As locals eat their lunch, all eyes are on the skies. Snow — likely heavy snow — is about to start falling in Arlington.
County and state crews say they’re ready to tackle what’s expected to be a messy mix of precipitation throughout the day: snow to start, freezing rain as the sun sets, and then plain rain as temperatures warm after nightfall, before perhaps a brief changeover back to soggy snow in the early morning hours.
A group of Virginia Square and Ballston residents are looking to get a dog park established in their neighborhood.
The neighbors want a fenced-in area for their pets to play off-leash at Quincy Park and are eyeing some sparsely-used green space near the sand volleyball court, says organizer Lori Meyers.
Nearly 40 years later, Rosslyn’s Gateway Park may finally officially become Arlington County’s responsibility.
This weekend, the County Board is set to vote on approving a land use permit between the Virginia Department of Transportation and the county formally allowing Arlington the use of Gateway Park. The agreement also pushes the responsibility of maintaining the park to the county.
This year saw major changes to how Arlington County and Arlington Public Schools run community swim classes, to the surprise of some locals.
In July, Arlington Public Schools launched the APS Aquatics School for students and residents, while the county opened the Long Bridge Aquatics & Fitness Center in August.
The Arlington County Fair will be returning to Thomas Jefferson Community Center and grounds in 2022, the county parks department tells ARLnow.
The decision comes after the Arlington County Fair Board deliberated a change of scenery for the event for more than a year. Thomas Jefferson’s fields and community center space at 3501 2nd Street S. has been home to the fair for 45 years.
Arlington’s parks department is identifying tennis and basketball courts that could also accommodate the increasingly popular sport of pickleball.
The department is surveying residents to gauge court usage and the need for pickleball courts, and see where they think pickleball lines can be added. The Department of Parks and Recreation currently maintains 18 multi-use courts that allow pickleball and 1 single-use pickleball court.
The board of the Arlington County Fair has its sights set on moving the annual event to Long Bridge Park.
But many residents who’ve weighed in say they’d rather see it stay at the Thomas Jefferson Community Center and grounds.
Dropping nearly 40 feet from a platform above, a climber cut the ribbon on the “finest ropes course in the Mid-Atlantic.”
Located at Upton Hill Regional Park on Wilson Blvd in Arlington, Climb UPton was formally opened this morning at a ribbon cutting ceremony attended by local officials as well as those from the Northern Virginia Regional Park Authority which operates the course.
Arlington officials are asking residents to keep an eye on the Bon Air Rose Garden in Bluemont after a brazen bush burglary.
“Last Thursday, about a dozen rose bushes were removed from Bon Air Rose Garden,” Susan Kalish, the Public Relations Director for the Dept. of Parks and Recreation, told neighborhood leaders in an email yesterday. “It’s sad enough when someone cuts a bloom or two, but this act of vandalism is very disheartening.”
(Updated at 4:15 p.m.) A local park with a popular playground keeps getting vandalized, this time with obscene language and drawings.
As of this article’s publication Rocky Run Park, along N. Barton Street in the Courthouse area, has graffiti featuring anti-police slogans and crude drawings of male genitalia. It’s been there, near the soccer field, since at least Friday.
Two years since Henry Clay Park in Lyon Park closed for renovations, the since-renamed Zitkala-Ša Park is on the verge of reopening.
Arlington’s Dept. of Parks and Recreation is aiming to open the park by Friday, more than a year after its initial target reopening date. That will be a relief for neighbors, who have been peppering ARLnow with emails asking when it will finally open back up.
Three Arlington County parks — Thomas Jefferson Park, Towers Park and Marcey Road Park — could see substantial upgrades over the next year.
Contracts to improve the amenities at these three facilities are teed up for County Board approval this Saturday. The projects were all approved in the summer of 2018 as part of the 2019-2028 Capital Improvement Plan.
