F.C. Planners Give Surprise Unanimous OK for 3rd Large-Scale Mixed Use Project

The project, known as The Pavilion, now needs only a final approval from the Falls Church City Council this Monday night to move ahead. The Council voted, 5-2, in favor of a preliminary approval last month, and appears certain to OK it Monday.

"We're very pleased at the unanimous vote," Chris Ciliberti of the Akridge Group, developers of the project, told the News-Press in a telephone interview yesterday. "It sends a positive message to both the City Council and the community."

"What we have is a superior project made even better by the hard work and thoughtful insights provided by the Planning Commissioners, which we've adopted into our plans," added Joe Svatos of Akridge.

The Pavilion will consist of 191 condominium units, including eight affordable dwelling units, along with 32,000 square feet of office space and 29,800 square feet of ground floor retail on 2.7 acres. It's centerpiece will be a horseshoe drive around a small park and fountain that will feature on-street parallel parking and wide sidewalks to accommodate outdoor dining. It will resemble a similar project in Clarendon.

The project will tie into the existing Panera Bread building, which will expand its office component.

Together with the already-approved The Broadway, nearing completion in the 500 block of West Broad, and The Byron, approved for construction at the site of the Red Lobster Restaurant, The Pavilion will bring the total of new condominium units to be built in a two-block area of West Broad to 361 and the total square feet of new office and retail space to 92,300.

As Jan Zachariasse of the Waterford Group, builders of The Broadway and collaborators with Akridge on The Pavilion, told the City Council last month, the three projects together constitute a "critical mass" for downtown Falls Church that will capture the attention of regional and national development and retail firms. It will help ensure that Falls Church will not only enjoy a prosperous tax yield from these developments to relieve the burden on existing residential real estate taxpayers, but will also benefit from a unique "pedestrian friendly" downtown ambiance that will be centered around a new City Center that is now in the works.

Pending the City Council's expected approval this Monday, the project's site plan will be ready for submission within a month, and the first shovel should go into the ground this summer. Once under construction, the project will take 18 to 22 months to complete, said Svatos.

The project is expected to bring in almost $1 million annually in net new tax yield to the City coffers, and comes with almost $3 million in up-front proffers of cash and services to the City.

The Planning Commission's OK Monday was for both a zoning change and a special exception to allow a height extension to 85 feet. The zoning change motion passed 7-0 and the special exception 7-1. The final resolution to OK the overall package was 7-0.