controversy

In the news business, this is known as a “process” story. On Saturday the county board voted to accept a task force’s plan for development around the East Falls Church Metro Station. The board passed the plan on to county staff, who will review it and make changes while preserving 15 priorities outlined by the board. The board’s action will have no actual, practical consequences. That will come when the final plan is adopted by the board about six months from now, following more revisions and public discussion.

For what was essentially a procedural action, however, there sure were plenty of people who wanted to talk about it. About 25 speakers voiced their opinion on the EFC plan, most of them residents who believe that the addition of transit-oriented, mixed use retail/office buildings and the subtraction of the commuter parking lot would “destroy” or otherwise sully their relatively quiet residential neighborhood.

The East Falls Church (EFC) development plan calls for the creation of a “transit town” of neighborhood-oriented retail and restaurants, six to nine-story mixed-use buildings, and pedestrian-oriented walkable and bike-able streetscapes. Development is inevitable, EFC task force chairman Mike Nardolilli says, since the station will soon become the transfer point to Tysons Corner and the Silver Line. Members of the task force spent three years working on the plan and says it mostly incorporates ideas that most residents welcome, based on a neighborhood survey.

But according to one man, supporters of the plan are “passive sheep,” the task force wants “to limit our freedom,” and the proposed narrowing of Sycamore Street is “idiotic.” That invective, and any other criticism of the plan, was greeted by loud applause from like-minded folks in the audience, who were clearly in the majority.