The Fairfax County Board of Supervisors is set to move forward two projects aiming to make Tysons and Vienna more walkable and bikeable.

At Tuesday’s meeting (Sept. 24), the board is slated to approve an extra $3 million for a project that will add a pedestrian and bicycle bridge over I-495, connecting the east side of Tysons to Tysons One Place.

“The project will provide for the design and construction of a 10-foot shared-use path along Old Meadow Road beginning at the intersection of Route 123 and Provincial Drive, and terminating at Tysons One Place near the intersection with Fashion Boulevard,” according to county documents.

Construction is slated to start on the project in spring 2021 and finish in spring 2022, according to the Virginia Department of Transportation.

“The project area has a mix of retail, business, and residential communities with no bicycle and pedestrian access across I-495,” the document says.

Previously, the project was fully funded, but changing right-of-way estimates and construction costs increased the costs, according to the county.

The board is also set to authorize the director of the county’s transportation department to work with VDOT on improving bike access to the Vienna/Fairfax-GMU Metro station.

The project includes:

• construction of a new shared-use path along the south side of Virginia Center Blvd
• removing the existing sidewalk on the west side of Sutton Road
• construction of a two-way cycle track and sidewalk along the south side of Country Creek Road
• adding bike wayfinding signage and shared lane markings

The work on the trails is part of the I-66 project, according to county documents.

Map via VDOT

The Vienna Police Department wants people to beware fraudulent calls from people pretending to be Vienna police officers.

A man reported one such scam call last Friday, Sept. 13, around 1 p.m.

“A man who resides in Fairfax County came to the Vienna Police Station advising he was on the phone with someone claiming to be a Vienna police officer and they were attempting to defraud him of money,” according to a police report.

When a police officer tried to speak to the caller, but “the caller hung up when the officer identified himself,” police said. The phone number that the call came from was the Vienna Police Department’s non-emergency number.

Police told the man that the call was a scam and advised him to report it to the Fairfax County Police Department for the attempted fraud, according to the report.

“Spoofing telephone numbers is a common scam that is used in an attempt to defraud citizens out of money. Our department does not make calls in an attempt to collect money,” the police department said.

If anyone lost jewelry at Caboose Tavern (124 Church Street NE), Vienna police may know of its whereabouts.

“A member of the Vienna Optimists Club advised a citizen found a piece of jewelry and turned it over to them at the Caboose” on Saturday, Sept. 14, according to police.

Photo via Facebook

A local organization is hosting a charity tailgate to help people who are experiencing homelessness and struggling youths.

The Tysons Partnership event will have live music from the Decades Band, beer and wine tents, a pop-up playground, arcade games, raffles and a speech from Dranesville District Supervisor John Foust, according to the event page.

The event aims to raise funds for Second Story, a non-profit founded in Vienna that works to improve the lives of struggling young adults and people experiencing homelessness.

Tickets are on sale for $30 and include two complimentary drinks. The event will be held outside regardless of the weather.

Drew Sunderland, a spokesperson for Tysons Partnership, said that the organization tries to work with local nonprofits in the regional Tysons area or surrounding communities.

“Second Story was identified as a great partner that was in need,” Sunderland said, adding that their work has a real impact on the Tysons community.

The tailgate is part of the Tysons Partnership’s larger Season of Giving, which raised money for similar organizations, like Food for Others. This year’s other events included a 5k and a happy hour event. In years past, the event has attracted over 1,000 attendees, according to the website.

Second Story supports a variety of people including homeless teens, survivors of domestic abuse and young mothers in northern Virginia, according to their website. The organization matches at-risk youth with counseling, shelter, food or other forms of assistance based on their needs, free of charge.

Teens between the ages of 13 to 17 and young mothers can text TEENHELP to 855-11 if they would like assistance from the program.

The party will last from 5-8 p.m. in Valo park next Wednesday (Sept. 25).

Photo via Valo Park

The Town of Vienna is seeking funding from Fairfax County to help fund a plan to address vacancies plaguing Maple Avenue.

The town approached the county earlier this year to split the costs of an economic development strategy and market study totaling $100,000, Scott Sizer from the Department of Economic Initiatives said. The town set aside its $50,000 half when it approved its fiscal year 2020 budget.

“Primarily they are concerned with some of the vacancy rates that they are seeing, particularly in the retail properties along Maple Avenue,” Sizer told the Board of Supervisors during a Budget Committee meeting yesterday (Tuesday).

The town has a 15% vacancy rate with 138 vacant spaces — 68 of which are on Maple Avenue, Sizer said.

The new strategy and study — which could take up to 9-12 months to complete — are meant to revitalize Maple Avenue and find more efficient use of resources to address the vacancies, along with discovering how to aid business recruitment and place-making strategies, Sizer said.

“Frankly retail vacancies are a problem all over the county,” Providence District Supervisor Linda Smyth said at the meeting. “We tend to have come up with a formula of mixed-use that has something above but always ground floor retail and not always is it sustainable.”

Smyth said that the vacancies are not just an issue for Vienna, urging her fellow board members to look “at this on a bigger scale… we need to get a better grip on what’s working.”

The town has already started some efforts to revitalize local businesses. The Town of Vienna created a new economic development manager position earlier this year and is currently recruiting the position, Sizer said.

County staff reviewed the proposal in June and recommend that the county provide the funding.

Dranesville District Supervisor John Foust agreed with the staff’s recommendation, calling the funding “a smart investment for the county.”

Vienna officials are taking another stab at outstanding details in the design plans for the Vienna Market project.

The project is set to replace the Marco Polo building and other surrounding properties with 44 townhouse condominiums, a 2,700-square-foot landscaped plaza and retail space at 245 W. Maple Avenue. Currently, the project is in the second phase, awaiting site plan revisions and building permit approval.

Vienna’s Board of Architectural Review (BAR) decried plans for the project as too boring during its meeting in May.

When the board made a motion at its August meeting to approve the development, it excluded some items for further review before approval.

Now, the project is coming back to BAR tomorrow night (Thursday). The board is set to review the project’s lighting plan, sidewalk landscape plan in front of the retail space and types of brick of some of the units and retail, according to town documents.

The meeting is set to start at 8 p.m. Thursday (Sept. 19).

Images via Town of Vienna

The Vienna Town Council is looking to implement a pilot program for dockless scooters and bicycles as a deadline nears for scooter regulation.

Legislation passed during the General Assembly session in January allows localities to regulate scooters and motorized skateboards, however, the localities have until Jan. 1, 2020 to take action to implement any regulations. After that date, the scooter companies can zoom around as they see fit.

Scooters, an increasingly popular alternative transportation option, are already around the area. Fairfax County and the City of Falls Church are also currently drafting up their own pilot programs for scooters.

At a work session last Monday (Sept. 9), the Vienna Town Council raised safety concerns while discussing a proposed pilot program by Public Works staff.

Councilmember Steve Potter said that he is worried that scooters going at 20 miles per hour could end up hurting pedestrians and urged the council to consider the fiscal impacts of the program, like impounding costs, late filing fees and recovery costs.

“I think we should have a schedule for public input surveys and public education efforts,” Potter said, adding that he wants representatives from the police department to also be involved in the decision making. “This is no small thing.”

Mayor Laurie DiRocco asked the Town Attorney to find out if the council can mandate helmet wearing for dockless scooter and bicycle riders.

Currently, the town is considering implementing a one-year-long pilot program instead of an ordinance before the January deadline. According to town documents, the program is based off the programs by Fairfax, Alexandria, Falls Church and Arlington County.

The proposed program would cap the maximum number of devices to 250 per company, allowing the company to increase the number up to 25 more e-scooters or e-bikes with “if they demonstrate at least three trips per device per day in the previous month.”

Each company would have to pay a one-time permit fee of $5,000 and a right-of-way use fee of $0.05 per trip.

While town staff suggested negotiating with Kimley-Horn, a consulting firm that focuses on transportation, planning and engineering, Councilmember Doug Noble balked at the idea of working with the firm because of its ties to private consulting. “They are not the only show in town,” Noble said.

Noble also urged the Town Council to look into investigations of scooters’ battery fires and inadvertent sudden stops.

Councilmember Pasha Majdi suggested that the Town Council implement “an extremely limited pilot program as a placeholder until a multi-modal plan with Kimely-Horn is created.”

Majdi adamantly said that he does not want to see motorized scooters on sidewalks — a sentiment he said scooter companies like Lyme and Bird share.

Getting data on how often the scooters go from Vienna to Tysons could give the Town Council insight into scooter demand in the area, Councilmember Nisha Patel said.

“I believe that will tell us a lot about how often these scooters will be used,” Patel said. “We are so close to Tysons and Tysons is the next major city in the area.”

In addition to the data, Patel said that parking hubs for scooters could help cut down on littered scooters around town. “It’s like dispositing your shopping cart in those metal racks,” Patel said.

Councilmember Howard Springsteen suggested forwarding the proposal to the Transportation Safety Commission — an idea that was supported by several councilmembers and the mayor.

The proposed pilot program is set to go before the Town Council on Dec. 9.

“We should get this done,” Springsteen said. “The clock is ticking.”

Vienna residents will have the opportunity to share their input on the Vienna Town Council possibly extending the moratorium on new development applications for Maple Avenue.

The Vienna Town Council requested Monday night (Sept. 16) that staff schedule a public hearing on Nov. 4 to discuss extending the suspension of the Maple Avenue Commercial (MAC) Zone from Nov. 15 to June 2020. The Planning Commission will also hold a public hearing.

The Town Council first put the moratorium in place last September to allow the town staff time to redesign the town’s guidelines. So far, the Vienna Town Council has approved four MAC projects and rejected one.

Councilmember Nisha Patel said that while she supports extending the moratorium, she would like to see the Town Council vote on new MAC guidelines before June. Mayor Laurie DiRocco said that town staff aims to have the plan go before the council by February.

The owner of a mixed-use development told the Vienna Town Council that selling the project to an assisted living facility could address neighbors’ lingering concerns.

Dennis Rice, the owner of J.D.A. Custom Homes, told the Vienna Town Council at a work session last Monday (Sept. 9) that assisted living facilities are interested in buying his mixed-use development at 380 Maple Avenue.

“I think the town needs an assisted living facility, and it’s a good location for it,” Rice said.

Rice said that he has talked with interested assisted living facilities about plans to address lingering concerns from neighbors about the project by:

• moving back the fourth floor by 15 feet so that it isn’t as close to nearby properties
• reducing the number of entrances on Wade Hampton Road
• adding a walking entrance to Maple Avenue
• removing the balconies
• keeping the width of Wade Hampton Road to 36 feet
• including a cafe for visitors, residents and the public in the retail space

“I don’t want to name any particular companies,” Rice said. “We tried to come up with an outline that would address as many of the issues as we could.”

Rice also said that if the development houses seniors instead of families, it would eliminate concerns about the number of new students going to local schools. He added that traffic turning left out of the project could be controlled more if the drivers are employees of the facility instead of residents.

“We could approach six of seven major concerns,” he said, adding that he thinks the assisted living option for the development would be the “least onerous one to the neighbors.”

Rice reassured the Town Council that the building height would stay at 54 feet.

“Is this something worth allowing an assisted living company to pursue?” Rice asked the Town Council.

Councilmember Nisha Patel advised Rice to reach out to neighbors to get input on whether or not they have a preference for the building to become an assisted living facility or not.

“Obviously the property owner can sell to whoever they want to,” Mayor Laurie DiRocco said at the work session.

The interest in turning the approved development into an assisted living facility comes on the heels of the Town Council killing a proposed Sunrise Senior Living Facility at the corner of Maple Avenue and Center Street. (Sunrise is currently suing the Town Council for allegedly discriminating against seniors and people with disabilities.)

The rejected Sunrise project came up several times during the councilmembers’ discussions about issues they would want to avoid — parking being the main one — if an assisted living facility buys 380 Maple Avenue.

DiRocco said that if Rice does sell the property to an assisted living facility, “I do think having a type of additional parking would be key.”

Rice said that the development has “more than ample parking” and that the companies he spoke to said that they have a no-driving policy. “I think by reducing the number of entrances, we pick up more parking on Wade Hampton,” Rice said.

If Rice sells the development to an assisted living facility, the new owner would need to bring changes to the Planning Commission, Board of Zoning Appeals and Town Council for approval.

“I see the advantages of having an assisted living. I think that would be great,” Councilmember Linda Colbert said, adding that the Town Council would to “be smart about parking.”

“I think some of the changes to the building would be nice,” Colbert said.

Photo via Town of Vienna Planning and Zoning

(Updated at 11 a.m.) A moratorium on new development applications for Maple Avenue set to expire in November may get extended again.

The Vienna Town Council is set to request tonight (Sept. 16) that staff schedule a public hearing on Nov. 4 to discuss extending the suspension of the Maple Avenue Commercial (MAC) Zone to June 2020. The matter would also go to the town’s Planning Commission.

The Town Council first put the moratorium in place last September to allow the town staff time to redesign the town’s guidelines. The moratorium was set to expire in June, but the Town Council voted to extend it to Nov. 15.

So far, the Vienna Town Council has approved four MAC projects:

• a combination Chick-fil-A and Flagship Carwash Center at 540 W. Maple Avenue that has received public backlash
• townhouse-style condominiums with retail at the northeast corner of W. Maple Avenue and Pleasant Street NW
• a much-debated redevelopment that would add ground-floor retail and more than three dozen multi-family residential condominium units to 380 Maple Avenue
• a controversial redevelopment of 430, 440 and 444 W. Maple Avenue into a four-story mixed-use development

The Town Council has also killed a MAC project — a proposed Sunrise Senior Living Facility at the corner of Maple Avenue and Center Street. Sunrise is suing the Town Council for allegedly discriminating against seniors and people with disabilities.

The Town Council meeting tonight will start at 8 p.m.

The Vienna Police Department is looking for the three women who reportedly stole merchandise from a cosmetics store along Maple Avenue.

An employee at Sally Beauty (329 E. Maple Avenue) reported to the police that three women concealed multiple items of merchandise before fleeing the store, according to a police report.

The incident occurred shortly before 6 p.m. last Tuesday (Sept. 10).

In a separate incident, a Vienna resident in the 900 block of Frederick Street SW reported to the police that “someone intentionally damaged a tree she recently planted” between Friday, Sept. 6, and Saturday, Sept. 7, police said.

The police department also received nine recent reports from people who said their cars had been rummaged through.

Photo via Facebook