A proposal to create a rapid-transit bus route along traffic-clogged Route 1 is drawing fire from Alexandria residents who say the bus system would wipe out their neighborhood parking and damage their historic homes.
The draft proposal by Alexandria’s transportation policy task force is being circulated publicly and is scheduled to be taken up by the City Council for the first time next month.
The task force suggests the city create three dedicated public transit corridors to help ease the increased traffic that is projected for the city by 2030.
One corridor would run along Duke Street, one between Van Dorn and Shirlington, and one along Route 1, which splits into Patrick and Henry streets in Old Town.
“I think there’s a real disconnect between a neighborhood where we have to get approval for dryer vents and window boxes to also be thought of as a major transportation corridor,” Robert Grove, who has lived on North Patrick Street for 25 years, told the council at a public hearing last week. “I think that ship’s sailed — we’re a residential neighborhood, and it deserves to be thought of and treated that way.”
Area residents said that creating dedicated bus lanes along the edges of Patrick and Henry streets would bring noisy and heavy buses within feet of their historic homes.
Currently, the city requires that trucks drive in the middle lanes to prevent their vibrations from damaging the houses.
Residents also said they worry the city would have to eliminate 200 parking spots in their parking-strapped neighborhood to accommodate the new bus lanes, and that the proposed route would mainly serve Arlington and Fairfax residents traveling between the Pentagon and Fort Belvoir.
“The idea that this is primarily serving Alexandria’s citizens I just don’t buy,” Grove said.
Task force member Maria Wasowski told The Examiner the route would serve Potomac Yard and Del Ray residents who live too far from the Crystal City and Braddock Road Metro stations to walk to them.
She also said the plan is not meant to suggest that Route 1 is the only option for a north-south transit lane.
“The idea was to propose some general concepts of where the area’s rapid transit corridors would be, and the precise routing of those would be determined at some laterdate by some other body,” she said.
Bus lanes
Transit corridors recommended by the task force:
» Route 1: A dedicated bus or light-rail lane would run through Alexandria along Route 1 and coordinate with Arlington and Fairfax counties to provide seamless service between the Pentagon to the north and Fort Belvoir to the south.
» Duke Street: This corridor would loop around Alexandria’s East Eisenhower area and then run west past Landmark Mall to the city’s border with Fairfax County, which would coordinate connections to Fairfax City.
» Van Dorn/Beauregard: This corridor would begin at Alexandria’s northern border with Arlington along Beauregard Street and travel south to the Van Dorn Metro station, with Fairfax and Arlington providing connections to Shirlington, the Pentagon and Kingstowne.
