Youngblood was the mother of the children.
Because the case involved crimes against children, it will be prosecuted in the Juvenile and Domestic Relations District Court, according to an employee in the clerk’s office.
Youngblood will be represented by a public defender. Whether the case is open to the public will be at the discretion of the presiding judge.
Photo courtesy FCPD
Blend 111, a cafe and wine bar, will planning to open in Vienna this coming spring if it can get local government approval.
The restaurant is planned to go into 111 Church St NW, and according to a Facebook post the construction plans have been finalized and sent to Town of Vienna and Fairfax County for review.
The location is near the heart of Vienna, just one block away from the Town Green.
According to the restaurant website, Blend 111 will offer a collection of food and wines from Spain, France and Venezuela. The restaurant styles itself as a cafe by day, with juices and locally roasted coffee, and a wine bar by night.
The full food menus for the restaurant are still forthcoming, but in addition to the usual animal-based cafe options Blend 111 will offer vegetarian and vegan options.
Blend 111 is currently looking for an assistant general manager with a marketing focus. The position would involve helping to support operations in the restaurant as well as running social media.
Photo via Facebook
The Palladium — could it be called Tyson’s hottest club? — is a new salsa dancing-focused venue that opened this past Saturday (Oct. 27) to add a little variety to Tysons’ budding nightlife scene.
The nightclub boasts 5,000 square feet of dancing space and a second-floor VIP room. The space is also available for private events like weddings, business lunches, dinners or cocktail receptions.
Dining is also available, with menu options including Mexican and Peruvian cuisine.
The Palladium isn’t the first nightclub to occupy 1524 Spring Hill Rd. Iris Lounge occupied the site before it filed for bankruptcy in 2016.
The new club has a series of events lined up for November, including the four below.
- Nov. 2: The first of “The Social” Fridays, a dance party with a live DJ that’s cover free for those who register in advance
- Nov. 3: Sabado con Xavi Hernandez
- Nov. 13: Salsa Palante Tuesdays
- Nov. 16: The Reflex Takes Over Tysons! (80s Night!)
Photo via Facebook
It wasn’t nearly as contentious as the preceding vote, but the Vienna Town Council voted on Monday (Oct. 29) to authorize a $1.6 million contract to design a new police station. The new station will likely be triple the size of the current one.
The contract was awarded to architecture firm Dewberry. The company previously designed the Fairfax Criminal Justice Academy and several government buildings across the county.
The current police station is a 9,800 square foot building at 215 Center Street South. It was built in 1994 and houses the administrative, operations and communications divisions of the department, while the criminal investigations section works out of an office inside the Vienna Town Hall.
A needs assessment in 2013 determined that the department would need a roughly 30,000 square foot building to house all of the police operations. The project will likely involve renovating the current building and constructing a new facility on the adjacent property at 144 Locust Street, which is owned by the town.
The total cost of the new police station’s construction is estimated to be $15.8 million. According to the Town of Vienna CIP review, the project is being financed through general obligation bonds. Construction is expected to begin in 2020.
According to the proposal, the new building will also have offices for other Town of Vienna departments as well as public spaces. Vienna Police Chief James Morris said it was important that the new building be a “community space” in addition to a police department.
“We do community policing all the time so that’s really important,” Mayor Laurie DiRocco agreed. “It’s nice to have people enter the police station for reasons other than negative reasons.”
Photo via Facebook
Developers seeking an alternative to the increasingly built-up Greensboro Metro station might be looking one stop north.
Dominion Square, an 18-acre site adjacent to the Spring Hill Metro station, is for sale, as first reported by the Washington Business Journal. The site, which encompasses portions of two existing redevelopment plans, has already been approved for 3.6 million square feet of mixed-use development, according to a press release (below).
Newmark Knight Frank, a real estate advisory firm, has been selected to help market the site.
The land is currently occupied by auto showrooms and sale lots, including Sheehy Infiniti of Tysons, Honda of Tysons Corner, Priority Mazda and Priority Nissan. The dealerships currently have leases that can be terminated to make way for the development when the project is ready to start construction.
More from the press release:
Newmark Knight Frank (NKF) has announced it has been selected as the exclusive advisor for the sale of Dominion Square in Tysons, VA. The 18-acre site is located directly adjacent to the Spring Hill Metro Station, currently the first eastbound stop on the Silver Line.
The site is approved for 3.6 million square feet of mixed-use development, comprises three separate parcels and is unaffiliated with a specific developer. The property includes terminable leases for four existing car dealership sites, offering built-in income and flexibility allowing investors to react strategically to demand.
Dominion Square represents a once-in-a-generation opportunity to shape one of the DC metro area’s premier submarkets. Located at the intersection of the I-495 Beltway and the Dulles Toll Road, Tysons is a major economic and employment hub,” explained Mark Anstine, executive managing director of land services at NKF. “With the ongoing construction of the Silver Line slated to connect Dulles Airport to downtown Washington, DC in 2020, the area boasts a perfect combination of mass transit, new urbanized residential and retail development, drawing significant interest from regional and national companies.”
With approval now in place for more than 2 million square feet of office, 1.1 million square feet of residential, 185,000 square feet of retail and a 205,000-square-foot hotel, Dominion Square is poised to become an urbanized and amenitized scene where employees can live and play where they work. Since Tysons is the 12th largest office market in the United States headquartering numerous companies–including many of the Fortune 500, it boasts one of the country’s most highly-educated and diverse workforces.
Map via Google Maps
