Measured Restraint is the Best Course
From The Alexandria Times, November 7, 2024
In October, the City Council approved the reconfiguration of King Street in front of Bradlee Shopping Center and the School Board voted to reconfigure the green space behind George Mason Elementary School (GMES) as part of the school’s renovation and expansion. These seemingly unrelated decisions resemble each other in significant ways.
The proposed changes to King Street restrict car traffic by enhancing other transit options. The city’s website says, “This portion of King Street was identified for multimodal improvements in the City's 2021 adopted Alexandria Mobility Plan and is a priority location to install enhanced bicycle facilities and additional sidewalks to complete gaps in the City's existing bicycle and sidewalk network. Safety improvements along this corridor will help the City reach the Vision Zero goal of eliminating all fatal and severe crashes.”
The King Street project has problems because Americans like cars and because the straight four lanes of King Street that run from North Quaker Lane to just north of Menokin Drive were originally laid out as an extended I-395 on- and off-ramp. This section of King Street is a relic of the pre-pandemic era of extensive commuter traffic to the District of Columbia. The car-centric environment is compounded by Bradlee’s retail attractions and expansive surface parking which are magnets for cars.
A citizens group from adjoining neighborhoods surveyed entrances to Bradlee over three high use hours. More than 400 vehicles entered each hour while no bicycles were observed. A road’s original design can make it resistant to the later addition of bike lanes and sidewalks. Accordingly, the multimodal improvements on this part of King Street may be of limited utility.
GMES’ renovation and expansion are necessary because of the school’s age, deferred maintenance, and the need for more elementary school capacity. ACPS feels pressure to move forward, in part because delay in expanding and modernizing GMES postpones the relief of overcrowding in other elementary schools.
GMES’ modernization involves goals that seem inconsistent: preserving the green space behind the school, limiting the new building’s height, and preserving GMES’ historic façade. A School Board member told me that a neighborhood concern is that GMES not be taller than its neighbor, Westminster Presbyterian Church. ACPS documents show that the “Open Heart” footprint option approved by the School Board reduces the existing public open space (327,760 square feet) by 9% (29,905 square feet). A planned and necessary fence behind the school will further reduce access to the green space.
A petition asking that “…any new school building and surrounding playground spaces should be built on the existing school site and NOT extend into the natural grass and green space of the beloved George Mason Park” attracted more than 500 signatures. A September 30, 2024, letter from the Park and Recreation Commission to the Mayor and City Council asks that a new school maintain, “…approximately the same square footage of natural grass fields that currently exist” and also reflects the position of the North Ridge Citizens Association.
School Board member and City Councilor-elect Abdel Elnoubi wrote in a message that ACPS and the Board, “…didn't explore all possible options to preserve as much green or open space as possible in a city where we have limited green and open space to begin with. We could have considered a 3-story design that removes the façade and moves the building closer to the street, or just a 3-story design and keep the façade. If losing the green space was the last resort, that would have been a different story, but this is not the case here, there were more options to be explored and engage the community on.”
Bike lanes, sidewalks, and play surface improvements are usually positive planning approaches. The common question for King Street and GMES is whether the unique elements and values in each situation should encourage city and school authorities to rethink what are proposed as improvements. The same question arose in the proposed changes to Taylor Run which were ultimately reconsidered.
In other words, are we reconfiguring King Street at Bradlee and reconfiguring the green space behind GMES because we can or because we should?
Progress is important, but such approaches should not be applied automatically. Sometimes, the better (and more difficult) course is one of measured restraint.
The writer is a former lawyer, member of the Alexandria School Board from 1997 to 2006, and English teacher from 2007 to 2021 at T.C. Williams High School, now Alexandria City High School. He can be reached at aboutalexandria@gmail.com and subscriptions to his newsletter are available free at https://aboutalexandria.substack.com.
Thanks, Mark, for asking the questions.
Alexandria officials’ plan to lessen car traffic while increasing pedestrian and bike access in the Bradlee section of King St. may be a noble goal but their vision to significantly alter the bustling area smacks of idealized thinking. Planned communities like Reston, Va. and Columbia, Md. embraced the concepts of town centers and less reliance on the automobile decades ago, but to the degree they succeeded it was because there were wide open spaces to work with from the beginning. A major obstacle facing transportation changes in older cities is that housing, retail, and connecting roads are as long established as the residents’ patterns are of using them. There are cities & towns throughout Europe and some in the U.S. with an ingrained culture of bicycle use, which is admirable for lots of reasons. Unfortunately, existing examples of Alexandria’s efforts at increasing “Multi-Modal” transportation already appear underutilized, so it’s unclear why officials are pushing forward with a project that will no doubt be disruptive and of questionable benefit to taxpayers. One gets the sense that city officials are like mad scientists in a lab concocting something they hope will work. This latest experiment seems like trying to put a square peg in a round hole.