Alexandria is looking for ways to relieve businesses from the years-long renovation impacts of City Hall and Market Square in Old Town.
With parking temporarily halted on the streets next to the property at 301 King Street, sidewalks closed and the sound of continual construction, businesses in a one-block radius of the building are feeling the effects.
Today’s Cargo (117 N. Fairfax Street) is having an unusually slow summer, staff told ALXnow.
“Business is dead right now,” Today’s Cargo assistant manager Lisa Shumate told ALXnow. “In the afternoons after school has started, people should be out enjoying themselves and they’re not coming here.”
The renovation of City Hall, Market Square and an underground parking garage is expected to be completed by fall 2028.
Carla Clarke, the owner of Today’s Cargo, is asking the city for financial relief, tax and fee relief, dedicated parking, complimentary parking passes, promotional directional signage and city-funded advertising.
“The businesses immediately surrounding the project are effectively bearing a disproportionate share of the economic cost of a public improvement,” Clark wrote in a letter to Mayor Alyia Gaskins. “Financial assistance would help ensure that these established businesses remain viable throughout the construction period and are still here to benefit from the completed project.”
City staff recently organized a meeting with businesses that surround City Hall to get their feedback on potential solutions. Media was not invited to the meeting.
“What I appreciate is that there’s a lot of ideas here, and every idea may not work,” Gaskins said at Tuesday night’s (Sept. 8) City Council meeting. “Some may work better in the summer than they do in the winter, but I think it gives us a chance to kind of at least hear back where we’re seeing the greatest impacts and where we might need to make some adjustments.”
Tourism is also down next door to Today’s Cargo at the Carlyle House Historic Park, which is owned by the Northern Virginia Regional Park Authority. NOVA Parks staff participated in the recent meeting with city staff and local businesses.
“We have definitely seen impacts due to the moving of the farmer’s market, the loss of street parking, the loss of the parking garage and just general challenges with foot traffic,” NOVA Parks Executive Director Justin Wilson, a former mayor of the city, told ALXnow. “We recognize it’s a big project and we look forward to its successful completion.”
So far, an interdepartmental task force convened by the city manager will meet monthly. The task force, which includes representatives from the city’s tourism bureau Visit Alexandria, made the following recommendations:
- Making partnerships with nearby garages, and looking into parking subsidies, discounts, waivers, and validation programs that businesses can use
- Making an evaluation of tour bus parking, which will take several months. Tour buses are currently parked up a block from their usual location on King Street at City Hall to Tavern Square
- Highlighting businesses adjacent to City Hall in a small video series
- The City would put out advance notice of city events and seasonal activities
- Promotion of available parking areas and waiving a wayfinding participation fee for businesses
Ebony Fleming, the city’s communications director, briefed City Council on potential solutions. She said that the city will reevaluate whether the plan is working in January.
“We are meeting with the City Hall-adjacent businesses to hear from them their concerns about what they’re seeing on the ground, what impacts the renovation has really brought to their doorsteps, and the way we’re doing this is [to] collaborate, promote and connect,” Fleming said.
City Councilman Canek Aguirre advised the city to move cautiously.
“I’m all for advertising the parking so that people know where to go,” Aguirre said. “I think it’s a little bit of a fine line if we start advertising for those businesses.”
City Manager Jim Parajon said that the plan is not set in stone.
“There’s lots of reasons that businesses succeed and don’t succeed,” Parajon told City Council. “We might start in this spot and maybe pivot based on what’s happening.”
