Maybe it’s the lousy weather keeping everyone glued to their phones and computers. Maybe it’s people tiring of the endless stream of national political news. Or maybe there’s just been a lot going on locally.

Whatever the explanation, ARLnow has officially set a new 30-day web traffic record.

From Jan. 14-Feb. 12, a timeframe that includes a federal holiday, ARLnow recorded 1.453 million pageviews, breaking the old record of 1.43 million pageviews, set in 2016. While not a record, ARLnow also served just over 400,000 unique visitors over the past 30 days.

ARLnow’s sister sites also posted strong numbers during that time frame, according to Google Analytics:

• ALXnow, which launched this past fall, exceeded 150,000 pageviews and 55,000 unique visitors for the first time
• Reston Now exceeded 250,000 pageviews and 100,000 unique visitors
• Tysons Reporter exceeded 225,000 pageviews and 100,000 unique visitors
• In total, our owned-and-operated sites served 2.1 million pageviews and 660,000 unique visitors

Our partner site PoPville, meanwhile, recorded 2.26 million pageviews and more than 375,000 unique visitors. ARLnow’s parent company hosts and provides business services to both PoPville and RunWashington.com.

Network-wide, Local News Now sites served 4.4 million pageviews and — for the first time — just over 1 million unique visitors.

ARLnow and our sister and partner sites provide original journalism and other local content to the community thanks to the support of our local advertisers. For more information about growing your business via ARLnow — or our other sites — see our advertising information page.

On Jan. 29, 2010, ARLnow.com launched with an inauspicious post that basically no one except the family and friends of the site’s owner read. It was followed by a post about 2-4 inches of snow in the forecast.

Ten years later, despite major challenges in the local news biz, this site is still around. A quarter million people read it each month. We have a dedicated, full-time team; a newly-formed alumni group; a long list of fantastic advertising clients (thank you for supporting local journalism!); and an office in a Ballston high-rise complete with a mini fridge stocked with Diet Coke and a granola bar drawer.

Yes, we’ve come a long way in the past 10 years. And we’re looking forward to the next 10.

To celebrate, ARLnow is pleased to invite everyone who lives or works in Arlington, or just is a fan of the site, to join us at Bronson Bierhall (4100 Fairfax Drive) on Wednesday, Jan. 29 from 5-7 p.m. for a free happy hour event.

We’ll have local beer flights and a special Arlington cocktail available for purchase, local movers and shakers, and the entire ARLnow team on hand. Meet your neighbors, local notables, and maybe even an ARLnow commenter or two. Also: we’ll have 10th Anniversary cups for the first 100 people to arrive.

Please RSVP via Facebook so we can better estimate a guest count. See you there!

On his last day on the job, we sat down with outgoing ARLnow managing editor Alex Koma to talk about Arlington, Amazon, ARLnow, our new editor Airey, and a bunch of other topics that don’t start with the letter “A.”

Alex is now reporting on real estate development at the Rosslyn-based Washington Business Journal, but you can hear from him on this week’s 26 Square Miles podcast. For more about his new employer, check out last week’s episode with WBJ Editor-in-Chief Doug Fruehling.

Listen below or subscribe to the podcast on iTunes, Google Play, Stitcher or TuneIn. We used some new recording equipment this go-round, so please forgive the resulting audio glitches — we’ll try to get them ironed out prior to the next episode.

As you might have seen, our managing editor Alex Koma is decamping for the Washington Business Journal. On Tuesday, we’ll toast his accomplishments and you’re invited to join.

Alex’s goodbye party is being held Tuesday, March 12, from 4:30-6:30 p.m. at Ireland’s Four Courts in Courthouse. It will double as a welcome party for ARLnow’s new managing editor, Airey.

Readers are invited to join us in the front bar area of Four Courts — look for the ARLnow sign — for this informal event. (You’re on your own for drinks and food.)

See you then!

You might’ve noticed a new byline popping up here at ARLnow this week, and that’s because we have some big changes on the way.

Give a hearty Arlington welcome to Julia Airey, who is stepping in as the site’s lead reporter and editor. After roughly a year with ARLnow, Alex Koma is moving on to become a staff reporter with the Washington Business Journal.

Airey, who normally goes by her last name, comes to ARLnow fresh off a stint as the metro reporter over at the Washington Times.

She got her degree at a college in the Netherlands in 2015, then proceeded to work a series of odd jobs out of school — she says those range from time working in a library to becoming a legal researcher.

Airey started her journalism career as a stringer for the Sentinel and Enterprise newspaper in Fitchburg, Massachusetts. She moved to the area to take a job as a staff writer covering technology for Technical.ly DC in 2016.

When she’s not busy chasing down stories, Airey says she enjoys woodworking and spending time with all dogs. She also serves as the co-captain of the Journalism and Women Symposium’s D.C. chapter and describes herself as “a big wonk.”

If you spot her out around the county, be sure to ask Airey about the time she was “shanghai’d into an antique sailing race.”

As for Koma, he won’t be leaving Arlington, and he says he’ll miss all of ARLnow’s staff tremendously.

ARLnow has hired a new full-time reporter.

Alex Koma joins ARLnow from Inside NoVa, where he covered Prince William County as a multimedia reporter.

Koma is originally from Pittsburgh, Pa. He graduated from Virginia Tech in 2014 with a communications and media studies bachelor’s degree.

Before joining Inside NoVa, Koma worked as a staff reporter for Scoop News Group and NBC29’s night producer in Charlottesville. He also earned a first place award in general news writing from the Virginia Press Association in 2017.

His first day at ARLnow was yesterday (April 23), so readers may have already caught his byline this morning.

With the new addition to the ARLnow team, the hyperlocal news company is one step closer to a premium newsletter initiative that it hopes to roll out this year.