A 19-year-old man from Arlington died Sunday night (March 10) after reportedly crashing into a sedan while riding his motorcycle in Bailey’s Crossroads.
Officers responded to the intersection of Leesburg Pike (Route 7) and Glen Carlyn Drive at 11:10 p.m. on Sunday for a crash involving a 1996 Yamaha motorcycle and a 2000 Acura sedan, the Fairfax County Police Department said yesterday (Monday) in a news release.
“Preliminarily, detectives determined the driver of the Acura was traveling westbound on Leesburg Pike attempting to make a left turn onto Glen Carlyn Drive when he was struck on the passenger side by the motorcyclist which was eastbound on Leesburg Pike in the left through-lane,” the FCPD said.
Alejandro Portillo, the motorcyclist, was taken to a hospital, where he was pronounced dead.
According to police, the Acura driver remained at the scene of the crash and didn’t experience any injuries. The crash remains under investigation.
Portillo is the eighth person who wasn’t a pedestrian to be killed in a traffic crash on Fairfax County roads this year, according to the FCPD. At this time in 2023, there had been three such fatalities.
This is the county’s first fatal crash of 2024 involving a motorcyclist, but seven motorcyclists died in crashes last year, a fatality rate matched in 2022, according to traffic data from the Virginia Department of Motor Vehicles.
In the most recent crash, an Ashburn man was charged with reckless driving for allegedly speeding when he crashed into Zafeer Piracha, 27, of Lorton, who was riding a motorcycle on Route 28 in the Chantilly area.
Portillo is the second person to die in a crash in the Bailey’s Crossroads section of Leesburg Pike this year. Gladys Bilbao, a 93-year-old Falls Church resident, died last month from injuries she sustained as a passenger in a collision between two Toyota sedans at the South Jefferson Street intersection on Feb. 16.
The Route 7 corridor in Bailey’s Crossroads was identified as particularly dangerous for pedestrians in a 2022 report by immigrant advocacy organization CASA and nonprofit Coalition for Smarter Growth.
Image via Google Maps
A Los Angeles fast-food chain that specializes in Nashville-style fried chicken is planning to spice up Bailey’s Crossroads.
Dave’s Hot Chicken is coming to the Crossroads Place shopping center, situated at the intersection of Leesburg Pike and South Jefferson Street, property manager Levin Management, a New Jersey-based realty management company, announced last week.
Neither Levin nor Dave’s Hot Chicken has confirmed an opening date, only stating that the chain has secured a lease for a 2,300-square-foot space in the shopping center.
“Crossroads Place offers a great location in a high-demand market and proved to be an ideal fit for this popular chain’s continued growth,” Rappaport Executive Director of Brokerage Melissa Webb, who serves as a local representative for Levin, said in a press release. “Dave’s Hot Chicken diversifies the center’s dining options.”
Founded in 2017, Dave’s Hot Chicken offers a menu centered on Nashville hot chicken, including tenders and sliders that are available in seven spice levels, from “no spice” to “Reaper.” The menu also features house-made kale slaw, mac and cheese, french fries, and milkshakes.
The new establishment at Crossroads Place will be the fifth Dave’s Hot Chicken location in the D.C. area. It opened its first Virginia location last August in Tysons.
Upon its opening, the restaurant will face some stiff competition. Within a half-mile radius, there are at least five other chicken-focused eateries, including Buffalo Wild Wings, the Peruvian-style The Chicken Place, Edy’s Chicken & Steak, Hangry Joe’s Hot Chicken and Wings and Wingstop.
More from the press release below:
Crossroads Place, which also features Olive Garden, Longhorn Steakhouse, Chipotle, Einstein Bagels, Quickway Japanese Hibachi and Starbucks, draws 3.7 million visitors per year, according to real-time traffic data from Placer.ai. Anchored by a Giant food store and Burlington, the property’s tenant mix also includes HomeGoods, T.J.Maxx, Cost Plus World Market, KC Beauty and Mattress Warehouse, along with neighborhood conveniences such as a nail salon and optometrist.
The center serves a growing residential population of more than 579,000 people within a five-mile radius, and the marketplace boasts an average household income of more than $186,000. Crossroads Place also benefits from a daily traffic count of 30,000 vehicles on Leesburg Pike. One 12,500-square-foot space remains available at Crossroads Place.
For seven decades, LMC has served as a trusted single-source commercial real estate services provider for institutional and private owners. Its diversified, retail-focused leasing and management portfolio includes 125 properties totaling more than 16 million square feet in the Northeast and Mid-Atlantic states.
A 93-year-old woman died earlier this week from injuries she sustained in a car crash on Leesburg Pike (Route 7) in Bailey’s Crossroads, police say.
Gladys Bilbao, a Falls Church resident, was in the front passenger seat of a 2007 Toyota Corolla when the driver collided with a 2023 Toyota GR86 in the South Jefferson Street intersection around 7 p.m. on Feb. 16, according to the Fairfax County Police Department.
“Preliminarily, detectives determined the driver of the Toyota Corolla turned left onto South Jefferson Street from eastbound Leesburg Pike, in front of the Toyota GR86, which was traveling west on Leesburg Pike, resulting in the crash,” the FCPD said in a news release. “The Corolla and GR86 both had two occupants per vehicle. All four occupants involved were transported to area hospitals for treatment.”
Detectives were notified on Wednesday (Feb. 21) that Bilbao had died from her injuries, the FCPD announced yesterday (Thursday).
An investigation into the crash is ongoing, specifically to determine “whether speed was a factor,” police said.
According to the FCPD, Bilbao is the seventh person to die in a traffic crash in Fairfax County this year, more than doubling the three fatalities recorded at this time in 2023. The count doesn’t appear to include this year’s two pedestrian fatalities, which both stemmed from crashes in the Richmond Highway corridor, where four people have died this month.
A 2022 study conducted by the immigrant advocacy organization CASA and nonprofit Coalition for Smarter Growth identified the Bailey’s Crossroads section of Route 7 as a dangerous road for pedestrians, citing frequent speeding by drivers and a lack of crosswalks and sidewalks. Last year, the Virginia Department of Transportation reduced the speed limit from 40 to 35 mph between the Falls Church and Alexandria city limits.
The speed limit was also lowered on much of Richmond Highway last May.
Image via Google Maps
With the help of local developers and property owners, the Tysons Community Alliance is on a mission to beautify the green spaces found where many of the area’s major roads intersect.
The first site targeted is the southwest quadrant of the Route 7 (Leesburg Pike) and Route 123 (Chain Bridge Road) interchange, where the Vienna-based company Tyson’s Tree Service began clearing overgrowth, invasive plants and dead trees on Jan. 2.
Led by the affordable housing firm SCG Development, which is headquartered nearby at 8245 Boone Blvd, the clean-up effort will set the stage for the approximately 2 acres of land to be replanted with native species and new landscaping — a process that Tysons officials hope to repeat at other locations.
“I would almost call this a pilot,” TCA spokesperson Karyn Le Blanc said. “…We would want to take a look at this, analyze it and then, see where we can replicate it in other areas or take the best parts of what’s worked on this and use this in other areas as well.”
The idea for the Tysons beautification project came from SCG Development President Steve Wilson. After 35 years of traveling the local roadways as a Northern Virginia resident, Wilson noticed the accompanying open spaces and landscaping had gotten unkempt, and in December 2022, he “just decided something needed to be done about it,” he told FFXnow.
Tysons has about 140 acres of green space that go unmaintained, mostly around its six major interchanges where routes 7 and 123, the Dulles Toll Road and the Capital Beltway (I-495) meet. That amounts to 5% of the 2,743-acre area designated as Fairfax County’s urban center, per SCG.
Arguing that cleaning up these areas would reduce safety concerns, encourage more pedestrian traffic and improve property values, the developer soon met with Providence District Supervisor Dalia Palchik, who represents most of Tysons, and offered to test its concept by sponsoring the Leesburg Pike and Chain Bridge Road interchange.
Once studied as a possible park, the site is “highly visible” and “perhaps the worst in terms of being overgrown,” Wilson says. He also highlighted its proximity to the Fairfax County Economic Development Authority, whose headquarters overlooks the interchange. Read More
Dark smoke was seen wafting over Route 7 near the Tysons Commerce Center office building (8219 Leesburg Pike) earlier this afternoon.
Alan Henney, a local crime and public safety watcher, reported hearing an “explosion [that] sounded like a transformer with fire” in the 8200 block of Leesburg Pike around 12:30 p.m. Photos and videos of the scene showed black smoke billowing up from near the office building, which is across the street from PetSmart.
While the Fairfax County Fire and Rescue Department didn’t receive any calls for a fire in the area, Dominion Energy spokesperson Peggy Fox confirmed that the utility had an equipment failure, sparking a fire on an electrical pole and causing a power outage that affected 1,572 customers.
“All but three customers were restored between 10 minutes and 39 minutes,” Fox told FFXnow. “Those remaining three will be out while repairs are made.”
Per Dominion Energy’s outage map, power is expected to be restored for those three customers around 4-7 p.m.
8200 block of Leesburg Pike in Tysons. Explosion sounded like a transformer with fire. @ffxfirerescue @ffxnow any more info? pic.twitter.com/lS3NBT6wDJ
— Alan Henney (@alanhenney) December 14, 2023
— Adam Parkhomenko (@AdamParkhomenko) December 14, 2023
(Updated at 3:30 p.m.) A car wash site on Route 7 in Tysons is ready to roll with a fresh coat of paint and a new company in charge.
Mr Wash Car Wash began operating at 8218 Leesburg Pike on Thursday (Dec. 7), replacing the long-standing Champion Hand Car Wash. To celebrate the opening, the facility is providing free car washes through Sunday, Dec. 17.
“We’re thrilled to serve the Tysons Corner community,” Evan Harris, executive vice president of Mr Wash Car Wash, said in a statement. “As a family-owned business, we’re dedicated to delivering a top-tier car wash experience, creating meaningful job opportunities, and fostering impactful partnerships within our communities.”
When announcing the opening, Mr Wash noted that customers on its unlimited membership plan “automatically have access to all locations.”
Unlimited members get one vehicle wash a day for a monthly payment.
The Tysons center is Mr Wash’s 11th location overall and its fourth in Fairfax County, joining sites in Merrifield, Bailey’s Crossroads and Centreville. Aside from one Delaware car wash, the business is concentrated in the D.C. area, with facilities in Alexandria, Arlington and Maryland.
Construction on the Tysons car wash began in July, according to Scott-Long Construction, which says in a press release that its team overhauled a “previously dilapidated structure.”
Based on its Yelp page, Champion Car Wash had occupied the site since at least 2007, but it appears to have closed around October 2021. The business provided auto detailing in addition to cleanings.
The existing structures were demolished to make way for the 4,703-square-foot Mr Wash facility, per Fairfax County permits. Construction finished on Dec. 1, Scott-Long Construction said.
“We are thrilled to have been involved with the planning and execution of this new state of the art car wash in the heart of Tysons,” Scott-Long CEO John Scott said in the press release.
Mr Wash is adjacent to an office building that’s co-located with Reston Hospital Center’s Tysons emergency room, which opened in June 2022.
(Updated at 3:45 p.m.) A stolen vehicle wound up on top of a gas pump after a brief police chase near Tysons Corner Center yesterday (Monday).
Fairfax County police arrested a man suspected of larceny and carjacking after he crashed into the Shell gas station at 8103 Leesburg Pike around 4:36 p.m., according to the police scanner on Open MHz.
“The suspect was running from the mall after committing a larceny when he carjacked a second victim in a parking garage,” the Fairfax County Police Department said. “He left the location at a high rate of speed and crashed a short distance away.”
According to an update from FCPD, an officer responded to a store in Tysons Corner Center at 4:32 p.m. after loss prevention personnel reported seeing the man — identified as a 20-year-old from D.C. — steal “over $2,500 worth of merchandise.”
Upon seeing the officer, the man fled into a nearby parking garage, police say. Scanner traffic suggests the garage was the one outside Bloomingdale’s.
The FCPD says the man then tried to open the door of a 2013 Kia Optima that entered the garage.
“The victim, a teenager, was alarmed and drove away, with [the man] holding onto the door and being dragged for a short distance,” police said. “The victim stopped a short distance away and exited the car.”
Per the police scanner, an officer told the dispatcher at 4:32 p.m. that the man “carjacked somebody” and took off onto Route 7 (Leesburg Pike), jumping a curb in the process.
The officer said the suspect initially headed west before attempting to make a U-turn at Gallows Road. However, he lost control of his vehicle and “took out a gas station,” according to police.
The man got out of the car and briefly went into the convenience store but then came out and surrendered to police.
Officers said at 4:36 p.m. that no further police assistance was needed, but a Fairfax County Fire and Rescue Department unit should be called.
“They got a fuel leak here. He nailed one of the gas pumps, took it out,” an officer said.
Police also requested an ambulance to treat injuries to the man, reporting that he sustained “facial injuries” after getting “dragged by the vehicle.”
The FCPD confirmed that the man was taken to a hospital for injuries not considered life-threatening, and the person who got carjacked didn’t get injured.
The man has been charged with carjacking and grand larceny, the FCPD announced today (Tuesday). He’s currently in custody at the Fairfax County Adult Detention Center without bond.
Larceny suspect in custody after carjacking a victim in the 8100 blk of Leesburg Pike as he attempted to flee. Suspect crashed the car into a nearby gas station & was taken into custody. pic.twitter.com/9GgAz7gs5p
— Fairfax County Police (@FairfaxCountyPD) October 30, 2023
Residents are calling on the Fairfax County Park Authority to ensure that a trail is constructed on the south side of a new tunnel in Colvin Run Mill Park.
Construction on the $1.5 million tunnel under Route 7 as part of the widening of Leesburg Pike is currently underway. But the project, which is managed by state officials, lacks a 1,000-foot trail to the south side of the tunnel that would allow residents to walk to the park’s sites in Great Falls, Lake Fairfax and Gerry Connolly Cross County Trail.
In a recent call to action by the Friends of Colvin Run Mill, James Waller described the issue as a a “tunnel to nowhere” and urged members of the nonprofit to ask elected representatives to allocate carryover funds for the project.
Last month, the Fairfax County Board of Supervisors allocated $15.7 million to the park authority from the fiscal year 2023 budget carryover.
In a statement to FFXnow, Dranesville District Supervisor John Foust says he hopes the park authority will use a portion of the carryover funds for the trail.
“The Park Authority, however, is an independent agency with many needs and challenges,” Foust wrote. “I cannot mandate when the Park Authority will allocate funds for the construction of this trail, but I am confident they consider it a priority and are trying to make it happen.”
But carryover funds can only be used for system-wide maintenance projects and not new amenities, according to FCPA spokesperson Benjamin Boxer.
“The carryover funding received from the County is restricted to different uses and will not be a part of this project,” Boxer said.
Boxer said the park authority has authorized up to $200,000 for feasibility, environmental review and design for the future trail project.
“Work is progressing as the studies have been completed and we are entering into the design phase of the project so that when future funding is identified, we will be ready to pursue the project,” Boxer wrote in the statement.
Updated at 4 p.m. on 9/26/2023 — The traffic pattern change at Lewinsville Road and Route 7 has been rescheduled for 5 a.m. on Thursday (Sept. 28), the Virginia Department of Transportation says.
Earlier: One portion of the ongoing project to widen northern Route 7 (Leesburg Pike) is complete.
The revamped Lewinsville Road intersection in the Wolf Trap area will fully open to traffic tomorrow (Tuesday) morning, the Virginia Department of Transportation recently announced.
Final work on the intersection will continue tonight into the morning, in preparation of the new traffic pattern taking effect by 5 a.m.
“Temporary traffic patterns may be in place during the overnight hours between 9 p.m. and 5 a.m. while crews complete the transition,” VDOT said. “Please use caution and be alert to directional signage that will be in place to guide drivers through the intersection.”
Under the new configuration, Lewinsville Road has been realigned with the McLean Bible Church’s east entrance on the south side of Route 7. A displaced left-turn lane separates Route 7 traffic headed east onto Lewinsville from westbound Route 7 traffic.
Traffic signals have been placed at both McLean Bible Church entrances, but a new acceleration lane lets drivers from Lewinsville Road turn right onto westbound Route 7 without having to stop at the light, as shown in a simulation video from VDOT.
Under construction since spring 2019, the Route 7 Corridor Improvements Project is widening the roadway from four to six lanes along a nearly 7-mile stretch from Reston Avenue to Jarrett Valley Drive just north of the Dulles Toll Road.
The $313.9 million project is also adding 10-foot-wide, shared-use paths on both sides of the corridor and reconfiguring several intersections, including Lewinsville and Baron Cameron Avenue in Reston.
Work is scheduled to be completed by July 31, 2024.
Whenever Route 7 (Leesburg Pike) gets widened, the new lanes from International Drive in Tysons down to the West Falls Church Metro station area will be reserved exclusively for a future bus rapid transit (BRT) system.
The Fairfax County Board of Supervisors approved a comprehensive plan amendment last Tuesday (July 25) incorporating the BRT into the county’s vision for Route 7 and International Drive, a move that enables county staff to pursue funding.
“I do think this is an important movement forward in this project,” Providence District Supervisor Dalia Palchik said after a public hearing.
The Tysons portion of the Route 7 BRT — which is intended to provide faster, more direct service than a traditional local bus route — is part of a regional system that the Northern Virginia Transportation Commission has been planning for a decade now. The finished route will extend into Falls Church City and Seven Corners, ending at the Mark Center in Alexandria.
For the initial Tysons phase, though, the Fairfax County Department of Transportation has settled on the West Falls Church Metro as the southern endpoint and the Spring Hill Metro station as the northern terminus.
Adhering to an alignment approved by the Board of Supervisors in 2021, the BRT will have nine stops:
- The West Falls Church Metro station
- Westbound Route 7 (Leesburg Pike) at Chestnut Street
- Patterson Road, near the Tysons Station and Idylwood Plaza shopping centers
- George C. Marshall Drive
- Fashion Blvd, serving Tysons Corner Center
- International Drive and Fletcher Street
- International and Greensboro Drive, next to Tysons Galleria
- International and Lincoln Circle, near the Rotunda Condominiums
- Spring Hill Metro station
Along with establishing the potential stations, the newly approved amendment designates two additional lanes planned for Route 7 from Haycock Road to International Drive as dedicated BRT lanes.
The comprehensive plan recommends expanding Leesburg Pike from four to six lanes between Haycock and the Capital Beltway (I-495) and from six to eight lanes between the Beltway and Route 123. Funds have already been secured to design the Beltway to Route 123 segment. Read More