It was the best of times and the worst of times for many Alexandrians this week.
Monday’s snowstorm shut down many services around the area — delaying trash pickup, canceling bus service, and more — but also offered some winter fun around Alexandria.
With the Omicron variant situation sending Alexandria’s COVID numbers skyrocketing, several New Year’s events like First Night are being canceled.
A majority of poll respondents last week said their holiday travel plans weren’t being affected by COVID-19 and they still planned to travel.
Has the spread of the COVID-19 Omicron variant affected your holiday plans?
The Omicron variant accounts for 73% of new coronavirus infections, federal officials said last week. In Alexandria, the city saw roughly 800 new reported cases within a week, though some of that comes from record-high levels of COVID testing ahead of the holidays.
The Campagna Center is hosting the 50th annual Scottish Christmas Walk Weekend with the iconic parade scheduled for Saturday, Dec.4.
The parade is scheduled to start at 11 a.m. and will be marshaled by Sen. Mark Warner. The event is planned to start at St. Asaph and Queen Streets and end outside City Hall.
In this month’s “Most Expensive” column, there were some eye-popping home sale prices over the last month, with some topping over $4 million.
For starters: there are currently 374 homes listed for sale in the city, according to Homesnap. There are 263 condominiums listed for sale and 70 townhouses — fewer in all categories than last month. The median list price is $477,000 and the median sales price is $615,000.
Thanksgiving is scheduled for later this week, so do you have any travel plans for this upcoming week?
Last year, during some of the peak COVID-19 numbers, a majority of poll respondents said they weren’t planning to travel for the holidays. Last year, the vaccines had not been approved yet and daily cases were trending upwards. The latter is true again this year, but it’s generally much safer to be around family provided everyone takes some precautions.
Electric buses have had a big boost this past month in Alexandria, with DASH laying out future plans for its all-electric fleet and Alexandria City Public Schools (ACPS) welcomed five new electric buses to the school’s fleet.
But electric buses have also faced some technological hurdles as well. DASH leadership noted that the buses struggle with hills and highways, and they also lack some of the heating of traditional diesel buses where the heat is supplied by the output from the engine.
The city is moving forward with a pilot program that could — deliberately — make traffic slower on residential streets near Duke Street to push more drivers onto the main arterial roads.
Phase 1 of the new program, scheduled to start in January and run through March, would change signal timing along Duke Street and nearby roads, punishing drivers using residential streets to get to Telegraph Road and I-395 beyond that with longer wait times. Phase 2, which would start next fall, would prohibit access to Telegraph Road from West Taylor Run Parkway.
It’s November, which means it’s time for a new round of everyone’s favorite Alexandria game show: what does the housing market look like for the city?
For starters: there are currently 485 homes listed for sale in the city, according to Homesnap. There are 316 condominiums listed for sale and 109 townhouses. The median list price is $519,950 and the median sales price is $615,000. That’s about a 13% uptick in median sales prices but overall not outside of the ordinary.
The Metro is operating at 40% service after the 7000 series railcars were pulled from service to be inspected for the same defect that recently caused a derailment in Arlington.
Metro has said that passengers should expect to wait up to 40 minutes for service on the Blue, Orange, Yellow, Green and Silver lines.
Months after the majority of Alexandria residents were fully vaccinated, coronavirus precautions now turn toward booster shots aimed at keeping those vaccinations effective.
A Pfizer vaccine booster has already been approved and yesterday a Food and Drug Administration (FDA) advisory panel authorized booster shots for Moderna’s vaccine.
