Hostile Territory for Travel by Foot

Every now and then Supervisor Sharon S. Bulova (D-Braddock) takes a one-mile walk along Lee Highway from her townhouse off Shirley Gate Road to a small shopping center, where she frequents a favorite Chinese restaurant. It's not a pleasant trip.

"You've never lived until you've tried to make it up Lee Highway from Shirley Gate," she said.

There is no sidewalk. On some stretches, there is scarcely a shoulder. As traffic barrels by, slender strips of grass and gravel vanish and reappear amid the empty cans of Red Bull and old signs for open houses and junk haulers. At one small bridge over a drainage channel, there is no clearance at all for a walker.

Those on foot in Fairfax County, along Lee Highway, Route 50 or in Tysons Corner, often must improvise.

With the county rapidly urbanizing, and more residents taking to their feet for transportation or exercise, the demand for "pedestrian connectivity" -- plannerese for a coherent sidewalk network -- is on the rise.

As Fairfax grew from a country crossroads to a mega-suburb where car was king, sidewalks were often an afterthought. Some early subdivisions were required to provide sidewalks on only one side of a street. Even then, regulations were fluid.

Gross said that when she took office 10 years ago, developers routinely secured waivers of sidewalk requirements, arguing that they were pointless because they would not link to a larger existing network.

As young families with school-age children move into these older established neighborhoods, the issue has taken on more urgency.

Mantua, a community of 1950s and '60s-vintage Colonials and ramblers just outside the Beltway, is extolled in an ad by one real estate agent for its "old trees, large lots and houses set back from sidewalk-free streets."

Mantua is not exactly sidewalk-free. In fact, it is a testament to sketchy planning and loose regulation. On the streets near Mantua Elementary School on Horner Court, the sidewalks ebb and flow.

Kirkwood Drive has a sidewalk down one side, as does Southwick Street. But Lido Place has none. It also has a heavy flow of morning rush-hour traffic from Little River Turnpike, with motorists seeking a shortcut to Route 50.

There have been no accidents yet, but there is constant anxiety.