Arlington County’s police and fire departments will commemorate National Night Out by holding neighborhood visits at events across the county from 5-9 p.m. tonight (Aug. 7).
In its 35th year, National Night Out strives to build relationships between police and the communities they serve, in part to help increase crime prevention awareness.
The county invites residents to “lock their doors, turn on outside lights and spend an evening outside with neighbors, police officers, firefighters and elected officials.”
Events will be held at the following locations:
Arlington Forest (200 block of N. Galveston Street) at 7:45 p.m.
Cathcart Springs (4600 block of 4th Road N.) at 6:30 p.m.
Nauck Town Square (24th Road S. and S. Shirlington Road) from 5-7 p.m.
Park Glen (824 S. Arlington Mill Drive, between buildings 812-816) at 6:30 p.m.
The Observation Deck at CEB Tower (1800 N. Lynn Street) from 5-9 p.m.
A daughter of one of Arlington’s “Lawyer Moms of America” preps a lemonade stand (courtesy of Natalie Roisman)
County Board member Libby Garvey attends an Alexandria rally with Arlington activists (courtesy of Natalie Roisman)
Ordinarily, it wouldn’t be big news that some kids and their parents plan to sell some lemonade around Arlington on a late-July day — but the lemonade stands popping up around the county this weekend come with a bit more of a message than most.
Activists with the group “Lawyer Moms of America” are setting up several stands in Arlington and other locations around Northern Virginia tomorrow (Saturday), as part of a national demonstration dubbed “Kids Take a Stand.” Parents and kids alike plan to use the event to raise money to hasten the reunification of families separated at the Mexican border.
While the Trump administration has managed to reunite roughly 1,400 children, from ages 5 to 17, with their families ahead of a court-imposed deadline, hundreds of other kids remain in government custody without any connection to their parents.
Though public outrage over the Trump administration’s since-reversed family separation policy has died down, Lawyer Moms of America is hoping to use Saturday’s demonstration to re-focus attention on the issue by putting their own kids in the spotlight.
“The women who founded Lawyer Moms of America heard first-hand accounts from lawyers who knew what was happening with these families at the border,” Natalie Roisman, an Arlington resident and member of the group’s national organizing team, wrote in a statement. “The immediate response was, ‘We have to do something.’ The next step was to think about how we – as lawyer moms – could uniquely contribute and do something effective. We have focused on education, advocacy and fundraising, and now we wanted to do something that would allow our kids to be directly involved.”
Roisman says the group will set up one stand at the intersection of N. Harrison Street and 8th Road N. in the Bluemont neighborhood, with another planned for Arlington Forest. She adds that stands will also be set up in the Waynewood area of Alexandria, at the Falls Church Farmers Market and in Reston, and more could pop up by the time Saturday arrives.
All proceeds of the lemonade sales will go to Project Corazon, an effort organized by the Lawyers for Good Government Foundation to provide immigrants at the border with legal services.
N. Edison Street and N. Carlin Springs Road in Bluemont (via Arlington County)
N. Edison Street and N. Carlin Springs Road in Bluemont (via Arlington County)
N. Edison Street and N. Carlin Springs Road in Bluemont (via Arlington County)
After a man was struck by a car in the middle of a Bluemont intersection, some of his neighbors see new urgency for their years-long effort to force the county to improve conditions for pedestrians in the area.
County police say Eric Larsen was crossing N. Carlin Springs Road near its intersection with N. Edison Street early in the morning last Monday (July 16), when a car slammed into him. Larsen was taken to George Washington University hospital with non-life threatening injuries, and neighbors say he’s still recovering from some broken bones caused by the crash.
Police spokeswoman Ashley Savage says “charges are pending” against the driver, but people living in the area see the intersection’s design deficiencies as the real cause of the crash.
Lora Strine, who lives in the Arlington Forest neighborhood nearby, says her citizens’ association has pressed the county for changes in the area going back to at least 2016. She points out that Carlin Springs is a popular option for walkers looking to reach the Ballston Metro, as Larsen was at the time of the accident, or even the Safeway near the intersection of Wilson Blvd and N. George Mason Drive.
Yet Strine says the area lacks clearly marked crosswalks or traffic calming measures to slow drivers, particularly on such a wide road, and she can’t understand why it’s taken the county so long to address the issue.
“This accident is not really an accident,” Strine told ARLnow. “It’s really been years in the making.”
Arlington officials point out that they’re hardly ignoring the area, however.
County transportation spokesman Eric Balliet says workers plan to install a flashing sign that can be activated by pedestrians crossing Carlin Springs near the road’s intersection with N. Harrison Street, just a few blocks from the Larsen crash. That signal should be in place as soon as next month.
Balliet added that the county is also planning some curb extensions and crosswalk improvements all along Carlin Springs, leading up to Edison Street, with work set to start in the spring of 2019 and wrap up the following year.
But Strine feels that’s far too long for the neighborhood to wait, and managed to secure a meeting with county staff and County Board member John Vihstadt to make that argument.
Vihstadt says “the jury is still out” in terms of how, exactly, the Board might be able to speed up the construction, though he certainly agrees with Strine’s assessment of the intersection. He’s spent the last year or so working with Arlington Forest residents on the issue, and he sees a need for the county to act quickly, as development in Ballston continues to ramp up and bring people to the area.
“That’s an awful long time to wait for these measures,” Vihstadt said. said. “I don’t find that acceptable at all.”
At the very least, Vihstadt hopes to see the county beef up the webpage displaying details about the road improvements to keep neighbors better informed.
But even if Vihstadt can successfully convince officials to speed up construction, Strine worries that the work won’t actually slow cars speeding along Carlin Springs. She’d much rather see an additional stop light in the area, or even a stop sign, to bring speeds down.
“They’re wasting time and money by making changes that we know aren’t going to work,” Strine said. “These are just incremental changes: another Band-Aid, as one of my neighbors said.”
While county officials are confident that their planned changes will indeed slow passing cars, Vihstadt agreed that he wants to see the county do more to take into account “context-specific considerations” raised by neighbors about local road projects.
Overall, he lamented that this latest community clash is indicative of a pattern he’s seen all around Arlington in recent years, and provides a clear example of how the county still struggles to balance traffic congestion and pedestrian safety.
“While we like to say that our public policies like ‘the car-free diet‘ are having a positive impact on Arlington traffic, and I think they are, a lot of neighborhoods don’t yet feel that way,” Vihstadt said.
The Sense of Place cafe after an overnight burglary (courtesy of Anna Seo)
The Sense of Place cafe after an overnight burglary
The Sense of Place cafe after an overnight burglary
The unusual overnight burglary of an Arlington Forest coffee shop has left its owners scratching their heads about what prompted the theft.
Employees at the Sense of Place Cafe, located at 4807 1st Street N. just off Arlington Blvd, arrived early this morning (Wednesday) to discover the glass in their front door smashed in and the cash register emptied. Co-owner Kay Kim expects the thieves made off with about $150 in all.
However, Kim was puzzled that the burglars left the restaurant’s expensive espresso machines untouched, and showed no interest in the iPad the cafe uses for customer orders.
Yet her notebook full of recipes and notes on the precise way to roast various types of coffee beans, one of her most prized possessions, is missing. She stored it in a desk drawer in the cafe’s back office, and she expects only someone intimately familiar with the store would know to look for it.
“It makes us feel like the target wasn’t money,” said Anna Seo, Kim’s niece and an employee at the store. “It’s all very strange.”
Neither Kim nor her sister and co-owner, Kim Seo, can think of any former employees who might’ve harbored a grudge after leaving the cafe, which has been open for just over a year now. Arlington County police spokeswoman Kirby Clark said the department is investigating the incident, but doesn’t have any description of the suspect (or suspects) just yet.
“This has never happened before and we never thought about it,” Kim Seo said. “This area in Arlington was supposed to be pretty safe. It’s very weird and scary.”
Nevertheless, she says the business is open as normal, even if it is still missing the glass from its front door.
Anna Seo notes that the whole incident “could’ve been much worse,” all things considered. But she is still frustrated that her aunt would lose so much hard work, so suddenly.
“Each of our roasts change, based on the season and the temperature, and she had that all written down,” she said. “Now, she’ll basically have to start from scratch.”
Some Arlington Forest residents are speaking out after spending the last four days without cable or internet service.
Frustrated Verizon Fios customers in the neighborhood are taking to social media and emails to ARLnow to lament the lack of response from the company since their service went down early Saturday morning.
Ken Schellenberg, who lives on 1st Street N., says that Verizon has sent a half dozen estimates for when the problem might be resolved — and has repeatedly missed its targets.
“Promised text messages about updates on the issue never arrive,” Schellenberg wrote. “They claim it’s a widespread outage but neighbors close never lost service at all. It seems more random.”
Some of Schellenberg’s neighbors have reported similar issues on Twitter, where Verizon support staff have been able to offer only limited answers.
Our #Fios has been out for 4 days and we’ve gotten no info from @Verizon when it will be back. Every time we call, they push the estimate back 12 hours! @VerizonSupport I need it for WORK!! @ARLnowDOTcom
Another neighbor here. Online support only tells me “don’t worry” or tries to transfer me to sales to renew contract. Signed up for text alerts and have rec’d none despite restoration time changing at least 9 times. No verizon trucks seen in area. Customer service FAIL.
Verizon spokeswoman Laura Merritt told ARLnow.com that the company’s engineers are currently looking into the issue. She’s hoping to be able to offer more details soon.
(Updated 7:30 p.m.) It isn’t easy being an independent coffee shop with only a handful of part-time employees, especially one outside of a Metro corridor in chain-heavy Arlington.
But Arlington Forest’s Sense of Place Café, which opened eight months ago, is making a go of it and has slowly been gaining both popularity and solid Yelp reviews.
The cafe was full for a Wednesday at mid-morning (March 28), and two baristas scrambled to fill orders quickly while chatting with an ARLnow reporter. On a normal day, the shop sees about 50 customers.
Most customers who walked up to the counter had something positive to say about Sense of Place Café, even if they hadn’t yet tried the shop’s specialty coffee.
“You’re getting a lot of great press on the Mothers of North Arlington listserv,” one woman said to a barista as she ordered coffee, adding that she hadn’t heard of the place until recently but was happy to have more options in the area.
The coffee shop is located at the Arlington Forest Shopping Center, at 4807 1st Street N., and difficult to get to if one doesn’t live in the neighborhood or have a car.
“The size of this mall, it’s not a really busy mall,” explained the coffee shop’s co-owner, Kim Seo, pointing out the next door Brick’s Pizza as the shopping center’s main attraction. “It’s kind of frustrating, not many people come here.”
It’s about 1.2 miles away from the Ballston Metro station, which, according to Google Maps, is a 24 minute walk away. A lot of customers are within walking distance, Seo explained, but many Arlingtonians aren’t aware of the shop or how to get there.
But Seo has found ways to stand out, even if the shop faces geographical challenges. She focuses on the store’s own unique Enzymo Coffee brand, which ferments for two weeks before in-house roasting, and a mushroom tea with “high levels of antioxidants.” She also posts frequently on the shop’s social media channels.
Seo added serving a variety of flavors has helped her and her sister, Kay, the shop’s licensed barista, grow the business.
Listening to customers’ needs, like expanded weekend hours, has also helped. Previously, the coffee shop was open Monday-Saturday, but now has dropped the Monday hours and is open Tuesdays-Fridays from 7 a.m.-3 p.m., and Saturdays-Sundays from 8 a.m.-2 p.m.
Kim did this to capture the weekend crowd, which she says is easily her busiest time, and now she sees more people come and enjoy a cup instead of rushing to work.
Coffee shop Sense of Place opened August 7 in Arlington Forest
The cafe’s coffee bar serves pour-over coffee and has a no laptop policy
Sense of Place is located in the Arlington Forest Center strip mall
It also serves various hot and cold drinks and homemade food
The new cafe serves Enzymo Coffee, its own brand
Staff said the fermented coffee beans help prevent post-caffeine crashes
Sense of Place replaced a Subway at 4807 1st Street N.
A new coffee shop is open in Arlington Forest in a low-slung shopping center just off Arlington Blvd.
Sense of Place (4807 1st Street N.) replaced a Subway sandwich shop in the Arlington Forest Center. It opened yesterday (Monday), next door to Brick’s Pizza, the DaVita dialysis center and the Mathnasium of Arlington education center.
Sense of Place features a coffee bar that serves specialty pour-over coffee, which uses a filter and a dripper to extract more flavors. At the bar, a certified barista will serve the coffee, while a sign nearby expressly bans the use of laptops to encourage customers to enjoy their drinks without distraction.
“At the bar, customers take the time to see, smell, and taste subtly different notes of flavors and textures with every sip that they may not have noticed before,” the cafe’s website reads.
The new cafe serves its own house-brand coffee, called Enzymo Coffee. The coffee beans undergo a natural fermentation process before being roasted, which staff said keeps the coffee fresh, the acid content low and prevents any post-caffeine crashes an hour or two after drinking.
Also on offer: various other hot and cold drinks as well as homemade pastries, paninis and sandwiches.
Early Tuesday morning, the store was already doing brisk business, despite having been open for just one day. Multiple customers told ARLnow how excited they were to have an independently-owned coffee shop in the plaza, which is also home to Outback Steakhouse and used to house the now-shuttered Filipino grocery store Fiesta Oriental.
Sense of Place is open from 7 a.m.-3 p.m. weekdays and 8 a.m.-2 p.m. Saturdays. It is closed on Sundays.
The Arlington County Police Department will hold National Night Out activities in neighborhoods across the county this evening (August 1).
Police will take part in a number of activities with local residents, including block parties, cookouts, safety demonstrations, youth events, visits from emergency personnel and more.
National Night Out aims to better relationships between the police and the communities they patrol. Many police departments around the country participate.
“We are committed to building strong partnerships with those we protect and serve and effectively communicating to ensure the public’s trust.” said spokeswoman Ashley Savage.
“Events such as National Night Out are important because they provide us with another opportunity to interact with our community, hear about any public safety concerns they have and continue to use effective problem-solving methods to reduce and prevent crime and improve the quality of life of Arlington’s residents, visitors and businesses.”
Events will be hosted at the following locations:
Arlington Forest (200 block of N. Galveston Street) at 7:30 p.m.
Arlington Partnership for Affordable Housing (First Presbyterian Church, 601 N. Vermont Street) from 5:30-8 p.m.
Barcroft Community House (800 S. Buchanan Street) from 6-7:30 p.m.
Cathcart Springs townhomes (4600 4th Road N.) from 6:30-7 p.m.
Fairlington Villages (3000 block of S. Abingdon Street) from 5-7 p.m.
Park Glen Condo Association (800 block of S. Arlington Mill Road) from 7-8 p.m.
Nauck Town Square (24th Road S. between Shirlington Road and S. Kenmore Street) from 6-8:30 p.m.
The County Board will consider a plan to revamp an intersection of Route 50
Work would be carried out at the intersection of Route 50 and Park Drive (via Google Maps)
The construction would add new sidewalks near the traffic circle
Grass grows where the new sidewalks would be
Currently, there are no crossings around the traffic circle
Other sidewalks would also be widened
County staff estimate that 64,000 vehicles pass through the intersection each day
The busy intersection of Route 50 and Park Drive is set for improvements under a plan being considered Saturday by the Arlington County Board.
The intersection, in the Arlington Forest neighborhood, is slated for new sidewalks, upgraded traffic lights, high-visibility crosswalks and new trees, curbs and gutters.
The majority of improvements are slated for the intersection and a small stretch of N. Park Drive between Route 50 and a traffic circle. That’s also near a small strip mall that includes an Outback Steakhouse restaurant.
County staff estimate that 64,000 cars travel through the intersection daily, and the traffic volume and speed can make life difficult for bicyclists, pedestrians and those getting on and off buses. The intersection has also been the scene of numerouscrashes.
Staff said the plan creates an “urban-style intersection that will reduce speeding and the incidence of collisions, and ultimately improve safety for all.
“The project will create better access and crossings for pedestrians, transit users, bikers and those traveling on the shared-use paths parallel to Arlington Boulevard,” they continued.
The County Board is set to award a construction contract for the plan at its meeting Saturday. The contract is worth just under $1.5 million, with $224,000 as a contingency for rising costs. More than $1 million of funding is through the Virginia Department of Transportation’s Highway Safety Improvement Program, with the county adding $461,000 in general obligations bonds.
Under a timeline proposed by staff, construction would begin in August.
Sunga said the store has become an unofficial gathering-spot for the area’s Filipino community
Fiesta Oriental will close June 30, having been open since 1991
The Arlington Forest store provides Filipino groceries and other services
Local schoolchildren also frequent the store for snacks
Sunga has stayed true to his Filipino roots after moving to the United States in 1978
Since opening Filipino grocery store Fiesta Oriental in 1991, Fred Sunga and his family have done much more than sell food and provide other services to a bevy of loyal customers.
“When you have a Filipino business, your country people, they come to you for information,” he said. “They always call you, if they have a problem they will call you. Even if sometimes their car won’t start they will call and ask if I know a mechanic.”
But next month marks the end of an era, as the 67-year-old Sunga is set to retire on June 30 and close the Arlington Forest staple at 4815 1st Street N. That means that the area’s growing Filipino community must go elsewhere for groceries or to send money and packages to family back in the Philippines.
Sunga moved to the United States in 1978 and started working in a bank before opening Fiesta Oriental. He prides himself on staying true to his Filipino roots, right down to watching television shows from the Philippines in the store and speaking to customers in Tagalog, the country’s official language, or one of its many dialects.
And in addition to Filipinos, who come from as far away as Manassas and Maryland to shop at his store, local schoolchildren will now have to go elsewhere for their after-school snacks.
“When the school bus stops there, the kids are going to come and get their candy and soda,” Sunga said. “Just last week I told them that I’m closing up the store next month, and they said, ‘Why? Why are you doing this to me?'”
For the family, Fiesta Oriental was a major part of growing up in Arlington. Sunga’s three daughters, Audrey, Alyssa and Angelica, all worked there at least part-time from elementary school onwards and helped on Sunday when they would cook and sell homemade Filipino dishes.
The store is open every day from 10 a.m. to 8 p.m., except Sundays, when it closes at 6 p.m.
Audrey Sunga, who has a 2-year-old son, Emmett, and another baby due in August, said it is a shame that the family business will close before they are old enough to appreciate it.
“We’re going to start buying rice for the first time in our lives,” she joked. “For Emmett and the baby on the way, it’s kind of sad they won’t be able to see this. We grew up with it our whole lives, so it’s sad to see it go.”
Fred Sunga, meanwhile, said he is looking forward to being a “stay-at-home grandpa,” and enjoying more time with his family. Both Audrey and Alyssa work in Arlington and graduated from VCU, while Angelica is still there studying electrical engineering.
While he is excited to start the next chapter of his life, Fred Sunga said it is hard when customers are clearly upset he is leaving.
“I’m going to miss the store that I’m doing every day,” he said. “Especially when my customers, when they come here and I’m telling them I’m retiring next month, I feel so sad when they say, ‘Oh my God, I’m going to miss you.’ Some old people, they cry when I tell them I’m retiring.”
A collision between two cars closed westbound Arlington Blvd
A gray Acura collided with a white Honda
The accident happened at the intersection of Route 50 and N. Park Drive
Police closed westbound Arlington Blvd from N. Henderson Road to N. Park Drive
Eastbound lanes on Arlington Blvd proceeded as normal
Police set up a diversion for westbound traffic
Officers restricted access to the nearby shopping plaza
Police closed part of westbound Arlington Blvd during the Friday morning rush hour after a collision between two cars in Arlington Forest.
Officers shut Route 50 from just before N. Henderson Road to the intersection with N. Park Drive at around 8:30 a.m. Drivers heading west on Arlington Blvd. were diverted around the crash scene.
A police officer at the scene said it appeared that the driver of a gray Acura tried to turn left from the westbound lanes collided with a white Honda heading in the other direction. Neither driver appeared to sustain injuries, and the Acura was able to drive from the crash to a tow truck.
Firefighters and medics spread sand on the street to soak up any spilled fluids from the cars.
Both cars were removed from the accident scene at around 8:50 a.m. The eastbound lanes remained open, with traffic passing through as normal.
