Plans to raze an aging office building and replace it with 400 residential units in the Fairfax Ridge Road area of Fairfax Center won unanimous support from the Fairfax County Planning Commission last Thursday (Oct. 16).
The proposal to amend the county’s comprehensive plan guiding development of the site will now be considered by the Board of Supervisors on Tuesday, Nov. 18.
If approved, county officials later will take up a rezoning proposal with a more detailed development plan for the parcel, located near the I-66 and Route 50 interchange just outside Fairfax City.
If the rezoning is approved, the mostly vacant, 1980s-era High Ridge office building on the 6.2-acre site at 3877 Fairfax Ridge Road would be torn down. In its place would rise a single multifamily structure capped at a height of 75 feet, with a small amount of retail space to serve the immediate community.
The site is surrounded by condominiums and apartments to the north, south and west and Waples Mill Road to the east.
At one time, the surrounding area had been zoned for office uses, but over time, much of it was rezoned to accommodate housing.
“What you have left is kind of the hole in the doughnut,” said Lynne Strobel, a land-use attorney with Walsh Colucci Lubeley Walsh representing the property owner, New York-based Time Equities.
Allowing residential construction would remove an underperforming office building with just one remaining tenant and “be more compatible with these uses that have evolved over time on the west site of Waples Mill,” she said.
Strobel said the plan includes more than an acre of “really quality open space” that feature both active and passive recreation.
But a number of commission members expressed concern that much of the park space is located on the periphery of the building, immediately adjacent to roads.
“It’s a nice setback experience, but it doesn’t strike me as a park,” said Commission Chair Phil Niedzielski-Eichner, an at-large member.
Dranesville District Commissioner Alyssa Batchelor-Causey said the project seems to continue a recent trend of new developments struggling to integrate park space fully into the overall site.
Doing so produces a “psychological impact that does prevent people from really, truly using it as an open space,” she said.
Given the odd shape of the parcel, the commission members acknowledged there might not have been any easy workarounds available to the designers.
Batchelor-Causey and Sully District Commissioner Evelyn Spain were among those voicing the need for improvements to benefit pedestrians and bicyclists in the vicinity, something that can only be partially addressed in any one redevelopment plan.
Spain also asked whether future residents could be notified of the proximity of the National Rifle Association’s headquarters, which draws frequent protests. Strobel said she would look into it.
Hunter Mill District Commissioner John Carter questioned how much affordable or workforce housing would be part of the overall package. While no specific numbers were floated, county planning staff said about 8% of all units is a typical figure.
Still, several commissioners praised the overall design, as did representatives from the nearby Fairfax Ridge condominium community, who also sought assurances that the redevelopment’s impact on their 420 units be minimized where possible.
The condo association raised concerns about noise, dust and construction parking, hoping to get a more restricted window of construction activity than the 7 a.m. to 7 p.m. proposed by the developer.
Niedzielski-Eichner said Springfield District Commissioner James Thomas, in whose district the property is located, could serve as a liaison between neighbors and the development team.
Strobel told the planning commission that if the comprehensive plan amendment wins the Board of Supervisors’ approval in November, she expects the rezoning application to make its way to them “in a couple months’ time.”
At the Oct. 16 meeting, members of the Planning Commission deferred to Nov. 12 consideration of a related proposal to redevelop the Fair Oaks Business Park to the east of the Fairfax Ridge parcel. That comprehensive plan amendment is still slated to go to supervisors on Nov. 18, so they can consider both in tandem.
The Fair Oaks Business Park proposal would add an option for residential mixed use development, consisting of up to 706 multifamily and stacked-townhouse units, 77,000 square feet of medical office space and 20,000 square feet of retail use. Plans call for retaining the Inova Kellar School, a therapeutic program for children eligible for special education services.
Residential units in the Fair Oaks Business Park would vary between market-rate housing and units available to households earning an average 60% of area median income.
Several years ago, county staff determined that the immediate vicinity lacks the sewer-pumping capacity to accommodate the proposed projects. As a result, the developers are required to fund sewer-pumping improvements for the corridor, with the county government reimbursing costs for improvements that will benefit areas outside the parcels in question.
Fairfax County has been working for more than a decade to update its Comprehensive Plan for the Fairfax Center corridor, which also includes Fair Oaks Mall and the Fairfax County Government Center.
Future planning for what is known as “Land Unit K” of the Fairfax Center area will continue next year, with community engagement taking place after a county transportation study is completed, staff said.
