Developer seeks to turn one house into three on Wolf Trap area lot

A single-family house in the Wolf Trap area could be razed and replaced with three smaller homes under a development plan filed earlier this month with Fairfax County.

Caliber Development is seeking to rezone the 1.14-acre site at the corner of Creek Crossing Road NE and Ridge Lane so it can be subdivided into three lots that will range from roughly 14,700 square feet to over 16,200 square feet in size, per the submitted plan.

The developer says that layout more closely matches the surrounding residential neighborhood than the existing 49,829-square-foot house did.

“The proposed application will facilitate a modest but high quality residential redevelopment in conformance with the [Fairfax County] Comprehensive Plan that will align with the density and development pattern of the surrounding subdivisions,” McGuireWoods land use planner Mike Van Atta wrote in a Nov. 10 statement of justification for the project.

Built in 1982, the house was sold by its former resident to a company called DB Creek Crossing LLC for over $1.3 million in March. Caliber then purchased it for $1.4 million on Oct. 7, according to Fairfax County property records.

Driveways for the new houses would be located on Ridge Lane, but the developer says it plans to provide 5-foot-wide sidewalks along both streets. The Creek Crossing sidewalk would come with a right-of-way dedication in place of an on-street bicycle lane.

“Construction of a bike lane at this time is not appropriate until a safe bicycle route is constructed along adjacent portions of Creek Crossing Road,” the application says.

According to Caliber, the redevelopment would reduce the lot’s impervious surfaces and exceed tree preservation and canopy requirements, with a commitment to planting native species. The plan shows a total of 29 trees with 5,600 square feet of canopy.

A site visit by the consultant TNT Environmental Inc. found several species designated as invasive or noxious in Virginia, including English ivy, porcelain berry, mimosa and Japanese honeysuckle, the plan says.

The application says invasive species will be removed by hand where possible “until the plants noted above are no longer in abundance or until bond release, whichever is later.”

The county hasn’t officially accepted the rezoning application for review yet.