A big hoo hah for Northern Va. Transportation

I've worked on two citizen committees here where I live. One was the roadways and pathways committee for our ambitious new parking facility in the VRE parking lot. The other was the new library building within walking distance to my house. Yessir!

Saturday there were two ground breaking ceremonies. One was for the PARKING LOT of the new library facility, which I didn't bother to attend (but here's a picture of the new parking lot anyway).



Why a ceremony for a parking lot? Well, to build the parking facility over at the train station, we will need SOME form parking relief for most of a year. Hundreds of spaces will disappear while this thing is being built. What do the riders do in the meantime?

The answer is to build shuttle parking at the new library parking lot (for communities south of the tracks) and hopefully my church will provide day parking for communities north of the tracks. Not optimal, perhaps, but better than getting tickets for illegal parking.

Gar and I did attend the facility ground breaking, and it was like a Who's Who in Northern Virginia politics.

Sharon Bulova, my district supervisor, emceed the occasion.

That's the facility architectural drawing behind her.



Congressman Tom Davis made some comments, very short and pithy... mostly about his efforts to get funding for VRE (which have been singularly succesful). That's an EZBus behind him, one of the subscription shuttles that move people to the railway station every day.



The drawing there is the side view. It will be a great facility.. very green, with self watering plants and a clock tower. Nice design.



Dale Zehner, CEO of VRE (who rides the same train in I do every day and is always eager to talk about VRE problems) makes some remarks



Let's fling dirt for the camera!!!