I was troubled by the WaPo report, too. I'm surprised that the planning officials would suggest something so short-sighted. Why not ultimately plan for maximum density but provide benchmarks that must be met before further development? For example, allow for initial development near the metro stations, promote grid-development, and then consider what needs to be done to meet additional development.

Even with the metro expansion, I think there is a definite need for better connectivity to the toll road and beltway: the current situation is full of bottlenecks and a lot of people commute to Tysons from non-metro accessible areas. However, to stall development until new access points are created is ridiculous.

I really hope this doesn't get stalled.

For those interested, there's a planning meeting tonight! www.fairfaxcounty.gov/dpz/tysonscorner

by Nick J on Sep 15, 2009 2:10 pm  

@David - I think you provided an incorrect link. That "scrap the idea" link takes the reader to a June 2008 profile of Lon Anderson (vom...).

by JTS on Sep 15, 2009 2:11 pm  

Good. We have enough people in the suburbs already.

by MPC on Sep 15, 2009 2:16 pm  

JTS: Fixed the link, thanks.

Nick J: I don't see anything on that page about any meetings later than July 22. What am I missing?

by David Alpert on Sep 15, 2009 2:18 pm  

to state that Northern Virginia was built by morons would be an insult to all morons.

I hate most of Northern Virginia and cannot understand why people all seem to want to live in such a dismal non- place.

yes- there are some nice areas- the old town centers along the WO&D trail, old town Alexandria, parts of Arlington that are not too sterile- but most of it was more vomited up by idiotic developers than planned.

As for $hitholes like Reston "towne center" Tysons, and Centreville, Potomac Mills Mall- you can have them.

by w on Sep 15, 2009 2:24 pm  

Sorry, wrong link and wrong date. The meeting is Wednesday at 7pm. Here's a PDF for the committee schedule: http://www.fairfaxcounty.gov/planning/tysons_docs/tysonscommitteeschedule.pdf

by Nick J on Sep 15, 2009 2:25 pm  

I grew up in NoVa (McLean) and think it has a lot to offer as a suburban community--great schools, proximity to a great city, stable jobs, etc. I currently work in Tysons and support high density development to 1) make it more people-friendly as a place to work (it needs more walkable restaurants, parks, etc to let ppl breath during the day, and 2) prevent further sprawl beyond the Beltway. I'm not a fan of the office park canyon that Dulles Toll Road is becoming. The county needs to concentrate new development in Tysons to protect green space and encourage more concentrated living.

by Nick J on Sep 15, 2009 2:33 pm  

I hate most of Northern Virginia and cannot understand why people all seem to want to live in such a dismal non- place.

Have kids? Rich enough to send them to private schools?

And why are you so defensive and feel such a need to justify your hatred for a place you don't even choose to associate with?

by MPC on Sep 15, 2009 2:38 pm  

I had heard others who work in Ffx planning say that something like this situation might come up. All the visioning that led to the Tysons Plan was good, but the underlying nuts and bolts of the comp plan and the ordinances were not yet updated in order to make it a possibility. There are some old-timers who are entrenched.

As much as many on this blog hate anything outside the DC boundaries, this has to work. It's not just a local/regional issue. All across the US other places are looking for a model for how to retrofit edge cities and suburban office sprawl.

by spookiness on Sep 15, 2009 2:42 pm  

@spookiness: well said!

by Nick J on Sep 15, 2009 2:58 pm  

One of the problems with taking away parking from Tysons Corner is that there won't be enough people within walking or transit range to support all the office buildings and retail.

The metro is a start, but many more people go to Tysons on a daily basis from places like Maryland and non-metro served portions on Fairfax County than Reston/Herndon, Arlington and the District combined.

For Tysons to function as a dense city without parking there needs to adequate transit from more that the east or the west. With the massive investment in Metro, there is really no more funds to complete the job.

The "rail buffs" won the transit debate, now we have to live with the consequences. BRT from many directions would have been a more practical solution.

by Tom on Sep 15, 2009 3:13 pm  

Here's an idea... instead of widening the highways and adding more lanes, why not add more Metro capacity? Put that money towards a new, separated Blue line, and what the heck, separate the Silver Line too! Then all three lines would have the same capacity as the Red Line. And there are no highways coming into DC from Montgomery County. They survive just fine.

by Dave Murphy on Sep 15, 2009 3:23 pm  

Jim Zook and his planning team are obviously feeling pressure to modify the Tyson's plan. But from whom is this pressure coming from? It certainly is mysterious as most Tyson land owners and developers appear to support redevelopment.

Could FFX transportation people or, perhaps, VDOT be throwing up the red flag? The only major concern expressed by Zook in the WP article was about increased automobile traffic and the possible need for more roads and exit ramps.

The individuals and groups who are concerned about the Tyson redevelopment plan, and why, need to be more fully fleshed out. Everyone is entitled to have an opinion and to put forth alternatives, but let the debate be open and inclusive. The redevelopment of Tyson's into a viable, vibrant mini-city is not an opportunity to be squandered.

by Anonymous on Sep 15, 2009 3:37 pm  

Jim Zook and his planning team are obviously feeling pressure to modify the Tyson's plan. But from whom is this pressure coming from?

Follow the money. Who will benefit from this suburban growth model? Therein lies your answer.

by Winston on Sep 15, 2009 3:52 pm  

The best Tysons could ever hope to be with this redevelopment is the Bethesda of Virginia, so given Bethesda's current traffic issues, no wonder they scaled it down. A Reston town center model in Tysons will suffice. After all it is proven.

by Sivad on Sep 15, 2009 4:48 pm  

@Tom good point

Tyson's is not pretty, but it's important economically, and it will lose economic viability if all the working moms there have to start paying to park at work. Their employers will hit newer sterile office parks in Chantilly, or they will move to companies that still offer free parking.

There is no place in this country where a suburban area with 30 million sq ft of office, combined with 5 million of enclosed retail, has been connected to a subway. I understand the county's hesitation to start upzoning everything there.

I would say many of the current plans for Tyson's are utopian fantasies, but hard to say that about a place aiming to be "another Ballston".

by David on Sep 15, 2009 4:57 pm  

@Winston: Follow the money. Who will benefit from this suburban growth model? Therein lies your answer.

Well, if one does follow the money, it leads back to land owners and developers. And, of course, road and bridge builders benefit, too, in the suburban growth model, albeit at a later stage.

But while money does play a factor in every developmental decision, be it infrastructure or residential or commercial, it's very possible outdated "thinking" may be a bigger factor here.

Your question, however, did provoke some thinking on my part whether some Tyson landowners might be putting up an agreeable front on redevelopment while, at the same time, going through back channels to water things down. Few landowners, to be sure, are happy to cede land to the county for new streets and sidewalks, as the proposed plan envisions, unless huge benefits come their way. Perhaps they're having difficulty seeing the "vision" of the new Tysons and how it will generate additional income and value, rather than just sharply rising property taxes.

by Anonymous on Sep 15, 2009 4:58 pm  

The current land use is a bit a crazy. There are surprising chunks of open land, although much of it would be difficult to develop. The traffic patterns aren't friendly for anything. The long-term problem is envisioning something different from what exists now and finding ways to increase density. The trouble with conventional thinking about suburbs is that places like Tyson's will ultimately strangle themselves if they continue in their current way and that will threaten the very infrastructure that people want to avoid altering now.

by Rich on Sep 15, 2009 9:53 pm  

The Washington Post article was written to incite comments such as the ones above. Anyone following the Tysons Task Force knows that their recommendation came from about 3 vocal developers pressuring the rest of the group to scrap any analysis they or their consultants did over the 3 years prior. This blog supports smart growth so you would think people here would support the recommendations of the smart growth consultant PB Placemaking which the county hired for Tysons at a 1 mil plus price tag. PB Placemaking actually recommended even less than what the planning staff is recommending now. I realize most people posting here follow DC more than Fairfax so I'd like to help others understand the real truth behind what has been going on with the Tysons plan. The Tysons task force was chaired by a private citizen, Clark Tyler (instead of a planning official who probably would have kept things more even keeled and detail oriented), and discussion was dominated by developers who routinely put down the hired consultant, the planning staff, and other groups such as COG and George Mason who were all telling them the same thing - that the density for Tysons over the next 20-30 years should recommend about 2.3 to 3 times the amount of development currently there. Instead the task force recommended 5.5 to 6 times the current density with no analysis to back their recommendation up. The task force meetings rarely went into much detail leaving much of the work to the planning staff after their recommendation was made. The board of supervisors actually never approved the task force recommendations, but only approved the report to go to the planning staff for futher review and technical write up mostly to benefit Connelly's campaign. All the other studies on Tysons say 5.5-6 times the current density over 30 or even 50 years is not backed up by even the best market data meaning that all of Tysons would be built out slower since so much density would be built on a few parcels. This is especially troublesome being that the grid of streets is the biggest problem with Tysons and therefore needs as many parcels as possible to be built out. This density would cause complete breakdown in Tysons (transit and car) even with ridership as high or higher than DC. I'm all for an urban downtown in Tysons, but don't understand why we should be pushing for the developer's wishes of maximum heights and little developer contributions with no analysis to guarantee it will actually produce a great downtown area. I'd rather take as much as possible into consideration which is what the consultants did and what the planning staff is doing now. Will Tysons cease to be urban if only some verses all of it's buildings are 200-350' high. Consider DC doesn't even have anything over 150' and I believe is even still losing population, but is very urban and walkable. Of course, Tysons needs to be an urban downtown area, but have a little faith with the planning staff who represent developers and citizens verses a few developers on the Tysons task force. Walter Alcorn is one of the most gifted people Fairfax County employs and is very dedicated to smart growth as he showed in chairing the TOD zoning re-write several years ago and I have confidence he will do what is right for Tysons.

by Dunfarall on Sep 15, 2009 10:43 pm  

If only they'd widen Route 123 and Route 7 to eighteen lanes in either direction, we wouldn't even be having this discussion.

by monkeyrotica on Sep 16, 2009 7:31 am  

Continued funding for the Metro line and stations should be contingent on executing the Tysons plan for walkability and transit orientation. The public is making a big investment in Tysons' infrastructure; therefore the land use plans must make the best use of that investment.

The planning staff is is worried that Tysons could become five times more dense by 2050. But even with its towers and bulky malls, Tysons presently has a relatively low density. If its density was tripled it would be around the density of Bethesda.

Maybe there are good arguments for reducing the theoretical maximum density of the overall Tysons plan. But there is no good argument for requiring even more auto facilities in an area that's intended to become walkable and transit oriented. Tysons is already buckling under the strain of too much auto infrastructure, and requiring even more will undoubtedly put a stop to the redevelopment plan.

by Laurence Aurbach on Sep 16, 2009 10:30 am  

VDOT is a huge obstacle, and I am suspicious of their relationship with the private toll road companies liek Transurban that want to profit off of AOD (Auto-Oriented Development).

They already greased the wheels to receive $500 million in state subsidies and $1 billion in federal dole for their "private / free" HOT Lane Beltway Toll Road.

And through the clause that requires the state of VA to pay for HOV users if car-poolers / bus riders exceed 25% of people using the HOT lanes, they already have a built-in profit guarantee. The watering down of TOD in Tysons reeks of special interests clammering for additional AOD as further easy profit.

And now VDOT / Transurban is proposing HOT lanes in I-66 as well (which is essentially the another highway into Tysons).

NOVA taxpayers should be livid that the rail investment is being undermined, but too many too many too-busy two-parent working households either do not have the time or don't make the effort to engage in their community, or accept the status quo as "nature".

The irony behind this is that NOVA is home to an extremely well-read, intelligent populous, but one that does not engage in Democracy at the local level....like, at all.

by stevek_fairfax on Sep 16, 2009 10:43 am  

I think there were a lot of misquotes in this article. There are no plans to widen Rt. 7 or 123 (or the Toll Road or Beltway) beyond what is already in the pipeline. 7 will be widened to three continuous thru lanes and one thru/turn lane starting later this year. This adds up to 8 lanes total, with the Metro running in the middle, however with the loss of the service lanes and proposed building frontages closer to the road, the actual width of the entire roadway will be much less than it currently is. Like 14th St. there would be no way to widen this in the future. Likewise, Rt. 123 through Vienna and McLean can not be widened further because of a permanent lack of right-of-way. Additionally there is no need to widen this monster in Tysons Corner itself.

What does need to be widened is the portion of Rt. 7 that is 2 lanes between Sterling/Herndon/Reston and Tysons Corner. To have a major thoroughfare that goes from 4 lanes to 2 then back to 4 is a bit of a problem for maintaining flow and it creates bottlenecking that backs into Tysons and Loudoun County. With the proposed reduction in traffic lights along Rt. 7 in Tysons Corner, and the elimination of mid-block turning, it won't be as difficult as people think to maintain traffic flow during the peaks if they eliminate these bottle necks and reconfigure the ramps to the highways. What I worry about is the additional traffic that will use 7 instead of the Toll Road as the tolls rise to pay for the Metro. Further, there is no room for 3 (or 2) additional interchanges with the Toll Road from a traffic engineering perspective.

I grew up right off the portion of Rt. 7 outside Tysons Corner that is 2 lanes and in the morning it is virtually impossible to turn on the road because of the non-stop commuters from Loudoun County. Eventually you just cut someone off and let them flick you off if they want, or a nice person lets you in.

The problem the planning commission sees is that there is no parallel between Arlington County, which has a grid network and Tysons Corner, which is entirely bounded by limited access highways on one side, and parkland/single family home neighborhoods on the other. There are many many fewer entrances and exits to this area than are available in a city grid, which is why vehicles get funneled to major roads and the traffic is much much worse than it is on Wilson Blvd in Arlington. In Arlington you can get from Point A to Point B any number of ways by using a different route through the grid network. You can't and won't ever be able to do that in Tysons unless they completely rezone all of McLean and Vienna, and wipe out thousands of single family homes and neighborhoods. Even in 40 years with the best possible economic demand they won't be able to change this political and geographical limitation.

I hope someday Tysons will be a great city (maybe they will actually give it a mailing address), but while I agree that the focus needs to be on transit and that density doesn't necessarily bring congestion, I understand the planners anxiety. They don't have to answer to people like us, but to people like my parents who aren't sure whether to be excited at the prospect of a further rise in property values, or to be anxious at the behemoth that might grow down the street, knowing they had no intention to ever move away from this area.

by xtr657 on Sep 16, 2009 10:48 am  

"There isn't much of a middle ground between city and suburb. That's one reason it's so hard to create new cities in suburban areas. If you simply gradually increase density and gradually add transit, then there's inevitably a long period where you have more density than the suburban model can handle but not enough for the urban one."

I'd like to see a reference for this. I believe that urban in-fill is possible, and has been happening around the country. The bigger problem is a lack of permitting.

"Follow the money. Who will benefit from this suburban growth model? Therein lies your answer."

People who own houses in the suburbs and don't want the area to change from what it was when they bought it? Most of the no-growth/slow-growth advocacy against increased density is from homeowners. So many people in this area are in favor of increased density-- somewhere else. Developers can make more money in Tysons by packing more townhomes and condos onto a plot of land than they could single-family homes. Blaming it on developers just doesn't make sense.

@stevek_fairfax:

Your comments make no sense. Anyone who favors TOD and believes that highways are being subsidized should favor toll roads like HOT lanes that make people who use the roads pay. It's better than taxing people who don't have cars to pay for roads, which is what we do currently. Free roads are what encourages auto oriented development, not tolls.

by John Thacker on Sep 16, 2009 2:17 pm  

Look at the article. The complaints are coming, as they always do, from citizens' groups. Developers want to build, people who live in McLean and Vienna fear extra density. If money really ruled the day in politics we'd be getting the TOD; it's because we have Democracy that the Fairfax County Supervisors are worried about a citizen backlash.

Many of the same people who say they oppose sprawl really oppose extra building near them. That's sort of okay when they live out in a rural area, but when they live out in an urbanizing area it's different. And other people who cheer density have a moral issue with being on the same side as developers and on the opposite side from community organizations.

by John Thacker on Sep 16, 2009 2:22 pm  

Maybe letting Tyson's strangle itself is a better option. Kill all road expansion funding and leave it to be a dump you can't get in or out.

I've thought it would be neat if major roads through Vienna and Falls Church and places like the Dunn Loring Metro Station grew with smaller infill in the 3 story height range. You'd have livable community features, and hell the W&OD trail runs through these parts anyways, making some bike objectives a possibility as well.

The total sum of this plus a strategic high density development like MetroWest around Vienna Metro would defeat Tyson's as the major heart of the area. Tysons would remain for the commuter cubicle worker, but in the future as online work from home meets the remaining need for local face to face interaction this might diminish. Why do we have glass boxes filled with people giving each other powerpoint presentations anyways? Its not 1985.But people still want to meet with friends and family in a "third place"

by NotFromMDorVA on Sep 16, 2009 2:31 pm  

John Thacker - "IF" money ruled the day?!?

Read the contract that the state of Virginia signed with Fluer/Transurban for the HOT Lanes. Myself and almost everyone that frequents these boards are for conjestion tolling existing publicly-owned freeways. The problems are the massive, costly, unessessary expansion of the beltway done in the name of this at enormous taxpayer subsidies (1.5 BILLION!) after last minute cost estimate changes by the private company hired to construct the "free" road expansion.

Add to that the hefty fines we taxpayers will pay for "too much success" of HOV/Bus traffic on the HOT lanes and you can understand why people are upset.

by stevek_fairfax on Sep 16, 2009 2:40 pm  

"Your comments make no sense. Anyone who favors TOD and believes that highways are being subsidized should favor toll roads like HOT lanes that make people who use the roads pay. It's better than taxing people who don't have cars to pay for roads, which is what we do currently. Free roads are what encourages auto oriented development, not tolls."

Not if you want to live in some fascist state. Not everyone wants to live in a toll-booth/post-industrial economy. We live in a sovereign country. Infrastructure like highways is important for society and economy and should be something that the people have control over. If free roads are the problem, why not just build less rather than give them, not really selling b/c of all the sweeteners involved, to private for-profit companies for them to gouge the people, raising prices to what the market will bear w/o our interests at heart? At the end of the day, we ought to concentrate on our economy becoming more and more productive, develop a better tax and monetary policy so we can finance infrastructure projects rather than to toll everything which is unfortunately the direction we're heading. Why not just sell off all services that the gov't provides if we don't benefit from every last one of them?

by Anonymous on Sep 16, 2009 5:55 pm  

There is no place in this country where a suburban area with 30 million sq ft of office, combined with 5 million of enclosed retail, has been connected to a subway. I understand the county's hesitation to start upzoning everything there.

Really? Is this true? I'd think several urban centers in the country have this? Why does the "suburban" matter? NYC and Chicago have major retail/office space connected by Subway systems.

What's the big deal?

by Curious on Dec 15, 2009 2:42 pm