Friday, July 2, 2010

Board of Supervisors Adopts Plan Amendment for Tysons Corner
Fairfax County’s “Downtown” to Include 20 Percent Affordable/Workforce Housing

On June 22, 2010, the Fairfax County Board of Supervisors adopted an amendment to its land use Comprehensive Plan that will guide the transformation of Tysons Corner into a walkable, green urban center by 2050.  
This groundbreaking action reaffirmed and expanded the Board’s efforts to foster the development of affordable, workforce housing in the county:

• Affordable unit expectation:  In total, 20 percent of new residential units must be set aside as work force or affordable housing. This requirement surpasses the county’s current countywide policy of 12 percent. This housing will be made available to households earning between 50 to 120 percent of the area median income. 
  
  
• Commercial development linked to affordable housing:  The Board also included in the Plan an historic provision that will generate $3.00 per square foot up-front contribution for affordable/workforce housing from non-residential developments (or $0.25 per-square foot annually) – ground-floor retail exempted.  The Board also directed staff to provide a proposal to modify the countywide workforce housing policy to encourage monetary contributions to affordable/workforce housing from future mixed-use development

The plan envisions Tysons as home to up to 100,000 residents and 200,000 jobs by 2050. It will become a 24-hour urban center where people live, work and play — instead of a sprawling suburban center.  Because the plan was designed to take advantage of four new Metro stations coming to Tysons in 2013, 75 percent of future growth will be within a half mile of these stations. Many offices and homes will be a three to six minute walk from the stations, allowing people to get around on foot, bicycle, bus or Metro.

The plan is built on transit-oriented development (TOD) principles. By building homes, stores and offices near transit, car trips can be dramatically reduced. Recent research by the Federal Transit Administration shows that people living in Washington area TODs cut their car trips by almost 50 percent.

As currently built, Tysons caters to cars not people. Today, 105,000 people commute into Tysons daily while just 17,000 people live there. As a result, there are 167,000 parking spaces in Tysons — or 1.3 spaces for every employee and resident. These spaces also consume 40 million square feet of land.

For further information, check out the county website www.fairfaxcounty.gov and click on “Transforming Tysons.”