News and notes from Reston (tm).

Thursday, July 7, 2011

This and That: A Random Summer Stroll Through Reston News

  • Please to be enjoying the "official video" of this weekend's Reston Festival. Accept no cheap promotional video substitutes.

  • The writing is increasingly on the wall that the Metropolitan Washington Airports Authority will be pressured to build an above-ground Metro station at Dulles Airport, which still strikes us as penny millions-wise and pound billions-foolish. Meanwhile, our BFFs at Reston 2020 point out that another key bug feature of the proposed cost-saving measures being hammered out by the feds -- shifting responsibility for developing parking garages and stations for Phase II of the Silver Line to Fairfax and Loudoun Counties -- will almost certainly lead to more "public-private partnerships," and more dense development around the future stations. And with all problems with the Silver Line apparently squared away, Metro is looking ahead to the creation of a Brown Line. Shouldn't they have saved the earth tones for us?

  • Good news, People of Reston: If you're a man in Fairfax County, you can expect to live to be 81, the highest male life expectancy in the country. Women get an additional two years, which means some of us might live long enough to see the aforementioned Silver Line pull triumphantly into the developments clone farms of Loudoun County.

  • Plans to redevelop the big-box splendor of the Spectrum Center go before the Reston Planning & Zoning Committee next week. The spring-loaded minute hand of the Macaroni Grill Doomsday Clock (tm) is twitching in anticipation of what happens next.

  • Seven people are seeking election for seats on the Reston Citizens Association board, including Colin Mills, Tammi Petrine, C.J. Basik, John Hanley, Gary N. Walker, Debra Eastham, and Diane M. Lewis. Best way to vote is during the aforementioned Reston Festival this weekend, so you can simultaneously enjoy democracy and funnel cakes.

  • Someone should probably check Reston's water supply, as there are currently a freakish number of twins -- 14 pairs, to be exact -- at Langston Hughes Middle School. It could be a world record!

  • While they may or may not build their own shiny fake downtown, Loudoun County officials currently consider its future urban core to be... a shopping mall, where future Sweet 16 parties will presumably be hosted. Maybe the Metro should stop at the Fairfax County line after all.

  • Among Reston's "a-list" guests of late: Hank Aaron and Indian spiritual leader Amma, better known as the "hugging saint."

  • Speaking of baseball, a Reston resident was excused as a potential juror from Roger Clemens' trial for lying to Congress about using performance-enhancing drugs. That's what those of us in the news web logging business call a "local angle."

  • Yay, new theater owner Bowtie Cinemas is planning extensive renovations of the movie theater in the fake downtown gritty urban core. They've already undertaken an "extensive cleaning," which, um, ick.

  • A petition to ban smoking in Reston common areas got attention from the usual suspects.

  • Fairfax County plans to blow up the Massey Building, its own mauvescraper, real good.

  • Just two decades after the Berlin Wall came down, a bridge linking Lake Fairfax Park and Reston has been opened, saving freedom seekers hikers from having to wade through a creek.

  • Hans Olsen of Clyde's of Reston won the best restaurant manager award at this year's RAMMYs, an award ceremony for DC-area eateries. And yes, he wore his kilt.

  • Finally, please to be enjoying this fancy public-access video interview with Frank Bensigner, who retired as principal of Forest Edge Elementary at the end of the school year. New principal Kim Price certainly has big shoes to fill.


7 comments:

  1. Instead of water, it's fertility drugs that are likely the cause of all the twins at Langston Hughes. Affluent parents + waiting to have kids longer = more twins.

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  2. Question about the Reston Spectrum/Macaroni Grill demise: Do you (or anyone reading this) have any idea when they plan to start the project? And finish it? Or is that something they will reveal in the meeting in a few days? I read over your entry from 2008 about the original plan but I didn't see a date anywhere. I'm curious because I live in ParcReston condos across the street from Mac Grill. (Yes, we smell it when the wind is blowing at just the right speed and angle. You can be jealous.) Thanks.

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  3. Note to the Editor: when referring to the Loudoun County, the correct term is "clown farms", not "clone farms".

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  4. I almost forgot that the Reston Town Center had a movie theater. I stopped going there long ago. That theater isn't modern enough to exist in the 90's let alone 2011.

    The renovation is the best thing to happen to Reston since the opening of the Macaroni Grill. Perhaps after the renovations are complete they can add a $1 ticket surcharge to finance the underground metro station near the airport.

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  5. An above ground station at Dulles would be a travesty. Pennywise and pound foolish indeed!

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  6. Bob Simon's Metallic Alter EgoJuly 8, 2011 at 12:12 PM

    Dawn: The developer will likely couch the timetable for redeveloping the Spectrum in "market conditions," meaning a) whenever they can get the financing for construction and b) when appetizer sales at the Macaroni Grill begin to fall off.

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  7. I'd love an underground metro station at the airport as much as anyone else, but was I the only person who caught the part of the story where it was mentioned that the Silver Line project is already projected to run more than a billion dollars over budget?

    Like it or not, American government at all levels is tapped out. If living w/o a few bells and whistles is the cost for completing the Sliver Line somewhere in the vicinity of the projected budget, then so be it.

    ReplyDelete

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