Ballston-Virginia Square:
A Mini-Urban Village

By Linda Wheeler
Washington Post Staff Writer
January 21, 1995

The county-made marriage of Ballston and Virginia Square in Arlington has created one of the jurisdiction's largest neighborhoods, one known as much for its commercial vitality as for a broad range of housing styles.

Unlike many of the adjoining neighborhoods, Ballston-Virginia Square has an urban feel with high-rise condominium buildings, major hotel and office buildings, as well as two Metro stations. Construction cranes continue to appear on the skyline as developers build yet more tall commercial buildings, while in residential pockets off busy Fairfax Drive, town houses are under construction.

"There is a certain critical mass, a point at which an urban center is created, and we are very close to creating that ambiance," said Robert Sherretta, president of the Ballston-Virginia Square Civic Association. "We do that block to block. A couple more of the blocks need to be filled in and that will make the difference."

Sherretta, 35, is an investment counselor who was drawn to his neighborhood five years ago when he moved to Virginia from New York. He said real estate agents tried to direct him to some of the livelier neighborhoods of Washington but he didn't want to live in the city again.

"I took one look and saw all the inner-city problems I wanted to leave behind," he said. "Here in Arlington I found the perfect combination of a mini-urban village with suburban advantages."

The neighborhood that Sherretta has embraced is bounded by Interstate 66, North Kirkwood Road, Wilson Boulevard and North Glebe Road. It draws its name from an early shopping center called Virginia Square that is now gone and Ballston, an old neighborhood name dating back to the 1920s. The Metro stations, each located on North Fairfax Drive, reflect the names of each side of the neighborhood as well.

Deem Gilmore, vice president of the civic association and a longtime resident, said the two neighborhoods were joined together for the convenience of the county about 15 years ago. Prior to that, his side of the neighborhood, Ballston, had organized associations as the need arose, but he sees the 10-year-old civic association as longer lasting.

"I think the county board decided they had too many neighborhoods to deal with so they just consolidated some of them," Gilmore said. "Some residents were not too happy about being lumped together. I think the Virginia Square sector has been very helpful."

There are about 4,000 residents in the area, with renters as well as homeowners. Besides the commercial and transportation attractions, the neighborhood also has within its boundaries the central county library, Page Elementary School, Washington and Lee High School, the George Mason University School of Law and the headquarters for the National Science Foundation. On the other side of North Glebe Road is Marymount University's Ballston campus and across North Fairfax Drive is a shopping mall, Ballston Common.

Nancy Iacomini, a civic association member who rents an apartment on the Virginia Square side of the neighborhood, said she doesn't think of her neighborhood as urban as much as having a "spine of development three blocks deep.

"This doesn't feel like Chicago or New York," said Iacomini, a 36-year-old assistant director in the office of congressional liaison for the National Endowment for the Arts. "A block from the commercial development is classic suburbia."

Through numerous meetings between several community groups and the Arlington County Board, an agreement was reached about 15 years ago on how commercial development would proceed along the major corridors. The tallest buildings, some 20 stories high, border major corridors and then the allowed height is reduced as commercial use meets residential use.

The meetings over new development go on even now as the civic association and others urge the county to mandate more parking spaces for new construction as well as have a say in land use issues.

Sherretta counts as a civic association victory an agreement with the National Rural Electrical Cooperative Association to include within its building, still under construction, space for groups like his to meet as well as a concert hall that will bring live entertainment to the neighborhood. He said the trade-off was that the association got to build a taller building then neighbors wanted.

"I think people sometimes see us as cranky but we are trying to do the best we can as a little group dealing with development issues," said Sherretta, who owns a condominium near the Virginia Square Metro station.

Gilmore, 72, who has lived in the community since 1926, applauds the changes that have occurred in his neighborhood. He said that when he moved there as a young child, it was a rural area with a small shopping district on North Fairfax Drive near North Stuart Street.

"Back then in the 1930s, life was a lot simpler, but I don't call it the good old days," the retired accountant said. "Now it is quite urbanized around here, a whole lot of it coming after the Metro station opened."

Gilmore said many property owners in the the Ballston part of the neighborhood had allowed their buildings to run down and the arrival of Metro and subsequent development has only improved the area.

"Before Metro, we had a lot of vacant lots with abandoned cars and junk," he said. "All these developments, the town houses in between Washington Boulevard and Fairfax Drive, are a great improvement."

Newly built town houses, high-rise condominiums and older, free-standing homes are available and selling in the Ballston-Virginia Square area, said Coldwell Banker, Stevens real estate agent Lynne Brock.

"What people want is to be able to walk to Metro," she said. "That is the draw. And in this neighborhood, we have just about every architectural style anyone could want."

She said there are 38 condominiums on the market, ranging in price from $80,000 to $360,000. In the past 18 months, 79 condominiums have sold. New town houses range in price from about $165,000 to about $300,000, with 22 on the market, and 54 have sold in the same time period, she said.

The free-standing houses, including small bungalows and larger Victorians, range from about $200,000 to $450,000, she said, with 15 available for sale.

Brock said buyers are usually young professionals or older couples without children because of the prices and the lack of yards.

"Here you get less for your money in terms of space and yard," she said. "A little further out, you can get a little more for the same price. But the Metro stations are here and the bars and restaurants."

With the urban-like setting also has come some crime, Sherretta said.

Civic association secretary Ernest Ragland took a detailed survey of residents in 1993 and again last year. Thirty percent of the 2,400 households sent the questionnaire responded and 90 percent of them identified themselves as homeowners.

In a 20-page newsletter published by the civic association, those who responded to the 34-question survey ranked crime as a major concern, an increase in that category over the first survey. Sherretta said residents have complained about house burglaries, stolen autos and car break-ins.

"Sometimes these survey results run counter to what I want," he said. "But they are meticulously done. Crime was a surprise to me. I personally have never had a problem."

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