Bacon's Rebellion

Democracy Thrives in Sunlight

The Dulles South Controversy Heats Up

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James A. Bacon
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If anyone thought that analyzing the traffic impact of local zoning and planning decisions would lead to more rational land use patterns, it’s time to reconsider. The Kaine administration’s pilot project — using VDOT traffic analysis to inform the land-use debate in fast-growing Loudoun County — took less than a week to become totally politicized. Traffic analysis, it seems, will become just one more tool that political interests use to batter one another.

In a letter last week, the Virginia Department of Transportation criticized a planning proposal to permit 28,000 housing units in the Dulles South district of Loudoun County, up from 5,000 previously allowed. VDOT’s “preliminary analysis” indicated that the development in the South Dulles district of the county would overwhelm the local transportation infrastructure, creating gridlock for miles around. (See “Batteries Not Included.”)

According to Leesburg2Day, Loudoun supervisors responded by describing the letter as a “distortion” and a political ploy by the Kaine administration to make the case for tax increases. Setting aside the rhetoric, VDOT critics leveled two substantive charges during a Board of Supervisors meeting. First:

It was unclear whether VDOT’s study showed that the impacts described in [the] letter would be caused specifically by new homes in the Dulles area or anticipated growth in general. In addition, [VDOT official Dennis] Morrison said a baseline study was not performed to compare the proposed new homes’ impact with a less dense option.

Translation: People gotta live somewhere. If you put those 28,000 households somewhere else, they’re still going to generate traffic congestion. And second: VDOT did not factor in the roads that developers were offering to build as part of their rezoning applications.

“Interestingly enough, they did not take into consideration our network plan, which we believe is the right way to do this,” [Dulles district Supervisor Stephen] Snow said, referring to a package of roads being proffered by several developers. “The didn’t take that into account.”

Translation: Dulles South developers are planning hundreds of millions of dollars worth of transportation improvements as proffers and other contributions.

I’m sure that the Piedmont Environmental Council and other opponents will offer responses to the responses. I’ll do my best to keep up.

Dulles South is shaping up as the hottest zoning/planning controversy in Virginia since the 80s-era controversies over the Manassas Battlefield and the Disney theme park at Haymarket. Watch the sparks fly! I’ll be taking a detailed look at Dulles South in next week’s edition of the Bacon’s Rebellion e-zine.

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11 responses to “The Dulles South Controversy Heats Up”

  1. Ray Hyde Avatar
    Ray Hyde

    “Traffic analysis, it seems, will become just one more tool that political interests use to batter one another.”

    I think I have predicted that would happen in previous posts.

    Unless the traffic analysis models are fully exposed, tested, and verified, and open to neutral third party analysis and interpretation they will be nothing but another political tool.

    They will also need to be subject to continuous improvement, if we ever get the data needed to perform validation studies.

  2. Anonymous Avatar
    Anonymous

    Science is ever the handmaiden of commerce. If Machiavelli or somebody equally wise didn’t say that, I’ll claim it now.

    My reaction on reading that 28,000 new homes would produce gridlock was, well, duh. But if VDOT based its analysis on existing roads and ignored the planned upgrades, then they should be ashamed.

  3. Toomanytaxes Avatar
    Toomanytaxes

    10:51 – Yes and No. Clearly, VDOT’s analysis should include all pertinent facts, including additional transportation facilities that will actually exist when the new development occurs. It would be inaccurate and unfair for an analysis based on the existence of a two-lane road if, in fact, there would be a four-lane road by the time the new residential or commercial construction were completed.

    However, the key to my example is whether or not the four-lane road has been completed by the time the real estate development occurs. If adding the new development to a two-lane access road would create traffic gridlock, the requested rezoning should not be granted unless and until there are provisions in place to ensure the road upgrades are completed.

    Planning road improvements and even their approval by the CTB does not constitute road improvements, At least in Fairfax County, we often see zoning requests that are based on the listing of road improvements in a plan or registry of desired construction. That is not accceptable.

    Things could be better than they are were some basic fairness and honesty interjected into the process. It’s unfair and dishonest to evaluate a developer’s proposal based on obsolete data about infrastructure. It’s unfair and dishonest to approve a development based on “planned” road improvements that are not likely to be made. It seems that quite a few people, on all sides of the issues, have a vested interest in maintaining an unfair and dishonest policy because it can often be manipulated.

  4. Virginia Centrist Avatar
    Virginia Centrist

    Jim,

    You know so much about Northern Virginia, I sometimes forget you don’t live up here!

  5. Jim Bacon Avatar
    Jim Bacon

    Virginia Centrist: If my wife had her way, we probably would move to Northern Virginia!

  6. Tobias Jodter Avatar
    Tobias Jodter

    Sparks did indeed fly!

    All I can say is if they can build this kind of development and it improves traffic it will be a first. I’ve seen all kinds of roads built here in NOVA – Fairfax County Parkway, Prince William County Parkway, all kinds of road improvements/widening – Waxpool, Route 7, Route 66, Shirley Gate, Union Mills, New Braddock, interchanges up and down Route 28, etc… I could go on and on. But traffic is getting worse not better.

    My major beef with the Dulles South planning is that we need the road improvements now just to keep up with the developments of the past 4 years. Forget about the future development.

  7. Tobias Jodter Avatar
    Tobias Jodter

    If adding the new development to a two-lane access road would create traffic gridlock, the requested rezoning should not be granted unless and until there are provisions in place to ensure the road upgrades are completed.

    Amen to that. An excellent example is Rt. 606 around the airport. I used to hop onto 606 off of 50 and it was a quick drive around over to 28 – a nice bucolic 1 lane road past goat farms. After the Greenway cuts through a few business developments appear between 50 and the Greenway. Then a few more. Traffic still ok. Then Brambleton and Loudoun Valley Estates off of Evergreen Mills start happening. Then South Riding, Stonegate off of 50 continue to grow. One day I discover the goat farm is gone and in its place a single family home development goes in – right beside a business park and across the road from the airport. Then a few more business parks go in. Traffic congestion is starting to occur. Any road improvements yet? NONE.

    Ok, finally improvements at 606/50 and road widening to Evergreen Mills occur. Wow – 1/2 mile of widening. Then a few more business parks are developed – more single family homes squeezed in. Now a retail strip mall is nearly to completion between the single family homes (Loudoun Valley Estates II) and a business park. And right across from the single family home development they want to put a solid waste recycling facility that will “generate more than 1,700 daily trips from construction trucks and more than 300 daily trips from tractor trailers.”

    Meanwhile, traffic is backed up almost daily stop and go from 50 to the Greenway and NO NEW ROAD IMPROVEMENTS. It’s still 1 lane each way!!

    My work colleagues and I saw this traffic nightmare headed our way in 2003 and we are not planning experts. It’s clogging access to the airport and it’s hurting our business off of 606 because delivery drivers hate to come out to our facility (and refuse to during certain times of the day).

    As far as I know as of July 2006 there is no concrete plan for fixing 606. And I’m supposed to be happy about 28,000 more houses a few miles away? Yeehaw.

  8. Toomanytaxes Avatar
    Toomanytaxes

    Tobias Jodter – I’ve been told by a reasonably knowledgable source that, even with construction of the Silver Line through Tysons Corner, the additional traffic to be generated by the added density that could be constructed would by twice as much as what is proposed by the Loudoun County projects.

    When do we stop playing games in Virginia? Just how many pounds can we reasonably expect to stuff into a ten-pound sack? How much would the 20-pounds sacks cost and do we want to pay the price, especially since many of the items stuffed into the sacks won’t even belong to us?

  9. Tobias Jodter Avatar
    Tobias Jodter

    It’s all about growing the size of government. Even though everyone knows 606 is gridlocked, the building permits for the new businesses in the Dulles Trade Center’s off of 606 are being fast tracked and new businesses are opening every month bringing in even more traffic.

    And of course, the first visitor to the new buildings are revenue agents from Loudoun County making sure the business licenses are there and the taxes are going to be collected. The final occupancy permits aren’t even issued before the “revenuers” start snooping around the offices…

  10. Toomanytaxes Avatar
    Toomanytaxes

    TJ – I think that you have identified a structural problem with local government in Virginia. Local governments tend to expand at such rates that the elected officials of both political parties find themselves in a desparate attempt to increase cash flow, regardless of the the overall impact on taxpayers.

    I’ve seen Fairfax County officials support plans that raise state taxes on county citizens and return only cents on those dollars, simply because of the cents returned.

    One of the games played by local government officials is to blame “unfunded federal and state mandates.” It’s is true that both Congress and the General Assembly force local governments to perform tasks or offer services without providing the funding necessary to comply. However, the bamboozle factor in the equation is that, in many instances, local governments would have done the very same things required by the mandates or go well beyond a mandate’s specific requirements.

    For example, Fairfax Public Schools superintendent Jack Dale (an excellent superintendent, by the way) informed a public meeting that one of the chief causes of his budget request that greatly exceeded the combined increase in students and inflation was the federal No Child Left Behind Act. However, when pressed about specifics, Mr. Dale admitted that many of the “mandated activities” would have been included in his budget request, regardless of NCLB.

    Similarly, Fairfax School are required by both state and federal law to provide additional and costly services to students with special needs (Special Education). Yet, in a number of areas that are often the most expensive to provide services, FCPS’ standards for services go significantly beyond what is required by law.

    In both of these instances, it is fair to ask what are the mandated costs and what are the voluntary costs. Both bureaucrats and elected officials tend to want to keep the issue fuzzy to avoid scrutiny of the costs and the results produced by the additional spending.

    A reasonable argument can be made that, but for out-of-control spending, local officials would be less open to added development that is often opposed by their constituents.

  11. Ray Hyde Avatar
    Ray Hyde

    The final occupancy permits aren’t even issued before the “revenuers” start snooping around the offices…

    You’ve got that right. It matches my experience perfectly. You can’t get anything out of planning or inspection for months on end, but the revenuers show up right on schedule.

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