Fairfax County will receive less regional funding than desired for its planned Richmond Highway (Route 1) Bus Rapid Transit system, but a top elected official says that won’t derail the nearly billion-dollar effort.
The county government submitted a request for $463 million from the Northern Virginia Transportation Authority (NVTA) to support the proposal.
But the funding package approved by the NVTA board of directors on July 9 included only $116.3 million for the Route 1 project as part of the authority’s Fiscal Years 2026-31 Six Year Program.
The day after the vote, Fairfax County Board of Supervisors Chairman Jeff McKay told FFXnow the reduced funding amount does not present an insurmountable hurdle.
“We’re grateful for the funding that was approved and appreciate the continued investment in this important project,” said McKay, who is a member of the NVTA board of directors.
“This project has always been supported through multiple funding sources, and we’ve met our overall funding goal while staying on schedule,” he said.
Dubbed “The One,” the transit project is slated to run 7.4 miles from the Huntington Metro station south to Fort Belvoir. Buses will primarily travel in dedicated bus lanes, with some mixed traffic areas on the northern portion of the project.
Along the route, there will be nine transit stations.
In filings with NVTA, county officials pegged the project’s total cost at $987.3 million.
Springfield District Supervisor Pat Herrity also serves on the NVTA board as an appointee of former Gov. Glenn Youngkin (R).
Though the Richmond Highway corridor isn’t in his district, Herrity told FFXnow in an interview that he remains concerned about how the Route 1 line is unfolding.
“I don’t think it’s the right project,” he said.
Herrity said he doesn’t know where the county will find the approximately $350 million in funds requested, but not funded by NVTA, saying only that the solution is “hopefully not county funding.”
Mount Vernon District Supervisor Dan Storck, who represents the Richmond Highway corridor, said he hopes to continue partnering with NVTA to fund the BRT project, which has been dubbed “The One.”
“NVTA has been a great partner for the Richmond Highway BRT ‘The One’ with its transformational investment for our community,” Storck said in a statement. “I look forward to continuing to work with them and all of our partners as we secure the full funding needed to complete ‘The One.'”
With the $116.3 million provided this year, NVTA has now committed a total of $754 million to the Richmond Highway project, supporting both the BRT and plans to widen the road between Mount Vernon Memorial Highway and Sherwood Hall Lane to accommodate the future bus service and other improvements.
According to NVTA, it has allocated more money to the Route 1 BRT than any other project.
Funding sought for 27 projects across N. Va.
At the July 9 meeting, the authority’s board of directors approved $776 million to fund projects for localities across the region. Total requests from localities for the FY 2026-31 cycle had totaled $1.26 billion.
Twenty-one of 27 project submissions received either full or partial funding. There was no discussion at the July 9 meeting on the reasons behind decisions to partially fund several projects, including the Route 1 proposal, which was Fairfax’s only submission during this funding round.
At a June 18 meeting of the authority’s Planning and Programming Committee, NVTA interim transportation director Sree Nampoothiri said there were “various factors” behind why individual projects did not receive full funding.
Without touching on specific projects, he said the reasons could include having other funding sources; lower ratings; limited long-term benefits; and negative reactions among the more than 700 public comments received.
In addition to Fairfax’s submissions, funding was requested by Arlington, Loudoun and Prince William counties, the cities of Alexandria, Falls Church and Manassas, and the Town of Herndon.
Arlington had the most funding requests fully or partially approved at 10, while Prince William County received the most funding at $295 million.
Reiterating comments made at a June meeting with the Fairfax Board of Supervisors, NVTA CEO Monica Backmon used the July 9 meeting to reaffirm the organization’s support for a network of bus rapid transit (BRT) lines crisscrossing the region in future.
“It is not going to happen overnight,” Backmon said, but suggested the total number of Northern Virginia BRT routes could eventually top two dozen.
Backmon told regional elected officials her organization is available to support their efforts, but ultimate decisions on where to locate the transit lines rest with the jurisdictions themselves.
“It’s not our job to tell you about land use,” she said at the July 9 meeting.
NVTA authorizes funding for Elden Street project
At the July 9 meeting, NVTA directors approved the Town of Herndon’s request for $4.4 million in regional funds for improvements to South Elden Street.
The funding will support upgrades along a 0.4-mile stretch between Sterling Blvd and Herndon Parkway.
According to the submission:
“Safety is a critical component for this project, emphasizing a seamless and safer multimodal environment for pedestrians and cyclists.”
“The scope is to add an 8-foot shared-use path and to reconstruct the existing 5-lane section to be a 4-lane section with a raised median and dedicated turning lanes. Other improvements include LED traffic/bike/pedestrian signalization, street lighting, ADA curb cuts, sidewalks and paver crosswalks.”
The project will also set the stage for future BRT lines planned to run along the Elden Street corridor.
Herndon officials initially planned to request $15.57 million for the project from NVTA. Town leaders scaled that request down to $4 million, which was approved in full, even though the project scored 25th out of 27 projects in NVTA’s Congestion Reduction Relative to Cost (CRRC) metric.
The total estimated cost of the Elden Street plan is $31.57 million, according to NVTA officials.
Haycock Road funding rejected
The NVTA board rejected a request from the City of Falls Church for $15 million in support of a shared-use path along Haycock Road near the city’s border with Fairfax County, which is also planning to add pedestrian facilities on its side of the street.
Falls Church did receive $30 million in support of improvements to Annandale Road and a number of intersections along it.
This story has been updated with information on the total funding that NVTA has approved for the Richmond Highway Bus Rapid Transit project. The spelling of Sree Nampoothiri’s name has also been corrected.
