The State of NoVa still growing fast, Loudoun now Virginia’s third largest county (Post article) (Arlington: 2015, homes)

[JD984]

One thing I found curious was that the U. Va. demographers estimated Fairfax's population in 2013 to be lower than the official Census estimates for 2012. Some people do leave Fairfax, of course, but the school enrollment this fall was up over the prior year, so it may simply be a question of access to different data sets and different methodologies.

[BajanYankee]

Give it another 10 years and Loudoun will be like Vermont. And all of that southern culture will be banished for good.

[FCNova]

Originally Posted by BajanYankee

Give it another 10 years and Loudoun will be like Vermont. And all of that southern culture will be banished for good.

Is that a good thing or bad thing??

[JD984]

Originally Posted by Caladium

You're free to believe what you wish, but I continue to notice that I meet a lot of young singles moving into Loudoun and they usually say the reason is their job is there. I make a point of asking, since (as you may have read on this forum) I've been working with the fire company to create more activities that might appeal to this growing group of young singles. And certainly on this forum we've had a high percentage of threads started by people moving to Virginia for jobs in the Leesburg, Ashburn, and Sterling areas.

It's easy enough to find state employment data rather than rely on anecdotes:

http://virginialmi.com/report_center...5104000107.pdf

http://virginialmi.com/report_center...5104000059.pdf

From looking at this, while Fairfax does have more jobs relative to residents than Loudoun, you'd certainly expect that given Loudoun's younger population, unless you want all the 12-year-olds in Ashburn to have after-school jobs in call centers.

To speak to one of TE's points, there are still about 2X as many people commuting from Loudoun to Fairfax for work as vice versa. You could say it strains the infrastructure in Fairfax, but the country would presumably rather keep the jobs and tax revenues than see them relocate to a different county.

The talk about what people "need" vs. want they "want" leaves me confounded, since I didn't see anyone claiming before TE weighed in that they had to live in any particular place to meet basic human needs, but instead only were living where they wanted to. Lecturing people about their bad or immoral choices rarely leads them to reconsider; on the other hand, if the traffic is more than they can stomach, they'll draw their own conclusions in due course. I wonder if what worries him is the prospect that the Tysons redevelopment plans might stall if enough people decide they would rather live even closer in or further out, rather than wake up every morning to a close-up view of an above-ground Silver Line.

[tysonsengineer]

Originally Posted by JEB77

It's easy enough to find state employment data rather than rely on anecdotes:

http://virginialmi.com/report_center...5104000107.pdf

http://virginialmi.com/report_center...5104000059.pdf

From looking at this, while Fairfax does have more jobs relative to residents than Loudoun, you'd certainly expect that given Loudoun's younger population, unless you want all the 12-year-olds in Ashburn to have after-school jobs in call centers.

To speak to one of TE's points, there are still about 2X as many people commuting from Loudoun to Fairfax for work as vice versa. You could say it strains the infrastructure in Fairfax, but the country would presumably rather keep the jobs and tax revenues than see them relocate to a different county.

The talk about what people "need" vs. want they "want" leaves me confounded, since I didn't see anyone claiming before TE weighed in that they had to live in any particular place to meet basic human needs, but instead only were living where they wanted to. Lecturing people about their bad or immoral choices rarely leads them to reconsider; on the other hand, if the traffic is more than they can stomach, they'll draw their own conclusions in due course. I wonder if what worries him is the prospect that the Tysons redevelopment plans might stall if enough people decide they would rather live even closer in or further out, rather than wake up every morning to a close-up view of an above-ground Silver Line.

What worries me is people complained 10 years ago in western and southern fairfax about traffic, built a ton of roads for Billions (with a B) only to see hundreds of thousands of people move further out, only to make traffic even worse in those areas. And now the complaining has started again but now focused another ring further out. As a person who doesn't drive that much, I refuse to keep spending BILLIONS( WITH A B) to subsidize those choices. So long as people are ok with 2 hour commutes, then I am ok with them living where-ever the heck they want.

God bless that is absolutely your right and freedom and thats what makes this country great. But just know I'm gonna play the world's tiniest violin if you complain about Route 7. It used to be a great road before 200,000 people popped up after it got widened in Loudoun.

I have no fear about Tysons development, more construction psf is occurring in the past 18 months than at any point in Arlington in Tysons, and given the fact that Fairfax grew at around 25,000 people in the past 3 years alone, I think the market is fairly stable in that respect. To position me as such is a bit of an injustice to what I think are some valid concerns and historical context I am trying to add into the issue of land use and population growth.

I am simply trying to provide insight into the definition of insanity suburbanites in this area have; you keep repeating the same mistakes and expecting something to change. If you want your outer neighborhood to remain more like it is today for longer, you should be showing up at rezonings and urban revitalization meetings saying you are in favor of it (urbanization in the core) because it means PRESERVING your neighborhood.

No one is saying, tear down houses. If you live in your house today you should be allowed to live in your house as long as you want, but we can be redeveloping strip malls and parking lots closer in, to absorb the future growth which is inevitable in this area (another 40,000 people coming this year I'm sure) in order to absorb it in a more rational way. Why that is not something that suburban people, urbanists, and rural people can join together on confounds me.

[FCNova]

I think it's funny when people who move out there complain about the Greenway. A couple people I know have complained about it. There also was a thread here awhile back that had a link to some petition claiming it was unfair and the state should force them to lower the tolls. Cmon man. You knew what you were getting into when you moved out there. Either pay tolls or deal with tons of traffic.

[Caladium]

Originally Posted by tysonsengineer

we can be redeveloping strip malls and parking lots closer in, to absorb the future growth which is inevitable in this area (another 40,000 people coming this year I'm sure) in order to absorb it in a more rational way. Why that is not something that suburban people, urbanists, and rural people can join together on confounds me.

Obviously, because not everyone agrees with you on what is "a more rational way."

When I lived in Loudoun, I lived, worked, and played in Loudoun. I had no need for strip malls or parking lots to be built closer in--didn't spend much time driving "closer in" so that wouldn't have been a rational thing for me to care about. Instead, I liked seeing more being built in my own neighborhood. The more they built out in Loudoun the more I had a variety of stores and restaurants to walk to from where I lived, and where I worked.

[tysonsengineer]

Originally Posted by Caladium

Obviously, because not everyone agrees with you on what is "a more rational way."

When I lived in Loudoun, I lived, worked, and played in Loudoun. I had no need for strip malls or parking lots to be built closer in--didn't spend much time driving "closer in" so that wouldn't have been a rational thing for me to care about. Instead, I liked seeing more being built in my own neighborhood. The more they built out in Loudoun the more I had a variety of stores and restaurants to walk to from where I lived, and where I worked.

Fair, I should say residential. I have no problem with retail or office in Loudoun. My issue is the tracts and tracts and tracts of subdivisions built my developers without having to pay a dime towards roads that become swamped because of them.

[stpickrell]

Originally Posted by tysonsengineer

Fair, I should say residential. I have no problem with retail or office in Loudoun. My issue is the tracts and tracts and tracts of subdivisions built my developers without having to pay a dime towards roads that become swamped because of them.

There's been a backlash against new residential w/o non-residential to support it.

While you can argue the proffers are insufficient, they are there.

[eastli84]

Originally Posted by tysonsengineer

What worries me is people complained 10 years ago in western and southern fairfax about traffic, built a ton of roads for Billions (with a B) only to see hundreds of thousands of people move further out, only to make traffic even worse in those areas. And now the complaining has started again but now focused another ring further out. As a person who doesn't drive that much, I refuse to keep spending BILLIONS( WITH A B) to subsidize those choices. So long as people are ok with 2 hour commutes, then I am ok with them living where-ever the heck they want.

I am all for smart planning and environmental preservation; however, the entire region is growing in population. It's not that Arlington, Alexandria, and Fairfax are hemorrhaging residents and businesses that are relocating to Loudoun and Stafford, etc. The whole region is growing which means that infrastructure needs to be expanded/improved throughout the region.

Originally Posted by tysonsengineer

I am simply trying to provide insight into the definition of insanity suburbanites in this area have; you keep repeating the same mistakes and expecting something to change. If you want your outer neighborhood to remain more like it is today for longer, you should be showing up at rezonings and urban revitalization meetings saying you are in favor of it (urbanization in the core) because it means PRESERVING your neighborhood.

No one is saying, tear down houses. If you live in your house today you should be allowed to live in your house as long as you want, but we can be redeveloping strip malls and parking lots closer in, to absorb the future growth which is inevitable in this area (another 40,000 people coming this year I'm sure) in order to absorb it in a more rational way. Why that is not something that suburban people, urbanists, and rural people can join together on confounds me.

It's unreasonable to expect all of your estimated 40,000 newcomers this year to be absorbed in a more rational way. First of all, the supply of depressed strip malls and parking lots in desirable, close in, transit-accessible neighborhoods isn't that large. Second of all, plans to rezone property often face strong NIMBY opposition. Case in point -- the city of Alexandria faced a long, uphill battle to rezone its West End neighborhood rezoning for higher density housing and retail.

In my opinion, it's a cheap and easy way out to blame people moving to far-flung suburbs that it's their fault the traffic in this region is horrible and that you're not going to fund their road improvements. Good luck getting Arlington to rezone land, approve new subway tunnels, and expand highway lanes to remove bottlenecks to accommodate a huge chunk of the folks moving to this region. So long as the Washington DC metro area continues to attract tens of thousands of newcomers each year, growth will continue in all corners of the region and subsequent infrastructure improvements will need to take place.