Author: chogan@directresearch.com

changes

Edited 9/14/2018 to remove discussion of meetings prior to the 9/17/2019 Town Council meeting.

For the meeting on the August 20th, the text of the amendments is in red, here (.pdf).  This appears unchanged in the materials for the September 17 Town Council meeting.

Arguably the most important change was a proposal to set a limit on density (dwelling units per acre), with the possibilities shown here (.pdf).  As of now, in counting dwelling units, the Town proposes to make no distinctions among dwelling units, (e.g.) an efficiency apartment and a four-story 3200 square foot townhouse each count as one dwelling unit. Continue reading changes

A vision of Maple Avenue, 8/9/2018

Picture this:

It’s Saturday afternoon on a beautiful, crisp fall day.  You’re at the Mosaic District, standing across the street from that lovely little Strawberry Lane park — where Angelica movie theater is.  You could take in a movie, buy some high-end apparel, eat in any of 20 different restaurants, get some organic groceries — you name it.  There’s a beautiful glass-fronted piece of modern architecture in front of you.  And a little park, where people are just hanging out and enjoying the day — families with young kids, maybe a group tossing a frisbee, a skateboarder or two, the obligatory hipsters, some older couples out getting dinner, maybe some people eating take-out in the sunshine or sipping a smoothie.

And as you stand across the street from that, you take all of that in and say, yeah, that’s nice.  That’s exactly the vibe I want to see in Vienna.

And translating that vibe to Maple Avenue is simple. Continue reading A vision of Maple Avenue, 8/9/2018

Planning Commission Meeting 8/8/2018 – Review

The Town of Vienna Planning Commission met 8/8/2018 to discuss, among other things, some potential changes to MAC regulations.  There were perhaps 20 citizens in attendance, and maybe 8 people got up to speak.  My overall take is that MAC zoning will proceed as business-as-usual, with minor changes.

For me, the absolute low point of the evening was when a Commissioner (who shall remain nameless) called out the citizens for spreading false information — and then proceeded to spread false information. Continue reading Planning Commission Meeting 8/8/2018 – Review

Meeting

The revised proposal for 444 Maple West/Tequila Grande will be discussed in a Town Council work session Thursday October 4, 7:30 PM, in Vienna Town Hall.

Link to materials describing the revised proposal is here.

Link to my analysis of the changes is here.

Looking forward, the Town Council will probably vote on this revised 444 Maple West proposal at the Monday October 29 Town Council meeting.

Planning Commission Meeting Wednesday August 8, 2018

The Vienna Planning Commission will meet TONIGHT, Wednesday August 8, 2018, at 8 PM in Vienna Town Hall to discuss some modest proposed changes in Maple Avenue Commercial zoning.  This is the meeting where they should finalize any recommendations they may have about these changes, to be passed on to the Town Council.  Please place this on your calendar and plan to attend.

The meeting materials are this web page.  Probably the overriding issue is the potential for adding a density limit to MAC zoning — limiting the number of allowable dwelling units per acre. Continue reading Planning Commission Meeting Wednesday August 8, 2018

Slug line

Thoroughly updated 8/5/2018:  As it turns out, there’s an app for that.  And a modern slug is a well-organized slug.

On this page, I argue that maybe the best commuter use of the Mill Street garage is to make it the base for the first successful I-66 slug line from Vienna.  And that the Town should work to make that happen.   The question I address here is, could that work? Continue reading Slug line