Unsolved Mystery: Where Have All the Cars Gone?

The new five-story garage at the West Falls Church Metro Station can now be seen rising above the trees behind the George Mason High School football field. But with construction well underway, what has happened to all the cars that the construction was supposed to displace onto neighborhood streets?

The mystery has Metro and City of Falls Church Officials puzzled.

Despite the delay starting the project, Metro officials say that the construction is going well. “We’re basically on schedule,” Bob Gagne, project director for the garage construction told the News-Press this week.

Gagne said they are expecting to open the garage by early winter, although he admits that signs outside the construction site say it will be opening in the fall. He said that the discrepancy is due to a small delay getting the elevators for the garage and that everything else is proceeding as scheduled.

West Falls Church is one of the few major stations without already a significant allotment of parking spaces, and a concern about insufficient parking ultimately led to the new construction of the 900 space project.

While the garage promises expansive new parking capacity, during its construction, metro had to eliminate 360 existing parking spaces. WMATA did manage to keep some parking around the construction area, as well as metered parking on the street and the small “Kiss-and-Ride” area in front of the station. Still, the construction has caused a significant, though temporary, decline in the capacity of the already overflowing station to handle commuter parking.

In order to deal with the displaced commuters, WMATA leased two satellite parking lots in Falls Church, one at the intersection of Shreve Road and Broad Street and the other on the 700 block on Broad Street. The plan was for commuters to park at the two lots and be ferried to and from the metro station by shuttle buses

Although leased by Metro, the parking lots are privately owned, and in order to park at the satellite lots, commuters have to reserve a space, which then becomes their parking spot for the duration of their subscription.

A lot of time and money was involved in arranging for the satellite parking. Because of public resistance to building the new lots in the City, it was required that the lot built on Broad Street conform to specific standards, including a single entrance requirement, non-intrusive lighting, and extensive landscaping, that mandated 44% of the area to be covered by green.

The requirements caused delays starting the garage project, reduced the lot’s parking capacity, and led to expenses for the Young Group, the project developer.

But rather than solving the parking problem for displaced commuters, the satellite parking lots have not caught on. On an average weekday Gagne said that the lots only serve around 60 drivers.

After all the trouble that went into providing the parking Gagne expected the lots to be more popular. “I don’t know what happened to the three hundred other people that were parking [in the former lots],” he said.

While the lots remain largely unused, the City hasn’t heard of any problems with people parking elsewhere either. The specter of lines of cars parked throughout the city on residential streets has not happened the way that many people envisioned.

City Manager Wyatt Shields admits that the lack of parking problems, “is just a little bit mysterious,”

The local concern about the displaced parking was that commuters parking along residential streets and then walking to the Metro would increase traffic along the small roads and make them less safe for residents.

As part of a preemptive action against that possibility the City put up signs regulating the parking in the area, threatening illegally parked cars with tickets and towing.

Shields pointed out that after all the talk, the parking hasn’t turned out to be an issue. “We haven’t had any such complaints,” Shields said.

Neither have Metro officials heard of any difficulties so far about the reduced parking capacity. Gagne was pleased about the lack of problems so far. “Maybe they’re going to Dunn Loring, maybe they’re driving into work, I don’t know, but we haven’t heard any complaints.”

Shields talked about some reasons why he thinks the satellite parking spots aren’t being used. “Perhaps it was just too much of a hassle,” said Shields. Shields guessed that the inconvenience of reserving a parking spot and then catching a shuttle was just a bit much for many commuters.

Shields also noted the Falls Church bus system, George, that provides transportation within the city and a way to get to the station without taking a car, could be accounting for the lack of parking problems.

Shields pointed to an increase in George’s ridership since the construction started, from 220 a day in Septembers of 2003, before the project began, to 300 a day in April of 2004, during the construction.

While the numbers indicate a higher usage of the system, Shields said that the increase isn’t necessarily related to the parking situation. He pointed out that the summer numbers were generally higher. He figured that people are more willing to stand outside waiting for buses when the weather was warmer.

On a Thursday afternoon Metro commuters shared with the News-Press some of their own experiences with the change in parking capacity.

Some riders said they have come up with strategies for their commute, including arriving earlier to find open spots along the street or coming later in order to park in the mid-day parking by the “Kiss-and-Ride.”

Others said they have taken steps to avoid having to park. One rider talked about how he has adapted. “I will usually get a ride from my wife,” he said. “I stopped driving to the Metro because the construction’s started and it’s limited the number of spaces,” he said.

Another possibility, as Gagne mentioned, is that more commuters could be driving into work rather than taking the train, resulting in a downturn in the amount of commuters using the station.

Shields said that even with a possibly decreased ridership, Metro still manages to keep its trains full, sometimes too full. “I think the Metro system is pretty much maxed out,” he said.

Metro has recently been asking for more money to expand its trains from six cars to eight cars, in order to handle to growing demand from commuters.

Shields said that while fewer people may be driving to the Metro station at this time, he is pretty sure the drivers will return when the parking becomes available.

“I feel pretty confident that the parking garage will be filled when it opens, people will go wherever the parking is,” he said.