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Health & Fitness

Master Plan Task Force in Election Year Stall

Reston vulnerable to unwanted density if Master Plan not rewritten. Process stalled. Election year politics?

In mid-2009, Fairfax County told us reviewing and revising Reston’s original Master Plan was a priority matter. 

In fact, a couple of years earlier the county’s planning chief had told a Reston audience that revising the Plan was urgent.  Reston was vulnerable, he said, because the original Master Plan with its density “blobs” drawn when Reston was all meadows left the community vulnerable to high density development where it no longer made sense.

So when the Reston Master Plan Special Study Task Force was finally convened by Supervisor Catherine Hudgins in December 2009, there was a sense of some urgency on the county’s part.  The first of a two-phase review process would examine only the Dulles corridor, the areas around the three rail stations to be:  Wiehle Avenue, Reston Parkway/Town Center, and Herndon-Monroe.

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 Hudgins filled the Task Force with heavy hitters from the commercial development community.  Task Force recommendations were to go for approval to our Fairfax County overlords (Board of Supervisors) by Summer 2010. A second phase would follow immediately, making Master Plan recommendations for the rest of Reston by the end of 2010.

Here we are in June 2011.  Is the revised Master Plan complete? 

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No. In fact, the Task Force is still in Phase One in what appears to be a holding pattern.  While Fairfax County is known for it’s glacial pace, there appears to be more at work (without actually working…) in this case. 

The three station area sub-committees submitted their reports and recommendations for their respective areas last fall.  Six months and countless meetings later, nothing has been prepared for, much less submitted to, the Board of Lords for approval.  And, there is not even a target date for submission.  It seems clear that the brakes have been applied to delay preparation of a revised Phase One Plan until after the November elections. 

What at one time was deemed urgent, now is just a candidate for greater aging, like a fine wine. Why would Supervisor Hudgins and Chairman Bulova want to delay this process—and one must assume that they are responsible since everyone else has reason to accelerate the process? 

For one, the train is actually coming, arriving in 2013 (say what you will about the Airports Authority, but they are the one player actually on schedule—building the line to Wiehle Avenue!).

 Secondly, all those directly involved in the Task Force work are tired of the delays and anxious to finish their work on Phase One. Developers, for example, salivate for the pot of gold awaiting them.  The wine will likely have a distinct vinegary taste beyond the developer community.

I imagine that Hudgins and Bulova are dreading the community upset they can expect when the actual Master Plan amendment comes up for public hearings and the populace fully realizes what the developer-driven process is about to give birth to.  Early on one can expect density numbers and consequent population, commuter and traffic projections to emerge. 

To date, I don’t believe many Restonians have followed the master plan process very closely.  When they see the results in what’s left of community media, they may be surprised to learn that Reston’s population, just as a result of Phase One planning, will more than double. 

They will also learn that with the arrival of Metro at Wiehle Avenue (the end of the line until 2017) and almost none of the essential transportation infrastructure in place to handle the huge increase in traffic caused by commuters coming to the new station and new commercial and residential development sprouting around the station, the term congestion will have a whole new meaning in Reston.  Current plans call for new infrastructure beginning around 2035.

Politicians just don’t like voters to be troubled with a lot of bad news before the elections, particularly if the news appears to be driven by bad public policy or incompetence.  Since re-election is the pols’ No. 1  concern in life, one can understand their motivation for avoiding bad news.  However, with Hudgins facing no opposition (a scary thought in itself!) and Bulova facing only token opposition, you gotta wonder! 

 Those watching the Task Force closely are already objecting to recommendations that, as they stand, are disappointing in major ways.  The citizens group Reston 2020 (see www.reston2020.blogspot.com ) sharply criticizes proposed excessive density, particularly in the Town Center and Wiehle Avenue areas; the lack of adequate internal connectivity and external transportation links at all three station areas; the dearth of adequate or creative open space at Reston Town Center; and, the excessive commercial to residential development ratios which portend much greater traffic congestion.  Personally, I would add that the proposals generally reflect a disappointing, lack of imagination which is inconsistent with Reston tradition.

One Task Force member who has tried repeatedly to get the group to address shortcomings in subcommittee drafts is John Carter.  John knows what he is talking about.  He has directed community planning for neighboring Montgomery County for many years and knows a great deal about planning around new Metro stations, for example. 

He recently repeated a warning he has sounded many times for a year or more:  overall, the densities being suggested are too high, in some cases way too high; the ratio of commercial to residential and retail development is way too high and should be reduced; and, the county should assign densities to assure that developers do not build further away from stations first.  To date, there is little sign that Task Force leadership or county staff is paying much attention to his well-founded suggestions.

 A couple of months ago, this column included residents’ suggestions intended to improve the quality and the efficiency of Phase Two, planning for the village centers and other areas of Reston not in the rail corridor.  A central recommendation was that the Task Force be reconstituted to be more representative of the community.  That is, it should include resident, cluster association, local business and landowner representation from the village center areas.  The rail corridor commercial developers so influential in Phase One are no longer needed. 

While organizing Phase Two is not as urgent as I had originally thought, it remains vital to our future.  Scrapping the Phase One organization and process is a good place to start contributing to that future.

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