SO SICK of the DC metro area!!!! (Centreville, Fairfax: condos, house)

[jmarkd]

dullnboring, thanks for the good input on Leesburg; it sounds like our best bet. My wife liked living there a lot, and a buddy from work just got a townhome ($420k, ouch!) there. He reports that the commute is not too bad, and he takes 7. I would probably try the back roads- that $3.20 for the greenway would add up! There would be plenty of people to carpool with, too.

I hear you on 28. I live on Centreville Rd. and work off of Centreville Rd. but I take 28 in the evenings. It is quick and getting better- everyone says getting rid of the McLearen light made a huge difference. Southbound is great until you get to 50, but that's where I get off so it works well.

As for Sterling, I was reading in the Post today about a gang war between MS-13 and some 18th Street gang. Recently a man was sleeping in his home and got hit by a stray bullet. No wonder the home prices are cheap! So Ashburn might be a cookie cutter collection of Yuppie Storage Units, but it's relatively safe as far as I know...

[dullnboring]

Jmarkd, yeah it used to be that Loudoun County was a bargain compared to the rest of the metro area and while I guess it technically still is cheaper than many places closer-in, the prices have increased exponentially and are now very similar even as far out in Leesburg as you'd find in places like Centrevile, Chantilly and Herndon. It seems like the new frontier of sorts for bargains on homes has been pushed out beyond Leesburg. Same thing on the Southern front. Manassas used to be fairly cheap but no more (although the price increases have been much less dramatic in Prince William County than they have in Loudoun) and now people are moving all the way out to Stafford or even Spotsylvania or Fauquier counties in search of affordable housing.

As for Route 28, I hate that road, largely because my aforementioned 4.8 mile, 30 minute commute was on the sections of the road that you are luckily able to avoid, those from Westfield to Braddock Road. The removal of the light at McLearnen Road and one of the lights near Westfield has cut off a few minutes in commute time (although I don't really commute on 28 anymore but I do visit my friend in Centreville fairly often). What they really need to do though to cut back on traffic is get rid of the light at the I-66 interchange. The whole set-up there is just really antiquated. I think eventually they will do away with traffic lights altogether along most of 28, at least the stretch from Sterling to Centreville, but "eventually" could be 20-30 years. They also need to build a road running somewhat parallel to Route 28 on the other side of Dulles Airport. The roads there are a mess right now and there's really no "straight shot" from points North of Dulles (Leesburg, Ashburn) ot those south (South Riding).

As for Sterling, it's not that bad of an area. While I absolutely despise Northern Virginia, I will give it credit where it's due and one thing I'll say is that we have remarkably low crime here. When you look at the crime rate in a place like Fairfax County and realize that it's a county of over one million people, it really is amazing how little crime there is, and even the more urban portions of Northern Virginia like Alexandria and Arlington have well below-average crime. As such, the terms "dangerous" and "bad areas" are a bit relative. I remember in high school, kids called certain parts of Fairfax City "ghetto". I just thought "have you guys ever SEEN Southeast DC?!" Sterling is an older suburb, with a lot of post-war 1950s suburban split-level homes and it has a relatively high immigrant population (particularly Latinos; maybe 20-25% Latino). It's light on the squeaky clean subdivisions and McMansions that dot the rest of Loudoun County so by comparison, it doesn't look to be as nice of an area. Crime is higher there, but the crime like much of Northern Virginia is fairly petty. Generally, nowhere in Northern Virginia do you have to fear being the victim of random violent crime. Most of the areas that are higher crime in the area tend to have more car break-ins or acts of vandalism or domestic disputes, but murders, armed robberies, rapes and such are rare. The drive-by in Sterling shocked the hell out of me, and most people. I don't doubt that there is a gang presence in Sterling but it seems like there's a bit of a gang presence (notably MS-13) everywhere. Generally however, they seem to target other gang members or immigrant Latinos (not saying that's a good thing, just that if you don't fall into those two categories, you're generally safe). So Sterling is fine, just a little more dilapidated and ugly than the rest of Loudoun County.

For all the crap I give Ashburn, I will say that it's incredibly safe. I take my dog out for walks at midnight and don't worry about it. That said, growing up outside of what was at one point the nation's murder capital, means that most people here, myself included, have some embedded street smarts and are cautious. In other words, even though there may be little crime, we still lock our doors, are wary of going to the ATM at night, always are aware of our surroundings, and avoid suspicious groups of lone guys standing around at night.

[jmarkd]

dullnboring, thanks for your insights. I am still wary of Sterling, though- I know the odds are pretty low but still not low enough compared to other areas.
If you know of a good restaurant in Centreville I can take the wife to this week please let me know...we're having baby #2 on Friday so this will be our last date...ever!
Went to South Riding this weekend- nice town! Planned out, the stores are there, and there is quite a bit of grass. Another nice thing I noticed: between two rows of townhomes (their fronts facing opposite directions) there are garages and good-sized backyards with a sidewalk going down the middle.
Most of the townhomes seem to be three-story (tall and skinny), with little ones I don't like all those stairs, but it is a well-planned, nice town. A fake downtown isn't as good as a real one but better than nothing!
It seems like a $50,000 premium for the planned-ness, though- most 3BR townhomes for sale were starting at $390K.
So my quest is narrowed down to Leesburg, South Riding, and maybe Ashburn...Fairfax county is out.

[jmarkd]

They also need to build a road running somewhat parallel to Route 28 on the other side of Dulles Airport. The roads there are a mess right now and there's really no "straight shot" from points North of Dulles (Leesburg, Ashburn) to those south (South Riding).

Centreville Road is expanding to a four-lane- between 50 and Mclearen the new road is built in some stretches. Looks like they're moving traffic to the new half, making it temporarily a two-lane, then tearing up the old road, leveling it, and then they'll open up the four-lane.

I'm not sure what that will accomplish. There are still way too many lights- 10-15 in the five miles from 50 to the toll road. I guess twice as many cars can get through those lights. If you drive on that road between McLearen and the toll road, though, you know six lanes doesn't help much.

But there is this one intersection, Centreville and West Ox, where there is no sign of construction. It's weird- there's a crummy old furniture store there on one side, and it looks like they wouldn't let the county buy their place or something.

[tarp]

It's not the furniture store -- it's the historic park across the street from it. If you look you'll see there is an old meeting house there that must be preserved. However, that area WILL be widened to four lanes. It's in the county plan. Just not yet.

[Mike from back east]

Originally Posted by tarp

It's not the furniture store -- it's the historic park across the street from it. If you look you'll see there is an old meeting house there that must be preserved. However, that area WILL be widened to four lanes. It's in the county plan. Just not yet.

This is one of the things that bugged me so about living in Virginia.

A developer would build houses or a commercial center. If it was a 2-lane road (1 lane each way), they would widen the one lane on that side of the road which they were developing. You'd get 2 lanes in the same direction, but only for that portion of road which fronted his plot of land. It was common to drive roads, like Centerville Rd, that went from 2 lanes to 4 lanes back to 2 lanes and back to 4 lanes, etc. This made driving nutty. People would try to pass slower cars, or butt in line where the road narrowed back down to one lane, etc.

I drove Centerville Rd, from Herndon to Chantilly countless times the past 10 years, and every timet, I'd get so irritated at how stupidly the road situation are handled in VA. The state should have widened that road many years ago, traffic volume warranted that, but as of 2005 when we left the area it STILL wasn't done. The cost for the work could be assessed to the land-owners, either up-front or when someone developed their property. But for pete's sake they should've done what was right by the citizens and not let them sit in looooooong lines of traffic at various points along the way. Whatever the rules and laws are in Virginia, they are horribly antiquated and need updating, but someone in Richmond is either stupid, or guilty of playing all manner of political games. Thank God we moved to Colorado.

s/Mike

[jmarkd]

They need to demolish that furniture store and widen the road. That intersection is consistently bad. Going toward Herndon in the morning, I will often do the make-a-right-bang-a-U-turn-make-a-right-on-red trick rather than sit through 2 cycles of that bottleneck.
When I have to do tricks like that to get where they're going more quickly, I know there's a road design/congestion problem (or maybe I'm just an impatient Type A!)
There are just too darn many lights on Centreville Road. I hate to complain about my 5-mile commute when so many of you folks do the DC thing, but I rented a place 5 miles from work so I wouldn't experience the aggravation of a morning commute!
Mike, they'll probably be done with everything by the fall except the West Ox intersection.

[htlong]

the reason that the developer makes it two lanes only where his development is ,he is forced top pay for it. should the farmer next door be charged for the street to be widened in front of his house just so you can get to work faster? i wouldnt want to, so just wait him out till he sells the property or dies then it will be developed and you can have a pleasant drive to work...isnt that what its all about anyway????

[Mike from back east]

Originally Posted by htlong

the reason that the developer makes it two lanes only where his development is ,he is forced top pay for it. should the farmer next door be charged for the street to be widened in front of his house just so you can get to work faster? i wouldnt want to, so just wait him out till he sells the property or dies then it will be developed and you can have a pleasant drive to work...isnt that what its all about anyway????

Sorry, but that's really not what it's all about. What it is about is achieving intelligent solutions for our infrastructure needs, for the greater good, not for one small property owner who may not sell or develop for many years. Use eminent domain to take enough for the road and be done with it. Put the cost of the roads in the general budget and cover it with tax revenues. We all benefit from the road, why make the developer eat it? Why wait for a developer to do it? We needed it years ago. Why aren't the County and State Governments solving our highway needs? We elect these people to make hard choices for us, but they don't do it. That's nuts. The current methods used in VA are as obsolete as buggy whips, but the state and county do not seem to care. Centreville Road, the entire distance from Herndon thru Franklin Farm, Chantilly and on over to Rt 28 should've been 4 lanes wide at least 10 years ago. I've been to California many times, love their system of state freeways, which are built to interstate standards, nothing like the ridiculous situation in VA where everything gets a traffic light and they only do bridges and ramps when a bottlenecked intersection is ludicrously overloaded (e.g. Rt 28/Waxpool Rd). The problem now with CA freeways is that they are simply buried in volume, but their design with overpasses and cloverleafs and multiple lanes is as intelligent as it can be. If only VA had such progressive leaders.

This form of "let the people suffer" government is why we left VA for Colorado. We don't have traffic like that here in Colorado Springs. No need to leave the light on back in VA, we won't be back.

s/Mike

[daaaaave]

Western Fairfax County just seemed to change so fast. I went to college in 2000 so I wasn't around as much, but every summer I went back home things just seemed worse and worse. Traffic was worse and worse and now you can even expect traffic jams in places like Chantilly. People got more and more rude and obnoxious, probably everyone was mad about being stuck in traffic. They are building new subdivisions where I didn't even notice there was open land...nobody is going to have a backyard anymore. I really don't get why you would move there and I have to think people are going to stop moving there since it's no secret any more that your commute is going to be over an hour for the majority of people. I think 5 years ago people figured they could deal with a 30-45 minute commute from the western suburbs, but now that's turned into 2 hours! I spent some time in the western US the last year and now I am at school, but I definitely don't plan on going back to that hellhole to live.