By Brian Trompeter
The Fairfax County Board of Supervisors unanimously agreed July 11 to reduce by an overall 29 percent the amount of parking required at a major redevelopment near the West Falls Church Metrorail station.
Supervisors on June 27 approved FCGP-Metro Development LLC’s proposal to build 810 multi-family dwelling units, 85 townhouses, 110,000 square feet of office space and 10,000 square feet of retail area on nearly 24 acres next to the Metro station.
Instead of the required 1,599 parking spaces, the developer now will provide 1,140. Parking at the site will include:
• 522 spaces for the 579 one-bedroom apartments, which is 31 percent fewer than the 753 than the 1.3 spaces per unit required by county ordinance.
• 208 spaces for the 231 two-bedroom units, 40 percent fewer than the 347 that county code requires, based on 1.5 spaces per unit.
• 98 spaces for the 49 townhouses measuring 14 and 20 feet wide, which is 26 percent fewer than the code’s requirement of 133, and 62 spaces for the 41 houses that will be 16 feet wide, down 44 percent from the required 111. County code calls for 2.7 spaces per townhouse in those size ranges.
• 30 retail spaces, down 13 percent from the code’s required 35, based on 3.44 spaces per 1,000 square feet of gross floor area.
• 220 office spaces, which exactly meets the code’s requirement of 2 spaces per 1,000 square feet of gross floor area.
The parking reduction was based on a “very well-done” study by the firm of Gorove Slade, said Supervisor John Foust (D-Dranesville), who noted the initial recommendation had been for 34 percent less parking.
“The caveat there is that there is pretty much a lot of capacity of parking in a Metro parking lot at this site,” Foust said. “I think there is going to be an opportunity to use that to some extent, but to finalize and make this permanent, I ask that the applicant enter into an agreement with Metro for the parking spaces if they are to get the reduction they initially sought.”
The applicant, FCGP-Metro Development LLC, was receptive to that idea and parking at the site will be reduced further if the developer can obtain commitments for up to 120 parking spaces in that garage, which is owned by the Washington Metropolitan Area Transit Authority, Foust said.
According to June 28 development conditions, parking for one-bedroom multi-family units at the site may be reduced from the current 0.9 spaces per unit to 0.75 if WMATA provides at least 45 spaces in its garage there.
According to county staff, the main reasons for the parking reduction were:
• The development’s location within one-eighth of a mile of the West Falls Church station’s entrance, which gives easy Metrorail access to people living and working in the vicinity.
• The station’s being served by Metrobus, thus offering connections to other parts of the local area.
• The ability of people to own fewer or no automobiles because of the provision of mass transit and extensive pedestrian and bicycle connections.
“Fairfax County has invested heavily in rail and rail development,” staff wrote. “Providing excessive parking is an inducement to auto travel and defeats the benefits and opportunities to be gained with rail-related development.”
Some local residents and groups, including the McLean Citizens Association, had urged supervisors not to cut parking too drastically for the site’s multi-family dwellings, citing potential impacts on surrounding neighborhoods if WMATA did not allow its garage to be used for residential parking.
Adrienne Whyte, president of the Ellison Heights/Mount Daniel Civic Association, testified at the Board of Supervisors’ June 27 meeting that the proposed multi-family parking reductions were “ludicrous” and residents probably still would need vehicles to get around the county.
County staff’s memorandum concluded that overflow parking from the development site could be mitigated by fees charged at the adjacent Virginia Tech site, vehicle-towing policies at the nearby Pavilion condominium/apartment site and permit-parking districts already in place in single-family neighborhoods around the station.
“Given the individual and community site parking controls in place, the proposed parking reduction is not expected to impact the surrounding area,” staff wrote. “However, if problems arise, the approval conditions provide a remedy by requiring a parking utilization study and corrective actions for identified problems.”
