I understand all of the issues, but there are buildings that are PLENTY older than that which are still in service. Heck, half of New York City is woefully outdated, per your standards of being "ridden hard." My point is, the County should at least try to think of ways it can recoup on its prior investments, instead of just assuming that spending a billion dollars (which is what this is going t
Forum: Fairfax County General

Their $158 million dollar estimate for the 8-story replacement is pretty laughable, too. Anyone remember what the original estimate for the billion dollar headquarters complex was? $83 million dollars. (http://is.gd/jH4VAg) How much did it cost to build, in the era of "intelligent" government (at least, compared to the mindless simps we have on the Board of Supervisors today)? $900 million.
Forum: Fairfax County General

Ridiculous. The county should look into selling this building to law firms that do business in the area, instead of soaking the taxpayers on BOTH ends of the deal. There's got to be something that could be gained in marketing the prestige of having a law office on the literal doorsteps of the courthouse.
Forum: Fairfax County General

See http://ruralfairfax.com/ for more examples. Fairfax County is actually quite aggressive about demolishing abandoned property, so it's hard to find anything that's hung around for a while.
Forum: Fairfax County General

The fire affected 4 homes-and displaced 22 people? Wow. Couldn't agree with the McMansion-bashing above enough. It is shameful that we have allowed such unnecessarily dense construction (considering how plentiful land in Ashburn is). Zoning really needs a reset back to reasonable levels, so entire blocks can't go up like this.
Forum: Off-Topic

I knew about it -- Been trying to get permission from Belvoir's PAO for a while now to go and get pictures of it, but haven't had any luck so far. I do think someone published some photos for an article at one point in time, but I don't recall where I saw that.
Forum: Fairfax County General

DPZ and the BOS have been discussing it. Mostly seems to be contractors so far, though I expect the shopping strips along Backlick Rd to start disappearing/getting rebuilt once these office buildings start getting populated. (All of this development is driven by the BRAC efforts at Belvoir North Post, for what it's worth.)
Forum: Fairfax County General

A parking lot, from what I understand. The major office development is going in on the other side of Loisdale Rd.
Forum: Fairfax County General

Heh, that's peanuts compared to some of FCPS' finest.
Forum: Falls Church

From the NTSB's report: "On November 13, 2008, the NTSB released the findings of its investigation. The primary cause was the under-sized gusset plates, at 0.5 inches (13 mm) thick. Contributing to that design or construction error was the fact that 2 inches (51 mm) of concrete were added to the road surface over the years, increasing the dead load by 20%. Also contributing was the extraordinary
Forum: Off-Topic

Of course, I will say that here in Virginia, VDOT is doing a phenomenal job of not making even the perfunctory effort at maintaining our roads. How many thousands of miles of storm drains do we have in Fairfax County alone, where every drain has some plant or another growing out of it due to all of the debris that the third-world VDOT contractors dump down there each time they mow. Or how about
Forum: Off-Topic

> Possible meanings of "a redefinition > of desired standards" would include a > bridge build 40 years ago to carry 20,000 > cars per day that cannot support the current > volume of of 35,000 care per day. That's > not dangerous? Are all 35,000 cars on the bridge at the same time? If not, then the bridge will most likely hold up. (It will certainly need to be repaved more o
Forum: Off-Topic

Looks like the Hunter Motel over in Lorton is getting knocked down. It's been sitting vacant for about a year now, so I figured it was only a matter of time.
Forum: Fairfax County General

You say that as if ANY class-action lawsuit has ever resulted in any tangible benefit for members of the "class" that was a party to the lawsuit, versus the slimeball ambulance chasers that "represent" them.
Forum: Off-Topic

So what the county is trying to say is that it's not REALLY necessary to dump millions of dollars into schools to generate good grades, since Jefferson has had almost no renovations in the 40 or so years that it's been around, and it remains one of the top schools in the nation? Good to know. On All School Bonds, Vote No!
Forum: Fairfax County General

QuoteWhen I read through the attached articles I also read some of the comments. In the article it gave the name of a company that is involved, unendibted though, as "Company A". Then in one of the comments someone speculated that Company A might be Agilex that is in Chantilly. Question is, does anyone know anything about this about Agilex being involved? I have dealt with Agilex in the past an
Forum: Fairfax County General

PS: I see where the confusion's coming from, Eesh. Bad design on my part. Each of the photos is intended to stand on its own, they're not supposed to be read all as a single article, but the site really clutters everything up when you look at groups of related photos. What can I say? I stink on ice! :)
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Eesh: No doubt. I'm the weirdest! (In my defense, it's no fun being covered in ticks.) VEIK: Thanks very much! :)
Forum: Fairfax County General

It's abandoned, but watched over by the neighbors. The main house was built in 1779, and the barn dates to 1904; Both are in a state of near collapse. I've got photos of the site here, if you're interested: http://ruralfairfax.com/taxonomy/term/24
Forum: Fairfax County General

Are we really going through this mess again? http://snappedshot.com/archives/1192-GMU-Still-Slouching-Towards-Dhimmitude.html
Forum: Off-Topic

They suck HARD down in the lower Springfield/Lorton area. Avoid 'em like the plague!
Forum: Fairfax County General

I'm guessing this means that the City of Fairfax set their business "Revitalization" tax rates way too high, no? Way to go, Aces.
Forum: Fairfax City

Some of it, yeah. I definitely remember when Pohick, Telegraph, and Ox roads were all two lanes. It really was a different (by which I mean "nicer") world back then! ;)
Forum: Fairfax County General

Johnny Walker Wrote: ------------------------------------------------------- > Yesyes liberal media conservatives are oppressed > blahblahblah I did say "IMO," jerk. (Feel free to link to all of the in-depth investigative stories the Washington Post has done on left-leaning churches in our area. I dare ya!)
Forum: Fairfax County General

I will say this - The Washington Post only cares about this story because Truro is a conservative church. If this scandal were happening in one of the area's more liberal congregations (you dastardly Presbyterians, I'm looking at you! ;) ), this story would have never been written. IMO, of course.
Forum: Fairfax County General

We're all sinners, unfortunately. Stuff like this will happen whenever there are humans involved.
Forum: Fairfax County General

Got a map, lay? I'd love to run by and check it out!
Forum: Fairfax County General

No problem! It's amazing how fast Chantilly transformed from a backwater into the tech central it is today.
Forum: Fairfax County General

The linear patterns in the trees are from the farm fields that existed here up until 20 years ago. 1981: http://www.historicaerials.com/?poi=13615
Forum: Fairfax County General

It's in the old Juvenile prison -- you can see it in Bing's aerial imagery. And unless something has changed within the past couple of months or so, that building is absolutely still there. (Did they empty it out or something?) http://is.gd/fYRwU
Forum: Fairfax County General