Development is On a Roll in Falls Church & There's No End in Sight

Up until as recently as a year ago, it's something few would have bet on reading on the front page of the News-Press: Development is on a roll in the City of Falls Church, and there's no end in sight. Known for decades as the bane of developers, viewed by them as the biggest black hole in the region, Falls Church is now not only on the radar screen of developers throughout the Washington, D.C., metro area, but is becoming very "in."

A recent Washington Business Journal article listed Falls Church among the region's hottest locations for action in the development field, and last week's approval of a special exception permitting Atlantic Realty to put a major mixed-use project on the City's largest single parcel of virtually undeveloped land, the 4.7-acre Diener Tract on S. Maple St., is only the latest proof of that the trend is for real.

Not only has much already happened, but much is in the pipeline while visionaries project still more. What's happened in the last 10 months alone is dizzying.

Let's review. On Sept. 10, 2001 the Falls Church City Council gave its final approval to a major new structure in the City since the George Mason Square building was approved in the mid-1980s as a minimalist alternative to a rejected First Virginia Bank proposal for 14-story building at the intersection of Washington and Broad.

That primed the pump even if it was to be another two years before a second project got approved. The Broadway was given the OK for construction on a blighted block that had been known as the "Ad Com site" ever since the closing of the Ad Com store there in early 1991 left the parcel as a vacant eyesore for over a decade.

The Broadway, whose completion this spring was marked by an opulent party for the City's elites hosted by developer Jan Zachariasse, is now operational with all 80 residential condominiums sold and most of its 12,900 square feet of retail either occupied by Hollywood Video or near ready to be so (a restaurant will open there next month).

Still, for two years, little more happened, at least outwardly. Inwardly, the City had some housecleaning matters to attend to. A proposal by the KSI Group to build a huge and dense residential facility for rentals on the Diener tract was rejected. The City's attention was drawn away in the fall of 2002 to an anti-development referendum that proposed to severely restrict mixed-use development. But it led to a major citizen mobilization to ensure its defeat and the outcome, an overwhelming rejection of the measure, helped identify the public support for pushing ahead. The outcome became a clarion call to push ahead.

Then, the City learned how to negotiate more effectively to win much more out of developers in the form of proffer requests, including a recommended flat rate of $5,172 per residential unit contribution to the City's school construction fund. It was much more demanding than what it sought earlier from The Broadway, when naivete almost got the City in hot water. By asking Zachariasse to create an escrow fund that would pay out $15,000 per school-aged child residing in the new project, the City opened itself up to criticism that it was inadvertently incentivizing the developer to discourage families from moving in. When that became evident, the policy was swiftly revised.

The City also retained consultants and moved to develop its own economic model for evaluating the fiscal and financial impact of development options of various kinds. With this powerful instrument, the City staff could assess what types of uses would yield the "highest and best use" in terms of net new tax revenues to the City. This produced some big surprises, including the revelation that an all-commercial office building does not bring a net tax yield nearly as high as a well-designed mixed-use project.

The City was then ready for the development ball to start rolling again. Washington, D.C., developer Ed Novak bought the property where a Red Lobster sat for many moons. He used his personal charms and willingness to step up to meet suddenly-stiffer City requests for proffers to gain approval of The Byron, a mixed-use project with 90 residential condominiums and 18,422 square feet of retail and office space.

While some developers were not happy that Novak acceded to the City's proffer request (the IDI group, which followed the KSI proposal with another mixed-use plan for the Diener Tract, walked away when it learned of the proffer expectations), he set a precedent that most since have been willing to meet without complaint.

Finally, on October 14, 2003, over two years after The Broadway was approved, The Byron became the second major mixed-use plan to get a formal OK. Novak demolished the old Red Lobster building, and hopes to break ground next month.

But just 10 months since then, much more has happened, much more, including the following:

• The approval of The Pavilion, an Akridge project that will be developed by Zachariasse, calling for 187 residential condominiums on eight stories and 28,800 square feet of retail. It will go in adjacent the Panera Bread building in the 400 block of West Broad and will include a park plaza on its front. It promises, when completed with The Byron across the street at The Broadway a block down, to transform the "Village Section" of West Broad into an energetic, pedestrian-friendly enclave with 357 new upscale dwelling units and 60,000 square feet of restaurants, retail stores and offices.

• Voters approved and construction was begun on a new middle school in Falls Church that is due for occupancy in September 2005 with, in addition to sorely needed classrooms, a first-rate gymnasium facility that makes the City a player in pursuit of regional basketball, volleyball, wrestling and other tournaments. The City's bond rating was elevated in pursuit of $25 million in bonding for the project and a creative partnership with the business community was developed that allowed Moore Cadillac to contribute to the addition of lights to the high school football field in time for this fall's season in exchange for naming rights to the field. All these are unprecedented new developments for Falls Church.

• The approval last week of the Atlantic Realty project on S. Maple, with 230 residential condominiums and 100,400 square feet of retail and office, including a Class A office building that will enable a growing City business, Tax Analysts, to remain in the City with its over 200 employees. The project includes a public plaza with public art and an arts center available to the City at a steeply-discounted cost. The project, according to City manager Dan McKeever, will not produce a net annual tax yield of more than $1 million to the City, but comes with $4 million in proffers and the promise of igniting a development renaissance in the blighted S. Washington Street corridor that it abuts.

• The steady accumulation of commercially-zoned City land by McLean developer Bob Young of the Young Group, who has plans on the drawing board for fresh developments on at least three sites so far, including one on S. Washington. Young has already purchased and thoroughly refurbished two office buildings in the City, at 450 W. Broad and 105. N. Virginia Ave. He will collaborate with The Pavilion's developers to link his 450 W Broad building to that project. Young has assumed the role of a civic leader in the City, a generous contributor to a variety of City-based causes, on the board of directors of the Greater Falls Church Chamber of Commerce, and chairman of the board of the City's new Falls Church Education Foundation.

• The Falls Church Housing Corporation's progress toward construction of a five-story senior rental housing structure on West Broad. A work session of the City Council and Planning Commission this week produced favorable responses to the plan from all present from both bodies. The building would include 60 to 70 units and office space on the ground floor. A determined effort by the FCHC to design a building that would maximize the percentage of the land in question retained for parkland use has helped to win favor for the project, which faces a tight set of deadlines to qualify for federal funds by early next year. Still, this represents an historic first step ever toward addressing the City's "affordable housing" needs with new construction.

• While successfully deflecting plans for a single-pad CVS store on the site, the City Council did not react favorably this spring to plans for a dense mixed use project on the site of the now-idle Pearson's Funeral Home on North Washington Street. Still, plans for the site are being revised with an aim to move ahead. As Silverwood Homes has commenced with construction of the large-scale mixed use project, The Westlee, a few feet beyond the Falls Church city limits on N. Washington, the northern "gateway" to Falls Church on Lee Highway (N. Washington) has become a prime developer target for a major makeover driven by its location, which includes proximity to both Interstate 66 and the East Falls Church Metro.

• The City's awarding of "master developer" standing to the Akridge Company for the redevelopment of a four-block quadrant of downtown Falls Church into a new City Center, replete with a town center, commercial and residential development and structured parking. Intense negotiations between City staff members and Akridge personnel continue, with plans to begin unveiling the parameters of the project to the public for review by the middle of September. The project will cover the areas between Park Avenue on the north and Annandale Road on the south, and Maple on the West and Washington Street on the east. According to McKeever, the first stages could be constructed and open for business within three years, and the later stages may take up to 10 years. McKeever, in an interview with the News-Press this week, said he doesn't expect any building to rise above eight stories and the project "will not harm the long-term identity of the City." He said the City acting as a key player will ensure that the project "maintains the atmosphere the community agreed to create" in its downtown during deliberations with the Street Works consultants in 2000. "It will be a lively, very public space," he said.

All this in just the last 10 months.

It's premature to even guess what the City Center redevelopment will yield the City in terms of new annual tax revenue. But the already-approved four projects can be expected to yield when completed new tax yields of up to $3.5 million annually. That represents relief to the City's existing real estate taxpayers of about 20 cents on their tax rate. With the tax rate at $1.08 (per $100 assessed valuation), that much relief amounts to 18.5% of each real estate taxpayer's total annual bill. The City Center could conceivably produce a similar chunk of additional relief, as well.

But as if this isn't enough to keep Falls Church busy for years to come, there's still more on the horizon. McKeever told the News-Press that, from a developer point of view, the biggest plum of all might be the in the City's West End, specifically the so-called "Gordon Road Triangle" bounded by Gordon Road, Shreve Road and West Broad. But McKeever suggested it could come in on the southwest side of Broad as far as the W&OD Trail. Still, he suggested, that trail would be an effective buffer against the surrounding residential areas of the City. "As the prospect of rail to Dulles comes closer to reality, preceded by rapid bus service, that location adjacent the West Falls Church Metro station will become prime for development," he said. "What could be more desirable than living where you could jump on a train to Dulles and take off for anywhere in the world?"