Arlington Forest:
Parks Are Among the Perks

By Linda Wheeler
Washington Post Staff Writer
January 22, 1994

Chuck Carter strings 600 lights around a giant holly tree at the Arlington Forest Shopping Center each year to mark Christmas, and then begins organizing a spring yard sale that attracts more than 100 families from his community.

"I've volunteered all my life," the retired firefighter and community association vice president said. "I got asked to help 15 years ago and I just do it every year. It's what neighborhoods are all about."

Carter and his family own one of the 850 houses in the 54-year-old neighborhood of Arlington Forest, an early planned community of tree-lined streets, substantial colonial brick homes and a period shopping center. It is divided by Arlington Boulevard into a south section with about 120 homes and a north section with the remaining houses. The entire community is bounded by Henderson Road, Four Mile Run Drive, Carlin Springs Road and George Mason Drive.

Residents point to the three parks -- Bluemont, Lubber Run and Glencarlyn -- within the community as one of the special ingredients that made their neighborhood attractive to new residents in 1940 and still attracts buyers today.

Casey O'Neal, a Prudential Preferred Properties real estate agent and Arlington Forest resident, said potential buyers often are swayed by the parks. "They are right there and so it is easy to go for a jog or take the kids out to play," he said.

O'Neal said 46 houses in the community sold at an average price of $207,000 in 1993, and 36 houses sold for an average price of $212,000 the year before.

It was Glencarlyn Park, which borders their south Arlington Forest home, that drew Cheryl and Lee Siebert to the community eight years ago.

"The biggest advantage for us is having access to the park," said Lee Siebert, a geologist at the Smithsonian Institution who bikes to work every day. "It is like living in the country."

The Sieberts decided they wanted to see the park as well as use it and three years ago, put a glass-walled addition on the back of their home. Lee Siebert said the key to the renovation was taking out a chimney at the rear when they put in a new high-efficiency furnace that only needed a vent. That allowed them to add the sun room, with its 180-degree view of the park.

They built their addition after a house tour held every three years for residents to look at alterations and renovations of other Arlington Forest homes. Because most of the houses were built on the same plan, what one owner does can usually be easily translated to another house.

Carter said he converted a side porch to a country kitchen after seeing how others had done the same thing.

The Sieberts were in charge of the community's Neighborhood Conservation Plan, which won county approval in 1991. In Arlington, the county encourages neighborhoods to develop a formal plan that delineates goals and identifies problems.

"It is a baseline document, a reference tool," Lee Siebert said.

The Arlington Forest plan is written as a 41-page booklet, complete with history, maps and statistics. The earliest landowner of record was John Colville, a land speculator and shipowner, who purchased what is now Arlington Forest and other adjoining land from the British government. In 1754, he authorized a grist mill to grind corn and wheat on Lubber Run.

Thirteen years later, a railway was constructed from Alexandria to Bluemont in the Blue Ridge Mountains along Four Mile Run. Water from Four Mile Run was used to fill the train boilers. During the Civil War, engineers frequently complained that their boilers sudsed over as a result of thousands of Union soldiers who had camped along the stream using the water to wash their clothes.

The railroad, with a station at Carlin Springs, remained in use until 1941 for commuters, and then as a mail and freight route until 1968. The right of way for the railroad is now the Washington and Old Dominion Regional Trail.

Other than pavilions built for use as dance halls and restaurants at Carlin Springs, the area remained mostly forest and farmland until Arlington Forest was built.

In 1936, a subdivision named Parmalee was proposed for the site. So rural was the area that a plan filed at the courthouse specified "no chickens, hogs, cows, horses, goats or other livestock, or animals, excepting house pets, shall be allowed to be installed."

Parmalee was never built and the land was bought by Monroe Warren in 1938. He chose the name Arlington Forest because of the wooded setting of his development.

Architect Robert O. Scholz designed a standard house for the community and offered variations on the basic plan. The two-story, 1,144-square-foot brick houses sold for $5,990 in 1939, with a fireplace or garage added on for another $500 each. Monthly payments for a 25-year loan at 4.5 percent interest was $38.82.

At the time, the developer laid power and telephone lines in back yards rather than along the street, as was common at the time. Parallel service roads, a buffer park strip and the small shopping center, all part of the developer's plans, were considered innovations in 1940.

Since then, a recreation center and swimming pool have been added.

The Arlington Forest Citizens Association was formed in 1940 and began distributing a newsletter in 1942. In continuous publication since then, the 12-page newsletter, called the Arlington Forester, is now edited by Chris and Karen Scheer.

The newsletter reflects a community that is quite involved in protecting its residential character, getting residents to participate in neighborhood projects and keeping everyone up on news of births, graduations, new arrivals and deaths.

The most recent issue has news from the local schools, concerns about commuters cutting through the neighborhood and the proposed expansion of the shopping center. The crime listings are few and deal mostly with automobile break-ins.

The most popular issue each year, according to Carter, is the one that announces the annual yard sale in April or May. It comes complete with a map showing the locations of each of the participating families.

"Each family holds their own sale in front of their house," Carter said. "Usually someone grabs a map and is off to see what the neighbors are selling, leaving someone behind to run the sale. I hear complaints from both sides on that."

Carter said sometimes people find something for sale they lent a neighbor years ago and get to take it back. And one time, a house got sold through casual conversation, one neighbor telling another about retirement plans.

Carter said baby clothes, exercise machines, games and furniture are always popular. Sometimes there are cars for sale.

"I always go out and see what I can find," he said. "One time I found a seven-foot-tall antique musket used for duck hunting. It was really great. I wish I'd bought it."

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