Another attempt to develop the Reston National Golf Course for housing appears to have fallen short, for now.
The Fairfax County Planning Commission informally voted last Thursday (May 15) to recommend the project be left off a list of Comprehensive Plan amendment proposals to be recommended to the Board of Supervisors in June.
“The application is incomplete. It’s premature,” said Hunter Mill District Commissioner John Carter, whose district includes the 166-acre site.
The 6-1 vote, with four abstentions, aligns the commission with county planning staff, who concluded the proposal is not fleshed out enough for consideration. However, the planning commission could still potentially revisit its stance in a couple of weeks.
“It’s not the final vote. June 4 will be the final point of decision,” said at-large member Phillip Niedzielski-Eichner, who chairs the commission.
After the planning commission finalizes its recommendations, the Board of Supervisors will have the last say on June 10 on which of the 43 site-specific plan amendments (known as SSPAs) submitted this year should be added to a work program for formal staff consideration.
Reston National’s property owner, a subsidiary of Baltimore-based War Horse Cities, is working with developer NVR in seeking a plan amendment that would permit residential or mixed-use development on part or all of the 18-hole golf course at 11875 Sunrise Valley Drive.
As the preliminary 6-1-4 vote suggested, the planning commission didn’t reach a consensus on the proposal.
Jeremy Hancock, who represents the Providence District, advocated for putting the project on staff’s work plan, giving the developer a chance to refine its work.
Not considering a residential option for a large parcel within a mile of the Reston Town Center Metro station would be a disservice in a community where housing remains at a premium and prices are high, Hancock said.
“Housing is really important. We are missing out on some of those opportunities,” he said.
Sully District Commissioner Evelyn Spain agreed.
“We need [more housing] everywhere in Fairfax County,” she said. “We have to examine all the alternatives out there before we say ‘no.'”
The SSPA would allow housing on 86 acres of the golf course, while designating the remaining 80 acres as open space intended for recreation, a park or another public use. However, the property owner is also pursuing a backup plan to renovate the golf course and add about 290 townhouse units on 14 acres that it says is already zoned for residential development.
“There’s room to maneuver,” said Mark Looney, a land-use attorney representing the property owner. “We can come back and give you a whole lot of detail. We’re just at the point we need to make a decision one way or another.”
Carter responded that if the request is turned down in this round of SSPAs, it could be resubmitted later.
“It’s only 18 months until the next round,” he said.
Reston National Golf Course was built in 1970 from a design by golf architect Ed Ault. Offering both memberships and pay-per-round options, the par-71 course hosts around 40,000 rounds annually.
The current owner purchased the property in 2019 from RN Golf Management LLC for $23.75 million. The latter had purchased it in 2005 for just over $5 million, and requested a plan amendment in 2012 in an effort to build townhouses on the site.
After a court battle, RN Golf Management opted not to move forward with the proposal.
Reston Association long has been against development either at Reston National or at the community’s other golf course at the Hidden Creek Country Club because it would remove open space.
“It sets a dangerous precedent,” organization president Travis Johnson said.
Johnson, who leads a group representing 65,000 Reston residents, said any change of this sort “must be driven by community consensus.”
A number of residents speaking at the hearing said the current owner targeted the property from the start for development, only to run into community opposition.
“The owner didn’t buy it for golf. They bought it to make a killing,” said Connie Hartke, a member of the Rescue Reston advocacy group.
“It was a speculative gamble on their part,” said Lisa White. “Not all gambles pay off.”
Harke said Reston National and Hidden Creek represent “the lungs of Reston,” and contended that the owner of Reston National planned to let it deteriorate to a point where golfers won’t use it.
“Do not give in to threats,” she told the commission.
Niedzielski-Eichner said it’s “a concern” if War Horse Cities is in fact a “reluctant owner,” and maintenance issues are piling up.
Looney said that if the property isn’t approved for redevelopment, its owner would need to transform it to a more modern facility in order to compete with other golf courses in the region.
Proposal to nearly triple planned housing on Reston site moves forward
At last Thursday’s SSPA workshop, the planning commission also made recommendations on several other SSPA proposals in the Hunter Mill District, including one from a development firm that believes it can triple the number of housing units on a 1.6-acre Reston parcel without expanding the footprint of the proposed building.
The Fairfax County Planning Commission appeared ready to let them try, agreeing to recommend the proposal for 1841 Explorer Street for inclusion in the county’s comprehensive plan amendment work program.
The site, located at the northeast corner of New Dominion Parkway and Explorer Drive, currently is home to the Winwood Children’s Center, which occupies a two-story preschool/daycare building, and surface parking. An earlier development plan called for 125 condominium units and 54,000 square feet of non-residential space.
Property owner Raj Development is seeking a comprehensive plan change to permit 350 apartment units and the same 54,000 square feet of non-residential space, without altering the building’s mass or height. Space for a day care center would be provided.
Several commissioners wondered how that would be possible.
“The size of the units is coming down pretty low,” Carter said.
A representative for the applicant said units under the new proposal would be smaller, but not minuscule. They would range from 800 to 1,200 square feet in size.
The switch from condominiums to rental units is in reaction to market conditions and legal concerns developers have in dealing with new condominium associations, the applicant’s representative said.
The commission recommended adding the Explorer Street proposal to “Tier 3” of the work program — the lowest priority in the queue.
Its preliminary votes on the other Hunter Mill District applications were:
Tier 1
- Wiehle North District: Reston Station owner Comstock Companies proposes expanding the development west to Plaza America with new residential, shopping and office districts.
- 11600 Sunrise Valley Drive: Proposes changing the comprehensive plan’s recommendation to all residential uses for the site, which is currently developed with a four-story office building
Tier 3
- Colvin Woods: The owner of the Haven Reston apartments at 11012 Becontree Lake seeks to add 73 new townhomes on the north side of the site, stating that market-rate units are necessary to ensure the long-term maintenance and preservation of the 259 existing affordable apartments.
Add to Work Program (tier not specified)
- 11600 American Dream Way: Replacement of the remaining office building on the former Fannie Mae campus with townhomes and a central green area
- Alexander Bell Drive: Replace two “largely vacant,” four-story office buildings with townhomes.
- Parkridge I (10800 Parkridge Blvd): A residential townhome development would replace the two-story office building, whose current tenants include the Social Security Administration.
- Parkridge III (10701 Parkridge Blvd): Owner Phoenicia Real Estate Holdings proposes redeveloping the 7.19-acre office building site with multi-family residences and/or townhomes.
- Parkridge IV (10690 Parkridge Blvd): Replaces a six-story office building constructed in the 1980s with housing, which could involve repurposing the building, adding multi-family or single-family attached residences, or a combination
Do Not Add
- Hunter Mill Road: The developer G&G proposes an increase in residential density to allow up to 100 homes on 67 acres of vacant land near Hunter Mill Road and Sunset Hills Road.
Staff had recommended putting the Hunter Mill Road application in the third tier of the work program, but Carter said there are still too many issues that need to be resolved.
“To me, it does not meet the screening criteria,” he said. “It’s not in a [transit station area], no affordable housing, there’s road that’s unresolved, there are still compatibility issues with [the] adjacent community, and I think we should take this off the work program.”
In addition to the prospect of increased density in an area planned as low-density, the proposal’s compatibility with a realignment of Sunset Hills Road approved by the county in 2018 has emerged as a concern.
A representative for the developer said the realignment originally wasn’t included in their SSPA proposal, because they were under the impression that it wasn’t a community priority. However, after residents at community meetings argued that it is, in fact, needed, G&G is now willing to incorporate it into its development plan.
“We believe there’s a good opportunity to gain consensus, because the community says they want that road,” the representative said. “… At some point in time, we have to look at it and say if they want the road and the county’s not going to build it, is there any incentive that [the developer is] required to provide for that in its place?”
