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Two Arrested for Brawl at Union Jack’s

Published February 20, 2013 at 3:45PM

An incident that started with an exchange of words inside Union Jack’s (671 N. Glebe Road) and spilled outside sent a man to the hospital for a brain injury.

According to police, on Friday, Feb. 8, the two groups were involved in a verbal altercation inside the bar which escalated throughout the night. Both parties left and while one group of four was trying to walk away, the other group allegedly followed and started a physical altercation.

One of the victims was knocked down and had his head kicked, resulting in a subdural hematoma, or bleeding on the brain. He spent four days in the hospital and was released to the care of his mother, who lives out of state. At the time he was released, the victim had not yet regained hearing in one of his ears.

Another victim was knocked out when she was punched in the face. She has made a full recovery and police anticipate she’ll participate in any upcoming trial or legal proceedings against the suspects.

Two people from the attacking group were arrested. Kevin Gutierrez, 21, was charged with malicious wounding and two counts of assault and battery. He spent four days in jail and has been released on bond. Ebony Hunter, 22, was charged with one count of assault and battery. She was released after being booked.

Police were able to catch up with the suspects quickly due to several witnesses reporting the fight. However, there are varying reports of exactly how many people took part in brawl, and some of the details reported by those involved are fuzzy.

“Everybody’s recollection of the night was a little bit impaired due to the amount of alcohol that was consumed,” said Arlington County Police spokesman Dustin Sternbeck.

New Ballston Sandwich Shop to Open in April

By ARLnow.com

Published February 20, 2013 at 9:55AM

A new sandwich shop is expected to open in Ballston in April.

Which Wich, which is replacing the former Daily Grind coffee shop at 4300 Wilson Blvd, has set Monday, April 22 as a tentative opening date, according to company spokesperson Hala Habal.

Based in Dallas, Texas, Which Wich has more than 300 locations in 30 states. The Arlington location is the first in the D.C. area and the third in Virginia.

The company is best known for its customizable sandwiches and its unique ordering system.

Which Wich offers more than 50 varieties of customizable, toasted “wiches,” from the signature Wicked® sandwich, loaded with five meats (turkey, ham, roast beef, pepperoni, and bacon) and choice of three cheeses, to unique items such as Thank You Turkey®, with stuffing and cranberry sauce. The Which Wich menu also includes plenty of vegetarian options, such as tomato & avocado and black bean patty, as well as 30 healthy wiches and bowls for less than 400 calories each. Guests can dine in or take out. Catering is also available.

Which Wich is known for its creative ordering system. Guests use red Sharpies® to mark up pre-printed menus on sandwich bags. They select a sandwich from one of 10 categories, then choose the bread, cheese, spreads, and toppings. The sandwiches are prepared to guests’ exact specifications, toasted to perfection, and delivered in the now-personalized sandwich bags. After they’ve enjoyed their wiches, guests are encouraged to draw on their bags using red Sharpies and hang their “artwork” on the community wall.

In addition to customized, toasted wiches, customers can enjoy hand-dipped shakes, signature house chips, and just-out-of-the-oven cookies in an edgy yet magnetic environment. Which Wich locations newspaper reading stations, free wi-fi, and a community wall showcasing the sandwich bag artwork.

Which Wich is also proud of its Sandwichfaction Guarantee®. We stand behind all of our sandwiches. If you’re not 100% satisfied with your wich at the time you receive it, we will replace it, refund your money, or both.

Store photos courtesy “JohnB2”

Board to Consider Long Range Plan for N. Quincy Street

By ARLnow.com

Published February 19, 2013 at 1:50PM

The current Harris Teeter supermarket and Mercedes-Benz dealership near Ballston could eventually be replaced with high-rise buildings under a new land use plan that’s up for County Board consideration this weekend.

On Saturday, the Board will consider an addendum to its 1995 North Quincy Street Plan. The amendment modifies the plan for the area around the Mercedes dealership and adds a plan for a parcel of land bounded by Carlin Springs Road, Glebe Road, N. Thomas Street and the Hyde Park Condominiums. The latter parcel includes the Harris Teeter store and its surface parking lot.

The plan “includes a series of overarching planning principles aimed at transforming this predominantly auto-oriented area into a more vibrant, mixed-use urban neighborhood at Ballston’s southern gateway, with a much more pedestrian-friendly built environment,” according to the staff report. It calls for 12-14 story mixed-use buildings along Glebe Road, tapered down to 5-story buildings on the edges of the parcels closer to lower-density residential neighborhoods.

The plan also calls for ground floor retail space along Glebe Road, improvements to the Glebe Road intersections with N. Randoph and Quincy Streets, extensions of N. Tazewell Street and Randolph Street, a portion of open green space between N. Thomas Street and the new Tazewell Street extension, a landscaped plaza at the corner of Glebe and Quincy, and a series of “distinctive” architectural features.

No immediate changes would be mandated under the plan; instead, it would encourage gradual redevelopment through zoning modifications. Should a mixed-use building replace the existing Harris Teeter, the store may opt to move in to the ground floor of the new building once it’s built.

Part of the plan area is already slated for redevelopment — last year the County Board approved a new six-story apartment building on the Goodyear site at the corner of Glebe and N. Carlin Springs Road.

Work on the addendum started in 2009 as a joint project between county staff and Arlington’s Long Range Planning Committee. It incorporates feedback from the county’s Planning and Transportation commissions.

Some nearby residents, particularly residents of the Hyde Park Condominiums, have expressed objections to the plan. Among other objections, Hyde Park residents said that the maximum building height along Glebe Road should be 12 stories — the same height as their building — instead of 14 stories.

Image (below) via Google Maps

Potomac River Running Completes Move

By ARLnow.com

Published February 15, 2013 at 3:15PM

Arlington’s Potomac River Running store has completed its move across Ballston.

On Thursday the store wrapped up a move from its former location at 3924 Wilson Blvd to the new location at 4501 N. Fairfax Drive. The new running store is located next to a FedEx office location, across from the Marymount University “Blue Goose” building at the corner of Fairfax Drive and Glebe Road.

While the new store doesn’t have the surface parking lot of the former location, it is validating parking at the building’s underground garage off of N. Vermont Street.

Store co-owners Ray and Cathy Pugsley told us last month that the move was prompted in part by the former location’s lack of street visibility, concern that the single-story shopping center they used to be in would be redeveloped, and the new location’s better proximity to the Custis Trail.

Red Parrot Asian Bistro Opens Soon

By Katie Pyzyk

Published February 5, 2013 at 1:45PM

Ballston is about to get an influx of Chinese, Japanese, Korean, Thai, Malaysian and Vietnamese foods. All of those varieties will be served up at Red Parrot Asian Bistro (1110 N. Glebe Road) when it opens next week.

Workers are setting up furniture and making finishing touches on the restaurant, so owner Wendy Cheng expects to have a soft opening by next Thursday (February 14), with a grand opening in March. She already has two successful Red Parrot restaurants in Maryland, and had been looking to open an Arlington location for a while.

“Arlington’s a great place,” Cheng said. “We want people to enjoy, to explore more good food. I think we’re right for here, a great restaurant for all these people.”

Cheng is originally from Hong Kong and used to be an engineer. She has a number of family members in the food industry and eventually decided to open her own restaurant due to a passion for cooking and an enjoyment of customers.

“We love cooking and I decided engineering is really not for me. I’m a people person,” Cheng said. “I’m a foodie and I’m a good chef myself.”

Instead of only offering one variety of Asian food, Red Parrot takes popular dishes from many cultures — such as Chinese dim sum, Japanese sushi and udon noodles, Vietnamese pho, Thai curry and pad Thai, Korean bibimbap and freshly made Malaysian roti flatbread. Less traditional items include cheesesteak egg rolls, spicy chicken wings and grilled ribeye steak.

“When you look at Chinese restaurants, they have all kinds of good food, and then a lot of things you’ll never order,” said Cheng. “I just want the best. I just picked the good items.”

Cheng said Red Parrot uses high quality ingredients and has high food turnover to make sure it stays fresh and flavorful. She noted that, for example, many Asian restaurants use lower quality or frozen seafood that doesn’t taste as good or has an unpleasant texture. She boasted that even the lobsters used in some of the Red Parrot entrees and the sushi are fresh.

“We focus on quality. I focus on everything from scratch, very high quality,” she said. “I love food. So I enjoy seeing people enjoying the food.”

Head Chef Sotheerny Massey is from Thailand and also prides herself on the fresh foods made from scratch. She pointed out that even the noodles are made fresh in-house.

“We plan all the food together, it’s great, we come up with ideas,” said Massey. “Sometimes the customers want to talk. We are happy when our customers like our food.”

The Red Parrot’s food will be available for carry out and for delivery within about a five mile radius. There will be happy hour specials at the restaurant from 2:00-6:00 p.m., Monday through Friday. In addition to drink specials, happy hour will include discounts on selected foods like sushi and appetizers.

The restaurant is hiring immediately for a number of positions including bartenders, servers and hostesses. Applicants should call Wendy at 443-506-3042 or email [email protected].

Morning Notes

By Katie Pyzyk

Published February 5, 2013 at 9:01AM

School Boundary Meeting on Wednesday — Arlington Public Schools will hold its next school boundary meeting on Wednesday (February 6), at 7:00 p.m. in the Williamsburg Middle School auditorium. APS will share feedback gathered at the January 23 meeting, and present a smaller set of boundary options. After reviewing the options, meeting attendees will have the opportunity to offer feedback. The final set of options is expected to be offered to the School Board in late March.

Metro Region Worst for Traffic — The annual Texas A&M Transportation Institute survey lists the D.C. metro area as number one for the country’s worst traffic congestion, topping Los Angeles, San Francisco, New York and Boston. The average driver is said to spend 67 hours per year sitting in traffic. Analysts believe drivers will add seven hours to that number by 2020. [Washington Post]

Cuccinelli Backs Alternative Transportation Plan — Virginia Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli is not backing Gov. Bob McDonnell’s transportation plan, but rather a plan that’s considered the conservative alternative. Instead of eliminating the gas tax and increasing the sales tax as McDonnell’s plan proposed, the alternative plan would replace the current gas tax with a sales tax on gasoline. McDonnell’s plan has been controversial, including when the Arlington County Board bashed the proposal late last month. [Washington Examiner]

Free Pancakes at IHOP — Customers at IHOP can get a free short stack of pancakes today. Guests celebrating National Pancake Day are encouraged to leave a donation for Children’s Miracle Network Hospitals. The offer is limited to one stack per customer while supplies last. Arlington’s lone IHOP is at 935 N. Stafford Street in Ballston.

Flickr pool photo by Wolfkann

Crime Report: Taxis Stolen

By ARLnow.com

Published January 30, 2013 at 5:00PM

Hard-driven, high-mileage taxicabs might not seem like a very attractive target for car thieves, but in the past week three have been stolen from the same block of Columbia Pike.

Arlington County auto crimes detectives are “actively engaged in” an investigation into the thefts, said ACPD spokesman Dustin Sternbeck, who couldn’t recall any other taxi thefts in Arlington in the past year. The cabs all had D.C. tags and ranged in model year from 1998 to 2004.

From the stolen vehicle portion of this week’s crime report:

01/23/13, DC 01232H, 2004 Ford Crown Victoria (Taxi), White/Yellow, 5500 block of S. Columbia Pike
01/23/13, DC H95014, 2002 Ford Crown Victoria (Taxi), Blue, 5500 block of S. Columbia Pike
01/28/13, DC H87744, 1998 Ford Crown Victoria (Taxi), Blue and Gray, 5500 block of S. Columbia Pike

Also in this week’s crime report, a woman was grabbed from behind while walking home from the Ballston Metro station. Her purse was stolen but she was otherwise physically uninjured.

ROBBERY, 01/24/13, 4400 block of N. 4th Street. At 11:53 pm on January 23, as a female victim was walking home from the Ballston Metro station alone, she was approached from behind by a male subject who placed his hand over her face and grabbed her purse. The subject fled the scene on foot and was not located. He is described as a black male, approximately 5’7” tall and 160 lbs. He was wearing a black wool coat, dark jeans, knit hat, light colored scarf and dark gloves at the time of the incident.

The rest of the crime report, after the jump.

File photo

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Protein Bar Opens Tomorrow in Ballston

By Katie Pyzyk

Published January 29, 2013 at 12:25PM | Updated January 29, 2013 at 1:27PM

A new restaurant aimed at offering high protein foods is opening in Ballston tomorrow. Protein Bar (800 N. Glebe Road) will start serving its blended drinks, wraps and other entrees around lunchtime on Wednesday.

The goal is to serve foods high in protein, high in fiber and low on refined sugars. Founder Matt Matros based the menu on the diet that helped him lose weight.

“I grew up heavy. I switched to the high protein diet and ended up losing 50 pounds in a summer. It’s all of the foods we sell now,” Matros said. “The idea being that high protein foods help you feel full longer, so if you have something higher in protein you’ll not snack later on in the day. That’s what’s worked for me and it’s worked for a lot of our customers.”

Matros went to business school and then worked for Kraft Foods for a while. He became discouraged by the lack of restaurants offering foods along the lines of his high protein diet, so he decided to launch Protein Bar.

“I realized there was no place that started the kind of foods I wanted to eat, so that’s when I decided to start it all myself,” he said.

The first restaurant opened in May of 2009 in Chicago, and Matros recently has been looking for other markets to move into. The D.C. metro is the first place Protein Bar has expanded outside of the Chicago area. Matros says coming here seemed like a natural fit because the people lead similar lifestyles as those in Chicago.

“They eat healthy, they’re educated, they can appreciate what we’re doing,” Matros said. “They’re urban professionals, they’re busy, they don’t have time for lunch.”

Eventually, Matros hopes to expand into other areas in Northern Virginia, like Rosslyn.

“Arlingtonians have a coolness about them,” he said. “We definitely enjoy being here.”

Protein Bar will open tomorrow (January 30) at 11:00 a.m. and will give food away to the first 50 customers. The restaurant will open for normal business hours (7:30 a.m.-8:00 p.m.) on Thursday. Protein Bar will be closed on Sundays.

Race Celebrates Healthy Dating Practices

By Katie Pyzyk

Published January 23, 2013 at 3:58PM

As Valentine’s Day approaches, there’s much attention on relationships. Next month, a 6-mile race will weave through Arlington to promote healthy relationships and to bring attention to domestic violence.

The “No Fear in Love Race” is designed to celebrate healthy relationships and to teach teens and young adults how to avoid unhealthy ones. The idea behind the name is that experiencing fear in a relationship is an early indication that it may be unhealthy.

The third annual event begins at Marymount’s Ballston Center (1000 N. Glebe Road), and the race will take place on the Custis and W&OD Trails. There will be refreshments, group and individual race prizes, raffles, and discussions about the promotion of healthy dating relationships.

Advance registration is available online for $25, and same day registration will be $30. Race organizer Karen Bontrager hopes to raise $3,000 to offer a dating abuse survivor a one year scholarship to George Mason University.

“I have been on both sides,” Bontrager said. “If we can bring one person from darkness to light, it will be a life saved.”

Race time on Saturday, February 23, is at sunrise (6:45 a.m.), signifying movement from darkness to light. Participants are encouraged to wear purple because it is the color of royalty, and Bontrager says that is how everyone deserves to be treated in a relationship. Participants will also be able to honor a survivor of domestic violence.

Smoke at Ballston Metro Temporarily Shuts Station

By Katie Pyzyk

Published January 22, 2013 at 4:45PM

(Updated at 4:50 p.m.) The Ballston Metro station has reopened after temporarily closing due to smoke. However, Metro now confirms there was no fire inside the station.

A tipster sent a photo showing smoke flowing from the grate over Metro at Fairfax Drive and N. Utah Street.

According to Metro’s Twitter activity, debris inside a vent shaft began smoldering but there was no fire inside the station. The Arlington County Fire Department confirmed the smoke came from leaves that had ignited in a ventilation grate. Capt. Gregg Karl said that sometimes occurs if a passerby tosses a cigarette through the grates and debris below ignites.

The trouble started just before 4:00 p.m., and for about 15 minutes trains skipped the Ballston station while the smoldering debris was extinguished. Metro spokesman Dan Stessel said the brief incident affected two trains in each direction. Fans were brought in to clear the smoke and trains are again running on a normal schedule.

Photo courtesy @CAPT258

BREAKING: Man Charged in Fatal Christmas Eve Accident

By ARLnow.com

Published January 16, 2013 at 4:20PM | Updated December 23, 2021 at 3:15PM

A 21-year-old Alexandria man has been charged in the Christmas Eve death of a pedestrian in Ballston.

The victim, 30-year-old Shabnam Motahhar-Tehrani of Nokesville, Va., was standing on a sidewalk around 4:30 p.m. on Christmas Eve when the suspect ran a red light, according to police, causing a crash.

Motahhar-Tehrani was struck by the suspect’s vehicle as a result of the crash. She was transported to a local trauma center where she was pronounced dead at 8:00 p.m.

The suspect, Farhan Mohammad Khan, was charged with involuntary manslaughter after an investigation by the Arlington County Police Department. He’s being held without bond and faces up to 10 years in prison if convicted.

From an ACPD press release:

The Arlington County Police Department has taken a 21 year old Alexandria man into custody on an involuntary manslaughter charge stemming from a Christmas Eve fatal pedestrian accident. Farhan Mohammad Khan, 21, of Alexandria, VA is currently being held without bond in the Arlington County Detention Facility.

Khan was traveling northbound on N. Glebe Road at 4:30 p.m. on December 24, 2012 when he ran a red light and struck a vehicle in the intersection of N. Randolph Street. The accident caused his vehicle to spin out of control, striking 30 year old Shabnam Motahhar-Tehrani of Nokesville, VA as she was standing on the sidewalk. She was pronounced dead at INOVA Fairfax Hospital at 8:00 p.m. that evening.

The involuntary manslaughter charge is a Class 5 felony and carries a maximum sentence of up to ten years.

Photo (top) courtesy “Dixie.” Photo (middle right) courtesy ACPD.