After a busy spring and summer, the Alexandria City Council will consider permanently changing its special event policy to allow for large events with 500+ people on consecutive weekends.
City Council approved a waiver earlier this summer, as well as last year, allowing for large events on consecutive weekends. They will consider the permanent change in a meeting on Tuesday (Sept. 12).
The City of Alexandria has a new Director of Transportation and Environmental Services to oversee some of the biggest ongoing projects in the city.
City Manager Jim Parajon appointed Adriana Castañeda to lead the department.
(Updated 12:30 p.m.) The massive WestEnd Alexandria project is taking shape, as the Planning Commission tonight will weigh in on a number of proposals by site development partner Foulger-Pratt.
Nearly half the 52-acre West End Alexandria development is devoted to the Inova at Landmark (the eventual home of Alexandria Hospital), and the rest of the property has been divvied into a multi-block town center. The redevelopment will include new apartment buildings, pavilions, restaurants, rooftop open space and more.
The bottom line at a panel on housing last night: housing is unaffordable in Alexandria and likely won’t get cheaper without more construction.
Last night, the City of Alexandria hosted a panel of experts to discuss the state of housing in the city — from a look back at the evolution of the city’s zoning code to projections and trends in the housing market. The panel is part of the city’s ongoing Zoning for Housing/Housing for All project, which aims to reshape zoning in the city to be more accessible, affordable and available.
Homes, schools and businesses around Alexandria are being recognized for their work to make the city sparkle a little more.
On Monday, the Alexandria Beautification Commission announced the winners of the Residential Beautification Award, celebrating the creative use of non-invasive plants, native plants, landscape architecture and more.
Dozens of protestors rallied against Alexandria’s zoning for housing plan in front of City Hall on Monday.
The rally was spearheaded by The Coalition for a Livable Alexandria, a group founded this year by residents to talk about complex issues. If approved, the zoning plan overhaul would reshape a number of zoning ordinances, including a bonus height amendment that incentivizes developers to add affordable housing to projects in exchange for two additional stories of construction in areas where height limits are 45 feet or more.
The City of Alexandria is taking its massive zoning reform aimed at making housing more affordable to the community this fall.
In Alexandria, around 20% of households are paying over 30% of their income in housing, and around 10% are spending more than 50% on housing.
After years in development, Alexandria leaders and students cut a blue ribbon and toured the rebuilt Douglas MacArthur Elementary School today.
“It feels like I’m floating through the school and marveling at each and every new feature that has been brought from design to full construction,” Principal Penny Hairston said at the ribbon cutting. “The only thing that’s missing are all of our students, and they will be here soon to enjoy this modern and welcoming school building.”
Salma Faqirzaava wants to be an attorney, but that future was impossible in Afghanistan. Now she’s back in school and learning English in Alexandria.
Eight months ago, Salma and her parents moved to Alexandria, where she enrolled in Alexandria City High School, finding herself navigating the busy hallways of the second largest high school in Virginia.
City-approved plans for the future of the Torpedo Factory Art Center are drawing serious concern from resident artists.
The Torpedo Factory Artists Association (TFAA) says it’s hopeful the plan will work, but that the city’s vibrancy initiative threatens to reduce rental space available to artists.
(Updated 3 p.m.) Alexandria’s teen pregnancy rate is falling, although Hispanic girls are disproportionately high, according to new data presented by the city.
The numbers are on the rise for Hispanic girls, with 22.4 pregnancies for every 1,000 female ages 15 to 17 reported in 2021, according to the Alexandria Campaign on Adolescent Pregnancy (ACAP), part of the Department of Community & Human Services. That’s an 8% increase from the previous year, but still below the 26 pregnancies per 1,000 females reported in 2020.
