Reston Real Estate: Reston's Oldest Building on the Market

Just steps from Reston's fake downtown Gritty Urban Core, the oldest building in Reston is now on the market. The picture at left is what inexplicably comes up when you do a Google image search for the Robert Wiehle House, which makes it look like those 1895-era builders were big fans of garden-style apartment complexes with vinyl siding and ample off-street parking.

Not to be confused with Linden Springs or the Bowman House, the Robert Wiehle House is all that's left of the first attempt to build a planned community in the wilds of the Virginia countryside, nearly a full century before Reston was a gleam in Bob Simon's eye. When Carl Adolph Max Wiehle, a doctor from Philadelphia, bought the chunk of land that is now Reston in 1886, he envisioned an 800-home bedroom community, presumably with detailed rules about appropriate burlap window treatments and on-street horse parking. Only 10 houses were actually built, though, and most of them went to family members, and then Wiehle said, "eh, this real estate stuff is hard, let's just get someone to build a distillery instead and get hammered every night," which is exactly what happened until the nudists showed up.

Who wouldn't want to spend a mere $474,900 to own a piece of that colorful history? The real estate listing helpfully points out that the property could be converted into a B&B, which we'd suggest calling "Garden Apartment View," based on what has since been built around the home:

Maybe if you ask really nicely, you could use the tennis courts that are just out of the frame of this shot.

Actually, this place looks seriously cool, at least from the vantage point of Google's all-seeing space machines. If we had the spare cash, we'd move Restonian World Headquarters into one of its two bedrooms in a heartbeat.

Finally, we learned one new (to us) Fun Fact about the drunken village of Wiehle. When Dr. Wiehle lobbied to have the post office change the town's name to his own, Wiehle replaced the area's even older name, "Thornton's Mills," unknowingly sparing future generations of Restonians from having to fight for parking at the "Thornton's Mills Station Metro Station Garage," the end.

Lake Thoreau Shocker: Another Hell-Cursed Creature of the Deep, Or Maybe Some Dead Fish or Something

When we tried to sound the warning about the hellish creature lurking underneath the surface of Lake Anne, people laughed at us. Now another brave Reston "web logger" is attempting to let the truth be known about these hellspawn creatures of the deep, this one under the otherwise placid surface of Lake Thoreau. Behold the picture, you naysayers, and fear the lake!

Here's what our intrepid eyewitness had to say:

Unfortunately I only took a still and not a video image of our possible “Nessie”… two days after this photo, we had two or three floating (and very dead) and very large grass carp.

There is also a possibility that our “Nessie” picture is of two large turtles fighting or mating. Another person (Tom) says he has seen something like our “Nessie” candidate above when he has been kayaking over the deeper section of the lake in front of our townhouses…. the mystery continues.

The same "web logger" documented another freak of nature on the lake, so maybe we'd better start checking what's being poured into the storm drains.

On the bright side, we've heard that Lake Audobon may be used as the setting for this upcoming period drama:

Say Goodbye to the White Picket Fence: Another Look at Our Hellish Future of Upscale Apartments

Piling on to earlier forecasts about the region's transition to more dense, urban housing stock comes this fancy "news-paper" article in which Reston's soon-to-arrive bollardy goodness is looked to as a model:

"The quarter acre lot and the white picket fence? Those days are over. Generation Y is willing to live in a far less pretentious situation than their parents did. They aren't going to be soccer moms," said [local real estate developer Bob] Buchanan.

The developer said he has been particularly impressed with the transit-friendly development planned for the new Metro stations in Reston, which he referred to as being "high quality" and "remarkable."

The good news for us with equity mortgages is that the DC region remains the only major metropolitan area in the country where average home prices increased in the past year, and prices have been climbing since mid-2009. The problem is that our fancy stucco manses with yards may not be what future buyers want, according to GMU economist Stephen Fuller.

"There really is enough big housing. What we need is more small housing. … We need different housing," said Stephen Fuller, an economist with the Center for Regional Analysis at George Mason University. He spoke to members of the Northern Virginia Association of Realtors about the state of the local economy and housing market this month.

BUT FULLER STRESSED that Fairfax County does not necessarily have a lot of housing that has become attractive to younger professionals and retiring baby boomers looking to purchase a home.

"Younger workers may not be as willing to spend as much of their income on purchasing a house," said Fuller, who said a real need exists for high-end apartment buildings and condominiums.

It should be pointed out that Fuller's shop is responsible for the baseline assumptions driving many of the estimates showing massive growth in Reston in the coming decades, including the ones driving assumptions made by the Reston Master Plan Task Force With the Unpronounceable Acronym (§). The challenge will be weaving that density into Reston's existing framework of housing and infrastructure without ruining things for the folks who still want, if not the white picket fence, the appropriately earth-toned enclosure for a yard free of red mulch and white stone, the end.

Flashback Monday: In Hunter's Woods, a Horse's Life

Now this is what high density in the Virginia countryside should look like! An early promotional brochure for our earth-toned community touted this fancy cluster for horse enthusiasts, a semicircle of townhouses "centered around a strikingly designed community stable" and a riding area, surrounded by commoners bridle paths. Imagine riding around South Reston, hunting foxes and jousting for the last parking spot at Fox Mill Shopping Center! Here's a closer look at the plans for the stable:

Apparently even horses deserved striking contemporary architecture in the Reston of the Future.

What was News to Us here at Restonian World Headquarters is that something like this actually wound up being built in South Reston:

What was considered one of the selling points for the Hunters Woods section of Reston in its early days? Answer: An elaborate vaulted ceiling horse stable. Later the stable collapsed and was razed.

It's no homicidal nudist colony, but it's still something we didn't know about the murky past of our beloved community. Apparently the RA opted not to rebuild the stable, but a cursory Google search extensive research didn't turn more details up about the stable, why it collapsed, or how it was used. Anyone remember? Please share in the comments.

Metro Silver Line: Fantasy and Reality, Plus The Washington Post Uses Naughty Words

Imagine the excitement in a few decades time when we can step on an express Silver Line train and be whisked directly to the fake ID emporiums midscale retail of Georgetown.

Believe it or not, this is one possible scenario for what Metro envisions the Silver Line looking like by around 2040, when it will build a fancy new subway line under M Street. In this option, the Silver Line would get its own tracks in Arlington, with stops only at East Falls Church and Rosslyn before shifting to M Street.

It's a nice bit of science fiction, but in the meantime, Metro has placed its faith in getting the part of the Silver Line that's actually already on the drawring board built in the hands of the airport authority, which got yet another verbal spanking yesterday from a group of business leaders including the Greater Reston Chamber of Commerce, who held a fancy "press conference" in an empty parking lot off Wiehle Avenue. Fans of schadenfreude will enjoy this fancy video of tongue-lashings about everything from the labor agreement to the decision to build an underground station at Dulles.


Meanwhile, fresh from an earlier trip to the woodshed, airport officials say they expect to come to an agreement on funding and whatnot within "the next couple of weeks," which sounds great but is suspiciously like what we're used to hearing from the contractors who reroofed our mauve mansion, not a multi-billion-dollar railroad.

In the meantime, the Washington Post "news-paper" has run perhaps the strongest argument to date for keeping the Dulles station underground, and they did it by using naughty words!

When did Washington become so half-assed?

I’m sorry. That’s not a nice expression. From here on I’ll use a different one.

When did Washington become so partially buttocked?

That's the last time we'll let the kids flip through the paper looking for Marmaduke. But there's more!

I’ve been flying in and out of Amsterdam a lot recently (no, I’m not going for the hash brownies) and the train station there is practically underneath the terminal. You roll off your transoceanic flight, take a 30-foot escalator ride to a platform, then wait for the train. The whole arrangement is so slick that you see foreign travelers buttonholing random Dutch people just to exclaim, “Your airport is so great! The public transportation is so convenient!”...

Why should other cities have better stuff than Washington? When did we become so partially buttocked?

We certainly weren’t in the past, when most of the great features of our city were built. Every time you look at the Washington Monument, imagine if some of today’s leaders had been in charge when its construction was stalled: They would have said, “It’s going to cost a lot to complete the obelisk all the way up to 555 feet. Let’s just put a roof on it at 152 feet and call it a day.”...

Of course, the whole country seems this way today: makeshift, slapdash, stopgap. But if America ever grows another gluteal hemisphere, I don’t want its future citizens looking back and thinking, “What was up with our forebearers? Were they so stingy and shortsighted that they thought it was a good idea to get us almost to the airport and then let us fend for ourselves?”

If Fairfax and Loudoun are successful in sinking the underground station, I want photos of the politicians who torpedoed it positioned every 50 feet along the pedestrian walkway, with the words “Almost there! Keep going! Not long now!” written in big letters underneath.

Heh. All we know is that if this increasingly silly game of political brinkmanship winds up with the Silver Line ending at Wiehle Avenue, we'll need to replace the rad 80s art planned for the station's walkways with pictures of the same politicians apologizing for the gridlocked sea of Loudoun cut-through commuters clogging Wiehle forever, the end.

This Fortnight in Crime: Reston House Party Yields 15 Arrests, Racial Grafitti, and the Feds Raid a Server Farm

What is it with kids today? If they're not getting chased by police helicopters and K-9 units while fleeing a house party in South North Reston, they're spray painting racial slurs on the signs of a local business. Why can't they do something constructive, like maybe post to a "web log" or something?

First up: the house party:

Police responded to citizen complaints regarding a large party where teens were allegedly consuming alcohol in the 1100 block of Northwind Drive in the Reston Police District on Monday June, 20 around 11 p.m
Upon officers’ arrival, numerous teens fled through the neighborhood. Police detained many of them, investigated, and charged 15 teens with alcohol-related offenses including drunk in public, illegal/underage possession of alcohol and violation of open container laws.

Then there's what police are calling a "bias crime":

Employees at a business in the 11600 block of Sunrise Valley Drive discovered racial slurs and derogatory comments spray painted on their business sign, driveway and retaining barrier around 6:30 a.m. on Tuesday, June 7. The employees saw a teenage boy and girl running from the scene. The area was searched but the suspects were not located. The male suspect was described as white, 16 to 18 years old. He was about 5 feet 6 inches tall and 140 pounds. The female suspect was described as white, 15 to 17 years old. She was about 5 feet 6 inches tall and 125 pounds.

As if that wasn't enough excitement, the FBI raided a Reston data center on Tuesday, knocking several popular "web logs" offline. (Fortunately, we don't have to worry, as this "web log" has never been popular.)

The F.B.I. seized Web servers in a raid on a data center early Tuesday, causing several Web sites, including those run by the New York publisher Curbed Network, to go offline.

The raid happened at 1:15 a.m. at a hosting facility in Reston, Va., used by DigitalOne, which is based in Switzerland, the company said. The F.B.I. did not immediately respond to a request for comment on the raid.

In an e-mail to one of its clients on Tuesday afternoon, DigitalOne’s chief executive, Sergej Ostroumow, said: “This problem is caused by the F.B.I., not our company. In the night F.B.I. has taken 3 enclosures with equipment plugged into them, possibly including your server — we cannot check it.”

Mr. Ostroumow said that the F.B.I. was only interested in one of the company’s clients but had taken servers used by “tens of clients.”

It's been widely suspected that the raid was connected with action taken against a group of hackers that have attacked government websites in recent weeks. Or maybe someone's not a fan of twee urban housing blogs.

Things in our friendly neighbor to our west continue to be weird -- and a little too friendly.

A man in a car was struck with a gun while driving through Northgate Square several weeks ago.

A man was struck with a gun as he was driving in the 1400 block of Northgate Square around 11:25 p.m. on Thursday, May 26. A group of people on mopeds approached him; one man asked a question then struck him with the weapon. The suspect was described as Hispanic, between 17 and 20 years old, with short, black hair and a light complexion. He was about 5 feet 8 inches tall and 160 pounds, wearing a dark blue polo-style shirt and khaki pants. The victim was taken to the hospital with non life-threatening injuries.

Finally, a box of donuts was stolen from a business on Baron Cameron Drive, there are no words, etc., etc., the end.

Fairway to Heaven: Proposal Elicits Best One-Liner in the History of the DRB

During a heavily attended meeting last night, the Reston Design Review Board nearly voted to deny the latest iteration of the Fairway Apartments redevelopment proposal, but after a last-minute bit of lawyerin' by JBG and a split vote, the board ultimately opted to defer a recommendation on the 804-unit proposal. Presumably this kicks the can over to the Fairfax County Planning Commission, which will consider the project next month. But in the meantime, we can enjoy what will likely go down in history as the best comment about a design proposal to ever escape a planning official's lips:

DRB member Richard Newlon called the Fairway East multiunit building, which has a pool at its center, "at best a South Florida motel design."

"I don't know of anywhere in Reston where you have apartments looking directly out on a pool," he said. "It is the Motel 6 approach. Absurd."

Oh no he DIDN'T!

The revised redevelopment proposal was little changed from the one approved by the Reston Planning & Zoning Committee earlier this year, but we did learn that the increased green space at the center of one of the sections of the proposal will be called "Central Park," presumably after the one in New York City and not this one. DRB members acknowledged that the project had improved from previous iterations, but they and audience members still cited green space, traffic, the size of the townhouses, and the delicious Texas donut design of the multifamily buildings as concerns.

When it came time to vote, our BFFs at Reston 2020 explained how JBG's attorney earned his retainer last night.

After a polling of the panel, a unanimous vote to deny the concept of the project was imminent. Newlon made a motion to deny but before it could be voted upon, the JBG attorney jumped up and advised JGB to request a deferral.

This resulted in a spirited debate between Jennifer Byl and Neal Rosenberry of the DRB board regarding the merits of granting the deferral (Rosenberry) vs. voting for denial (Byl). The first vote to decide this impasse resulted in a tie. On the second vote, Richard Newlon capitulated and the vote for deferral passed, much to the disappointment of the majority of the audience.

In its presentation, JBG argued that increased density was part of the original plan for Reston and touted the fact that its proposal now includes more green space and 12 percent workforce housing. A representative of one neighboring cluster spoke in favor of the proposal, and there's no doubt that if there's going to be redevelopment -- and there will be, no matter how hard some people keep clapping -- an aging garden apartment complex isn't a bad place for it. It's clear, though, that after years of trying, JBG still has not won many people over to the idea of dropping 800+ units and 50-foot-tall townhouses into an existing neighborhood. Here's hoping that county planners keep that in mind as the project returns to them for consideration.

Public Art Bingo: We'll Take The 'Sun Boat' to Block

While out and about on Reston's trails, did you spot out of the corner of your eye a random jumble of concrete blocks, maybe with pointed edges or other whimsical adornments, peeking out from behind the trees? If so, the Reston public art initiative wants to hear from you.

Much like a hunt for a brutalist Sasquatch, IPAR is cataloguing and making sure it knows of all extant examples of public art in Reston. Sounds fun!

This summer, the Initiative for Public Art - Reston (IPAR) is compiling an inventory of all the public art works in Reston in preparation for an exhibition, and to develop a rich resource for the community. This database will serve to educate, and to support appreciation of the array of public art in our area.

As part of this work, they've compiled a list of all known chunks of public art in Reston, present and past. To us, they read like a track list from an unreleased Led Zeppelin album or maybe a collection of Emerson Lake & Palmer B-sides:

At Reston Town Center:
1. Mercury Fountain by Saint Clair Cemin
2. Iris by Daniel Goldstein in Town Square Park
3. Fidelity of Form by Dennis Heimbach in Town Square Park
4. Vascular Form III by Foon Sham at GRACE
5. Sculpture at the end of Market Street and Crescent Park (unidentified)

At Lake Anne Village Center:
6. The Sun Boat by Gonzalo Fonseca
7. The Underpass by Gonzalo Fonseca
8. Pylon by Gonzalo Fonseca
9. The Lookout by James Rossant
10. The Pyramid by James Rossant
11. Plaza Fountain by James Rossant
12. The Pulpit by James Rossant
13. Robert E. Simon (aka Bronze Bob) by Zachary Oxman
14. Decorative pieces by Lakeside Pharmacy (first aid kit, eating utensils, pole by former barber shop etc.)

At pools, libraries and parks:
15. Untitled (granite sculpture) by David Holland at Reston Regional Library
16. September 11th Memorial Dedication by Kathy Walden Kaplan at Freedom Grove at Brown's Chapel
17. Book of Love by Anne Nagy at Reston Regional Library
18. The Swimmer by John Parker at Lake Newport Pool
Schools and Underpasses
19. Lake Anne Elementary Tunnel Mural by Marco Rando and Lake Anne ES students at Fairway Drive pedestrian tunnel
20. Emerge by Valerie Theberge at Glade Dr. Underpass and students from Hunters Woods ES
21. Sculpture at Hunters Woods ES
22. Mural at Hunters Woods ES
23. Moorings Dr. Underpass by Russ

Corporate collections:
24. Group of sculptures at United States Geological Survey Headquarters
25. Group of sculptures Parkridge corporate campus on Parkridge Blvd.
26. Chrome sculpture at 1875 Corporate Commons Dr.

Works no longer on display:
27. Upstart II by Clement Meadmore, 1980s
28. Sleeping Tree at Greater Reston Arts Center (GRACE), 2008 (RTC)
29. Earthquake, The Way to Be, and Monument to the Sun and Stars by Mike Schaffer in Town Square Park as part of the Juried exhibition gaps at Greater Reston Arts Center
30. Fountain at Reston International Center
31. Sculptures on Reston Parkway Greens (RTC)

Works no longer in existence:
32. Wooden Horse by Gonzalo Fonseca at Lake Anne Village Center

Future public art works:
33. At Hyatt Park, RTC
34. At Reston Station (WMATA)

For parents with kids home from the summer, this list could provide hours minutes of fun, playing public art bingo or "find the oblong object along the path." If you know of other examples of public art, or maybe see a pile of bricks arranged in a vaguely pleasing shape, let the folks from IPAR know.

Fairway to Heaven: Redevelopment Proposal To Go to DRB for Review

In what our BFFs at Reston 2020 are calling an unpublicized "surprise," the five-time-revised proposal to redevelop Fairway Apartments will go before the DRB tomorrow evening. This, after the RA Board of Directors wrote a letter to Hunter Mill Supervisor Cathy Hudgins asking that a July planning commission meeting on the proposal be deferred until the DRB had a chance to weigh in. The last-minute addition of the proposal to the DRB's plate is likely a sign that the RA didn't get its requested deferral, meaning that this is the DRB's one chance to comment before the project is placed in the hands of the county.

The DRB is being asked to give the JBG proposal "conceptual approval" before it goes to the County Planning Commission. According to people within the DRB, the proposal remains essentially the same as presented to the DRB and Reston P&Z committees earlier this year.

The P&Z committee approved that proposal in April by a 10-1 margin, calling the revisions an "improvement" over past iterations, which included a mauvescraper and whatnot and were roundly recommended for denial by county officials. More recent proposals eliminated the mauvescraper, reduced the number of residential units to 804 and added more green space, but the Reston Citizens Association is still urging county officials to reject it.

Reston 2020 is urging people to speak at tomorrow's DRB meeting, which will be held at 7pm at RA Headquarters. Here's hoping the DRB has more feedback to offer than a warning that any sprinkles on the complex's Texas doughnut should be appropriate earth tones, the end.

Update: RCA President Marion Stillson points out one possible scenario in a fancy "news-paper" article:

Stillson worries, however, that should the DRB continue to oppose the development, JBG could legally challenge the authority of the DRB.

"There are bigger bucks at stake now with Metro set to come through," she said.

Behold Reston's Future: A Nightmarish Hellscape of Parking Garages and Upscale Apartments

As we await the bollardy goodness soon to sprout along the Toll Road, a couple of fancy "trend pieces" from the local media offer a hint of what we can expect as Reston, like the region around us, continues to grow.

The first sign of the apocalypse more dense growth? The possibility of having to navigate an underground parking garage whilst visiting Whole Foods or Trader Joe's. It happened in Bethesda, it's happened in an otherwise unremarkable strip mall in Herndon, and it could happen here.

When a new Whole Foods store opened in North Bethesda recently, shoppers found their familiar organic laundry detergent and curried wheatberry salad, but something new caught many by surprise: underground parking.

Those accustomed to pulling into a vast parking lot and walking directly into the former Whole Foods six miles up Rockville Pike suddenly had to navigate a cavernous two-level garage before boarding elevators or escalators to reach the store entrance.

It’s been a rough ride for some. One surefire way to get under suburbanites’ skin is to mess with their parking, and there are few places more sacred, some say, than their wide-open grocery store lots.

“For me, parking in a garage for grocery shopping is really weird,” said Bolormaa Baljinnyam, 40, of Rockville as she waited May 24 for an elevator with a baguette in her cart. “It’s kind of not natural.”

Quite right! There's nothing more natural than acres of above-ground parking, as God strip mall developers intended.

Such complaints highlight a cultural shift taking place as planners transform parts of the sprawling suburbs into urban hubs where the car will no longer be king. The vast parking lots born out of the 20th century suburban boom, particularly those near Metrorail stations, are giving way to more clusters of high-rise office buildings, condominiums and stores where people can walk more easily or park once for multiple activities.

Urban planners say the change is the only way the crowded Washington region can absorb unrelenting population growth without making the area’s stifling traffic even worse. Eliminating traditional parking lots, they say, also will alleviate environmental damage that occurs when rainwater runs off warm, dirty asphalt and eventually into streams.

Wait. Didn't we already take care of the streams?

“Cars are still going to be there, but they’re not going to get the priority they did in previous decades,” said N’kosi Yearwood, a Montgomery planner for the White Flint area. “Walking will become much more important.”

Ed McMahon, a senior fellow at the Urban Land Institute, said he’s counted 14 grocery stores in the Washington area with parking garages.

“You’ll see a lot more of that going forward,” McMahon said. “Will Americans adapt? Absolutely.”

We'll spare you the sad detail that when the Bethesda parking garage opened, Whole Foods staffers had to guide people through the garage to find a parking space, and presumably to reassure people that they weren't about to fall into a Sleestak-infested trap.

Also, those high-rise apartments and condos on the drawring board aren't just a way to make a quick buck foster density around Metro stations. They're also the residence of choice for the next generation of young adults, what with their shattered expectations of maintaining a middle-class standard of living fancy iPods and cube-shaped roadsters and whatnot.

Urban planners say apartments are the wave of the future for the D.C. suburbs, as interest in homeownership drops among young adults.

But the tide is likely changing as demand for more affordable apartments extends to D.C.'s suburbs over the last decade. And with today's younger work force predicted to change their careers up to seven times, experts say being tied down early can be a drag.

"Young people will hold many jobs over their career and they'll move from region to region," said Anirban Basu, chief executive officer of Sage Policy Group. "In that kind of labor market structure, it may make more sense to be a renter [for] longer."

Total hyperbole. Most will be moving back into our semi-finished basements.

The Action McNews Van Returns Once Again, This Time To Cutwater Court

The Action McNews Van returned yet again to Reston, this time to cover a month-old, barely publicized dispute about, we dunno, a house or something. Fortunately, they didn't worry our beautiful minds about the issue of piecemeal infill redevelopment in a growing community with an aging housing stock, allowing us to simply enjoy the schadenfreude of a neighborhood dispute with no broader ramifications, the end.

Petition: Thank You For Not Smoking (At Least Outdoors, in Reston)

A fancy "on-line" petition is being circulated asking the Reston Association Board of Directors to ban smoking in all common areas in Reston, including our many miles of paths:

We, the undersigned, urge the Reston Association Board of Directors to set a policy to formally expand the current tobacco smoking prohibitions to ALL outdoor Reston Association Common Areas, without exception.

Reston is a model community with a reputation for being leading-edge on many fronts. Now is the time for the Reston Association to join the more than 3,270 municipalities in the United States that have more broadly recognized the hazard of tobacco and secondhand smoke by implementing local anti-smoking laws and policies. Please mandate a policy now to promote 100% smoke-free Reston Association Common Areas.

One backer of the proposal, Reston resident Cindy McConnell, first brought the idea to the Reston Association Board of Directors last fall.

As of today, there are 21 signatures on the online petition. The first to sign? None other than Bob Simon. Del. Ken Plum is #3.

On the YouTubes: We Watch the Reston Association Videos So You Don't Have To

A lovely shot of two ducks in a comically undersized birdbath kicks off this, the fancy June news video from the Reston Association. Host Melissa Knueven lets us know right off the bat that she is still filling in for Andy Sigle, which pretty much resolves any edge-of-our-seats tension left over from the last thrilling episode. For now.

Anyhoo. In this video we learn that the lifespan of a typical bridge on Reston's pathways is 20 years, meaning that a couple get replaced each year, but not to worry, because there's some fancy new "footer" design that means they can do this without deforesting the area around the bridge to bring in heavy construction equipment impacting the environment. We also hear about a new water safety awareness program sponsored by the RA and the RCC, but to us the real highlight is seeing the bitchin' new mowers the RA has bought to help it keep more than 161 acres of grass and highway medians from running rampant with weeds and tall grass. When we heard the new mowers ran on alternative fuel, we thought maybe they were Priuses (Priusi?) equipped with rotating knives, but in reality they run on propane and look like souped-up go-karts, only go-karts that look less like go-karts than actual Priuses/Priusi, the end.

Flashback Monday: Early Reston, From the Air

If you could build a time machine out of a hot air balloon instead of a DeLorean, and for some reason you decided to set the controls to 1966, this is what you might see before a squadron of F-4s shot you out of the sky: An earth-toned real estate development rising from the Virginia forest. Note the unpaved clearcut gash snaking to the top right that would become Wiehle Avenue. Otherwise, it's pretty much just Lake Anne Village Center, Lake Anne Elementary School, some single-family homes, the 'ole distillery near the lower left corner, and an unfinished golf course. We'll leave you to ponder a Reston without a Home Depot or Memco, much less a Macaroni Grill, the end.

Oh Look, Another Flash Dance Hits Lake Anne

Oh, look. Yet another flash mob decided to spontaneously dance at the Lake Anne farmers market this past weekend. Um, surprise?

Actually, the dancing's not bad. And the best thing about this fancy video from our BFFs at Patch is that it appears to be shot from the Reston book depository some high vantage point.

Our Ursine Overlords Are Coming to Devour Us All, But No Need to Panic

Fairfax County Police said today that the "first seasonal reports of bear sightings" have been made in and around Reston.

Police received the first seasonal reports of bear sightings in 2011 on Thursday, June 9 around 6:30 a.m. near Holly Briar Lane in Great Falls. Callers reported a medium-sized black bear crossing the road near Hollyview Drive, heading toward the woods. Police also received three reports on Friday, June 10 around 6:30 a.m. near Bennington Woods Road, Stowe Road, and a walking trail near Autumn Wood Drive.

According to animal control officers, it is not unusual to see black bears at this time of year and residents should not panic or feel alarmed when they see one.

"But watch out for your pic-i-nic baskets," police did not say, the end.

Reston Real Estate: The High-Low Game

Hey gang! It's a slow news day time yet again to play everyone's favorite game of earth-toned real estate wheeling and dealing, the High-Low Game(tm)! Just load up the U-Haul and bring it with you to the open house, because in this game, everyone's a winner!

At the high end of the spectrum, this stunner on Waterfront Drive near Lake Newport can be yours for a mere $924,900. It's a lovely home, with an added -- and unpublicized -- perk for the security conscious:

We've always wanted to have a phalanx of protective columns surrounding our conversation pit so we can dive behind them in the event of an ambush. Though we'd need to lose a bit of weight for that to be effective in this case. Much to our surprise, for just a little bit more cash, the Deck House we profiled in our last thrilling installment is also still on the market for a cool $949,500. What's the matter, folks? Is no one rolling double sixes in the High-Low Game (tm) of late?

On the other end of the price spectrum, this charmer on Southgate Square can be yours for a mere $164,900. At a price that low, no wonder the place looks a bit shy, peeking out bashfully from behind the fence out front. The asking price is down from the $248,400 the place fetched in 2004, so you can use all that INSTANT EQUITY to fill up this room:

Imagine the possibilities.

Finally, this townhouse in Hickory Cluster is regrettably off the market, but like the movie Spinal Tap, it poses the eternal question: How much more Reston could a place be?

The answer, of course, is none. None more Reston.

Well, that's about all the time we have this week. Until next time, keep your feet on the mohair carpet, and keep reaching for the reflective wallpaper on the ceiling!

Trash Talking in South Reston

And we don't mean the kind emanating from a lakeside cul-de-sac. Our favorite correspondent, the Peasant from Less Sought-After South Reston, explains:

Looks like we got ourselves a David vs. Goliath match in the wonderful world of gar-BAGE, one that would make the trash hauling racket of the Five Families in New York positively green with envy (or at least slightly green in the face from the aroma of decaying refuse in 90+ weather). I believe the attached flyer, which was left by Reston Trash with their customers, says it all.

Now I realize Garbage Wars may not be as exciting as Star Wars (either Lucas' version or Reagan's version), but Reston Trash sounds like it's getting a raw deal from much bigger competitors trying to stamp it out. Reston Trash is a small, family-run operation that provides absolutely great service -- when Hurricane Isabelle hit in autumn 2003, for example, they made numerous extra runs at no extra cost to help their clientele remove storm damage. I don't think they would have survived for 40 years and have such a loyal client base if they weren't doing something right. Reston is fortunate to have a small business like them.

As far as rumors go, you know the old saying: garbage in, garbage out.

Update: Our BFFs at Reston Patch have profiled Reston Trash. Turns out it was American Disposal Trash Services that was telling customers that the company was selling out. There's also lots of rad trash-into-truck photo action if you're into that sort of thing.

Reston 2020 Enters Dulles Metro Fray With Fancy Letter, Wonders Aloud What Happens if Silver Line Winds Up Ending in Reston

The Reston Citizens Association's Reston 2020 Committee has stepped once more into the fray of the Dulles Metro Phase 2 debacle, writing a fancy letter to U.S. Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood, who is currently mediating the ongoing dispute about the Dulles station. In that letter, the committee calls the current funding formula a "recipe for disaster," and asks a range of questions about increasing costs and why the lion's share of funding will now be paid by Toll Road suckers users.

While most people have been fixated on the Dulles Airport Station, its cost and style are practically irrelevant when compared with the more fundamental flaws in MWAA’s plan for Dulles Metrorail Phase Two (DMP2). Unless it can identify alternative funding options, the project is extremely unlikely to fly. Now, Secretary of Transportation LaHood has offered to help resolve the problems; let’s hope he can help.

R2020 also sent LaHood their recent report on the project's funding formula, which we're sure LaHood will read while sitting in an overheated single-tracking Metro car somewhere under downtown DC, listening to a static-filled announcement about a track fire at Metro Center being driven somewhere in a government vehicle.

Meanwhile, the suckers stakeholders met again on Friday, though no one's talking about what they discussed, which may or may not be against open meetings laws -- but don't worry, because any fancy "freedom of information" lawsuit can be paid for with a few additional quarters at the toll booth.

Also, Virginia's "top cop," or whatever they call attorney generals these days, would be perfectly happy if the whole project just went away.

in a two-hour guest spot on WMAL Radio on Friday, Ken Cuccinelli said “I hope they don’t do Phase Two,” meaning the Metro rail phase from Reston to Dulles to Ashburn.

Cuccinelli called the project an “economic boondoggle” and that “the cost-benefit just is not there.” He said the issue would be a central feature of the Loudoun board of supervisor elections this year, and that ”I hope [voters] elect an entire board who’s committed to pulling out of Phase Two to kill it.”

Cuccinelli also said he was monitoring attempts by the airports authority to require union labor, and was ready to file suit if a “project labor agreement” were put in place, contrary to Virginia’s right-to-work laws.

Isn't there a half-nekkid lady on the state seal or anything else he can spend his time worrying about?

As others have pointed out, ending the Silver Line at Wiehle Avenue is just fine, so long as you don't mind an endless parade of Loudoun County commuters clogging Wiehle Avenue, fighting for the last of the parking spaces in the fancy garage being built there. In fact, the R2020 committee asks LaHood to consider the implications of Cuccinelli's offhand comment:

If DMP2 is delayed significantly, or cancelled, what happens to Reston? Will it be the Silver Line parking lot forever? What remedial steps, if any, is MWAA prepared to take to prevent traffic paralysis in the Reston area?

We're not holding our breath. And along with Loudoun commuters taking away our precious Wiehle garage spaces, they'll be in an extra bad mood since their own fancy fake downtown likely won't be built without a Metro connection, resulting in long lines and surly customers at Jacksons and whatnot and that simply Can Not Stand, the end.

This Week in Crime: The Dog Days of Summer Began Early at the Reston Dog Park

It's always exciting when the Action News Crew scrounges up some quarters to send a camera truck out to Reston, this time to "investigate" charges that a Fairfax County animal control officer reached for his weapon and threatened dogs at the Reston Dog Park last Thursday.

Canine camaraderie at the Reston, Va., dog park came to a halt Thursday morning when an animal control officer used extremely aggressive behavior toward the dogs, according to their owners.

“He said he’s looking for dog licenses so he starts throwing dog treats around,” Joseph Yindra said. “So of course all the dogs surround him, and then a couple of the dogs started to bark and he immediately took an aggressive stance, reached for his weapon and said, ‘Which one of you wants to get shot?’”

“I was just stunned,” said Leslie Craine, who was standing nearby. “And I was afraid because he did put his hand on his gun, and I have never been around a gun and my dog has not, so I didn’t know if that would set her off.”

Fairfax County Animal Control disputes the allegations. The officer recorded the entire incident, but authorities would not release the recording Friday.

Lt. Carol Wilhite did not hear the officer say, “Which one of you wants to get shot?” on the recording.

“What I heard was an officer who was perhaps in fear of his own safety advising the dog owners of what could happen if he was attacked by a dog,” she said.

Meanwhile, in Loudoun County, sheriff's deputies have been accused of letting a dog die in a car after arresting its owner at a Sterling IHOP and ignoring his pleas to check on his dog in the car parked outside. If you were wondering if there's now a Facebook page calling for "Justice for Rex," you obviously haven't been on the Internet much in the past decade.

Flashback Monday: Reston's First 'Web Log,' Minus the Web and the Log

Back in the days when computers were the size of small houses, this apparently was how Reston "web loggers" got the news out, after making sure to put a carbon copy in the "type writer" to make sure that more than one person could see it at once. We're assuming this is one of the aforementioned carbon copies, meaning we can't see the header in its original earth-toned "full" color glory, but we're guessing it was a shade somewhere between Russet Brown and Onyx, the end.

On the YouTubes: It's Not 'Friday,' But A Video on a Friday

Okay, FINE. Here's Herndon High School junior Zach Katz's YouTube sensation that a bunch of Confidential Restonian Operatives have forwarded, a "rap" about ice cream set in the multiple ice creameries to be found in our fake downtown gritty urban core. The fact that it's a rap just lends itself to that urban "flava," as the kids today don't say, we feel every time we stop by the Apple Store or pick up a salad or cupcake or whatnot.

This is now officially #3 on our list of the best Reston videos of all time, after this one and this one. Though in the true spirit of midscale Reston retail, we've got to admit we like his prank calls to Target.

Maybe one day we'll actually do a full Kasey Kasem-style video countdown of the rest of the best Reston-themed videos. Until then, keep your feet on the shag carpet, and keep reaching for the dated lighting fixtures.

Reston: Through Some of the Decades More than Others

Behold the exciting T-shirt design for the upcoming Reston Festival! We actually rather like the design, which was submitted by design contest winner Herndon High School 11th grader Kerry Burtschi, but wonder if they really needed to include decades beyond the 60s and 70s, since when we think "Reston Through the Decades," we mostly think this and this, and maybe, if we really try hard to think "contemporary," this, the end.

Next Stop, the Woodshed: Metro Silver Line Feud Enters Double Secret Probation

The ongoing brouhaha about the second phase of the Dulles Metro extension -- you know, the one that will actually extend Metro to Dulles -- entered a fun new stage yesterday, as Principal Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood got all the involved parties in a room and brought out the paddle urged them to come up with a solution that will cut costs in the next 30 days or face Double Secret Probation a potential loss of federal funding for the project:

A lot is at stake for all of the funding partners if the second phase stalls or does not get built. Among those risks for MWAA is losing a rail station to the airport.

Loudoun County risks more than $200 million in net revenue through economic development near the new stations. Fairfax County risks overwhelming its Reston station because Loudouners would drive to Wiehle Avenue to ride the train. With the risks in mind, Fairfax County Board of Supervisors Chairwoman Sharon Bulova said Fairfax is still committed to finishing the second phase of the project.

“We already have a lot of skin in the game,” she said. “We worked very hard to get phase one under construction.”

Which is why we think we'll ultimately see an underground station at Dulles. As others, including a seasoned medical practitioner, have pointed out, the airport authority ultimately calls the shots:

There is no threat to the construction of a rail line out to Dulles International Airport. It’s going to get built. The key decisions to do this were made years ago. Today’s politicians are haggling over the details.

The decisions that got us to this point included choosing a a heavy rail line over bus rapid transit, choosing a route through Tysons Corner rather than taking a straight shot at the airport and choosing to put the airports authority in charge of the construction.

If politicians didn’t want the airports authority to be the decision-maker on the location of the airport station, they shouldn’t have put the airports authority in charge of building the railroad.

And since we’re on a course to invest more than $5 billion in taxpayer and toll-payer money in this railroad, we also should care about putting the station close to the potential riders.

The Dulles Metrorail project is a hybrid. It’s partly about making sense out of that space station we call Tysons Corner. It can’t be the 21st Century economic hub that people envision if everyone has to drive in and out of the place.

But Dulles Metrorail is also about Dulles. To succeed, the airport transit system has to be competitive with other ways of getting to and from the airport. It has to be easy to reach when you pluck your bags off the luggage carousel and look for the exit.

Individual politicians may see some political interest in sticking it to the airports authority over the station’s location. But the D.C. region’s interest is in finding a way to put the station within a few football fields of the terminal while keeping the cost as low as possible.

But the politicians who have been bashing the airports authority will have to stop pandering and join in some serious discussions about revenues and costs. The problem isn’t the location of the station. The problem is the cost of the project.

Instead of shaking down the Toll Road users, could there be another revenue source? Could there be a surcharge on using the airport station? Metro already crossed that threshold last year by creating a financing plan for station improvements that allows for a surcharge on riders entering or exiting a particular station.

In the same vein, the Northern Virginia Transportation Alliance continues to point out what it calls the elephant in the room: the fact that Dulles Toll Road users are now going to be tapped for more than half the funding for the total cost of the $6.25 billion project. (If the airport authority relents and builds its station above ground, it will be a reasonable $5.95 billion, or maybe 50 cents less per trip, but that basic fact remains unchanged.) When the project was first announced, it was assumed the feds would pick up half the total cost, but it ain't exactly high-rolling times in D.C. anymore.

Despite all this, airport authority officials are starting to sound more conciliatory.

Metropolitan Washington Airports Authority Chairman Charles Snelling, chief of the board that decided in favor of the underground station, told The Washington Examiner that the decision is not final. His tone represents a shift away from more adamant past statements in favor of the underground station.

"There are problems that need to be addressed," Snelling said. "We don't want high tolls any more than anyone else."

Fortunately we are Here to Help. Maybe he and other MWAA officials can throw some extra quarters (and it'll have to be a whole bunch of quarters) into the basket for the next driver every time they go through a toll plaza, Oprah/Pay It Forward style, and everything will be just fine. Problem solved -- and with 29 days to pick out the color swatches on those rad subway seats, the end.

This Fortnight in Crime: Haynesworth Road Rage Charges Dismissed, Bank Robberies Probed, and a Missing Book on Wallachia and Moldavia

And that, literally, is all you need to know about Reston socialite Albert Haynesworth's dismissed charges stemming from an altercation on Fairfax County Parkway back in February.

Meanwhile in non-celebrity crime news, there may wind up being no charges filed in Virginia against last year's serial hamburglar, and police are still trying to find a man they believe is connected to two bank robberies in Reston and two others elsewhere in Fairfax County in the past six weeks. Here's a YouTube video of the most recent Reston robbery, a May 13 incident at Cardinal Bank on Sunset Hills Road that left a 54-year-old employee injured.


It's also been a busy couple of weeks for robberies in and around Reston:

A 37-year-old woman was robbed by three men near the intersection of Olde Crafts Drive and South Lakes Drive around 7:55 p.m. on Saturday, May 21. The suspects were described as Hispanic, in their early 20s, between 5 feet 5 inches and 5 feet 8 inches tall and about 145 pounds. One of the suspects had a goatee.

Two men robbed a 50-year-old woman of her purse in the 1500 block of Brookshire Court around 10:55 p.m. on Saturday, May 21. One suspect was described as Pacific Islander or Hispanic, about 6 feet tall with a thin build and wearing dark-colored clothing. The victim did not require medical attention.

A 16-year-old boy was robbed of his phone on Sunday, May 8 around 12:31 a.m. in the area of Green Range Drive and Lofty Heights Place. Police located two suspects nearby and arrested them, though only one was determined to be involved. Austin A. Sheppard, 21, of 2401 Glade Bank Way in Reston, was charged with robbery. The victim was not injured.

And finally, there's this weird list of missing books from the Reston Regional Library. All we can say is that if you're the low-life who stole An Account of the Principalities of Wallachia and Moldavia: Including Various Political Observations Relating to Them, we hope they -- wait for it -- throw the book at you.