Falls Church’s Assistant City Manager Cindy Mester will be on an urgent conference call with WMATA officials and her counterparts in Arlington and Fairfax Friday in an effort to mitigate the impact on neighborhoods in the City of Falls Church of WMATA’s plans, announced less than two weeks ago, to close the parking lots at the East and West Falls Church Metro stations months ahead of the closing of the stations for platform repairs over the summer.
Mester told the News-Press that the sudden news has thrown officials in the City, plus Arlington and Fairfax, into a tizzy as it was announced without regard for any planning for its consequences on neighborhoods near the stations that may be flooded with desperate Metro users looking for places to park on the streets. The parking will shut down on March 15, only leaving the drop-off “Kiss and Ride” open at the East Falls Church station and a loss of 400 parking spots, and at the West Falls Church station, where only 50 percent of spaces will remain open while one of the two platforms there will be rehabbed for a time this summer.
The closings will be due to the need to use the lot for the staging of the repair efforts. Also the West F.C. station is set to be the central staging location for all the Orange Line work, including the Dunn Loring station, further disrupting the situation there.
Mester said an emergency email from her to WMATA officials resulted in the plan for a conference call Friday. She said she offered some alternative solutions in her email.
