Shirlington

ART Set to Run New Bus Route Connecting Ballston and Shirlington Starting This Month

By Alex Koma

Arlington Transit will start running a new bus route to better connect Ballston and Shirlington later this month.

Starting Dec. 17, the bus service will introduce a “72” route, running from N. Glebe Road’s intersection with Old Dominion Drive in Rock Spring to the intersection of S. Quincy Street and S. Randolph Street near the Village at Shirlington. Buses will run every 20 minutes during rush hours and every 30 minutes the rest of the day, according to ART’s website.

The transit agency first surveyed riders about the new route this fall, and it will use it to run buses through the Ballston Metro station, via both directions of George Mason Drive. ART also plans to run new buses along the route, some of which it acquired this summer.

The new 72 route will involve the creation of a total of eight new bus stops, including:

Northbound Bus Stops

Stop 1 – N. Glebe Road and in front of the Marymount Admissions Building
Stop 2 – N. Glebe Road and 32nd Street N.
Stop 3 – N. Glebe Road and N. Albermarle Street
Stop 4 – N. Glebe Road and N. Abingdon Street

Southbound Bus Stops

Stop 5 – N. Glebe Road and 35th Road N.
Stop 6 – N. Glebe Road and 33rd Road N.
Stop 7 – N. Glebe Road and Rock Spring Road
Stop 8 – N. Glebe Road and Old Dominion Drive

The route will run from 5:58 am to 8:37 pm every weekday.

File photo

New Restaurant Could Be Coming to Former Capitol City Brewing Space in Shirlington

By Alex Koma
1/5

A new restaurant could soon be on the way for the space formerly occupied by Capitol City Brewing in Shirlington.

A tipster recently told ARLnow that workers in the area believe Lazy Dog Restaurant and Bar is eyeing the property at 2700 S. Quincy Street, part of the Village at Shirlington shopping center. The chain is primarily based in California, with locations in Colorado, Illinois, Nevada and Texas.

Barbara Caruso, a spokeswoman for Lazy Dog, confirmed that the restaurant is evaluating the location, which would be its first in the D.C. area.

“Lazy Dog is exploring a potential future location in the Arlington area but a lease has not yet been signed,” she said.

According to the restaurant’s website, the menu is centered around traditional American fare, with brunch options as well. Lazy Dog also boasts an extensive beer list.

Since Cap City closed up shop in March, ending its 22 years in business, the space has seen a flurry of construction activity, but otherwise remained empty. That work could be tied to plans from the shopping center’s owner, Federal Realty Investment Trust, to add new buildings to the area and refresh the development.

The property owner asked county officials for a special General Land Use Plan review of the area last December, which could ultimately clear the way for more density on the site. However, that request “has not been addressed due to the current county staff workload,” according to minutes from a Nov. 14 meeting of the Long Range Planning Committee.

I-CE-NY Set to Open Today in Village at Shirlington

By Catherine Douglas Moran

I-CE-NY is set to start dishing out ice cream today in Shirlington.

The unique ice cream chain, which serves “smashed and rolled ice cream” with mix-ins like fruit, cookies and candy, started in Thailand before expanding to New York City in 2015 and then other U.S. cities.

Debuting on the same day as Shirlington’s Light Up the Village event, the shop plans to offer a “Buy One, Get One Free” rolled ice cream promotion today (Nov. 29), a spokeswoman for Federal Realty told ARLnow.

With more than 250 locations across Asia and more than 20 locations in the U.S., this is I-CE-NY’s first D.C.-area location.

In October, signs in the windows of a storefront at 4150 Campbell Ave for I-CE-NY indicated that it would take the former Knits Etc. space. The shop neighbors Samuel Beckett’s Irish Gastro Pub and Diana Nails.

I-CE-NY offers a number of signature pre-set ice cream and mix-in combos, including “Mango Sticky RI-CE” and “Strawberry Cheese-CE Cake,” per its website.

The ice cream gets made by pouring the ice cream base — including flavors such as “Thai I-CE Tea,” “Biscoff Cookie Butter,” “Cookie Spree,” “Want S’mores” and more — with a choice of mix-in ingredients on a custom-designed metal plate that can get as cold as -15 degrees Fahrenheit, the spokeswoman said. It is then chopped, smashed, flattened and served in chubby rolls.

Deer Killed in Unusual Circumstances Near Shirlington Neighborhood, Police Say

By Alex Koma

Arlington police are investigating after a deer was killed in some unusual circumstances near Shirlington.

Officers discovered the deceased deer around 4:45 p.m. last Saturday (Nov. 17) in a wooded area along the 2600 block of S. Walter Reed Drive, according to Arlington County Police spokeswoman Kirby Clark. The area is home to some woods backing up to residential neighborhoods — Fairlington is on one side, Claremont is on another — as well as a trail along Lucky Run.

Clark says that animal control officers collected the animal and added that “at this point, the incident is not believed to be criminal in nature.”

However, neighbors who witnessed the incident and its aftermath believe someone felled the deer with a bow and arrow of some kind, and several posted about it in a local Facebook group.

Jennifer Toussaint, the county’s chief animal control officer, said she could not confirm those reports. Clark similarly added that she is “not able to confirm the deer’s cause of death.”

Arlington does have an ordinance making it illegal for “any person to shoot a compound bow, crossbow, longbow, or recurve bow at or upon the property of another without permission,” or within “100 yards of any public road, public building or structure, private residence or structure, or property of another.”

But the county does allow for the bow hunting of deer without antlers in certain time periods. Deer season ran from Oct. 6 through Nov. 16 this year, with another “late season” hunting period for the month of April.

Flickr pool photo by Lisa Novak

Morning Notes

By ARLnow.com

McChrystal Speaks Out Against Lee — Amid the furor over changing the name of Washington-Lee High School, Gen. Stanley McChrystal, who attended W-L, says it’s time to set aside icons like Robert E. Lee and “combat our desire to mythologize our history and our leaders.” [Washington Post]

Soft Opening for Shirlington Ice Cream Shop — Rolled ice cream shop I-CE-NY is scheduled to hold a soft opening tonight in Shirlington from 4:30-9:30 p.m. [Instagram]

Fill the Cruiser Tonight — The Arlington County Police Department is holding one of its three planned “Fill the Cruiser” holiday toy drive events today from 2-6 p.m. at the Fashion Centre at Pentagon City mall. “A cruiser will be located in the food court next to the Christmas tree,” ACPD notes. [Arlington County]

E-CARE Stats — This month’s Arlington E-CARE disposal and recycling event collected more than 100,000 pounds of hazardous household materials and used electronics products. [Twitter]

AFAC Helps Less Fortunate Celebrate Thanksgiving — The Arlington Food Assistance Center gave away 2,500 turkeys, along with other Thanksgiving staples, over the past week. Hunger remains an unresolved issue at a time when Amazon’s future arrival will likely exacerbate inequality and housing unaffordability in Arlington. [Washington Post]

Nearby: Big New Development in Falls Church — “The development team of EYA, PN Hoffman and Regency Centers was chosen by the Falls Church City Council Monday night to orchestrate a dense and diverse $500 million development of 10.3 acres of City-owned land where its George Mason High School currently sits,” near the West Falls Church Metro station. [Falls Church News-Press]

Celtic Festival Returns to Shirlington, Set to Prompt Road Closures Saturday

By Vernon Miles
1/3

Expect road closures along Campbell Avenue in Shirlington tomorrow (Saturday) for the fifth annual Samuel Beckett’s Celtic Festival.

From 8 a.m.-8 p.m., the street will be closed from S. Randolph Street to the parking garage entrance in front of the Shirlington Harris Teeter.

The event itself runs from 11 a.m.-7 p.m. Live music, as well as bagpipes, is scheduled both inside and outside Samuel Beckett’s Irish Gastro Pub (2800 S. Randolph Street).

After 7 p.m., the party is scheduled to continue inside the pub with a band performing from 9:30 p.m.-1:30 a.m. Irish food and drink vendors will be located along Campbell Avenue.

Street parking during the festival will also be restricted. Motorists are encouraged to park in the Randolph Square Parking Garage behind the pub.

Festival photos via Facebook

Renovations on the Way for Former Capitol City Brewing Space, Though Future Remains Murky

By Alex Koma
1/5

There’s some renovation work on the way for the space once occupied by Capitol City Brewing in Shirlington, though the location’s long-term future remains unclear.

Sterling-based construction company Cypress Contracting secured permits in August to make “interior alterations” to the space at 2700 S. Quincy Street, part of the Village at Shirlington shopping center, county records show.

However, the permits do not make clear whether the changes are coming ahead of a new tenant moving into the space, with the documents noting that the changes are designed for “portions of an existing restaurant space” that will slightly reduce its square footage and involve a new “partition that creates a common service space.”

A spokeswoman for Federal Realty Investment Trust, the company that owns the shopping center, didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment on the location’s future.

Signs listing the space for lease still adorn its facade, as of Tuesday morning, and a small construction fence sits outside its storefront along Campbell Avenue.

Capitol City closed its Shirlington location back in March, after serving up brews there for the past 22 years. The chain’s D.C. location remains open, though the company filed for bankruptcy shortly after closing the Shirlington restaurant.

I-CE-NY Coming to Shirlington Village

By ARLnow.com
1/4

A unique ice cream chain that started in Thailand before expanding to New York City and then other U.S. cities is coming to Shirlington.

Signs are up in the windows of a storefront at 4150 Campbell Ave for I-CE-NY, which serves “smashed and rolled ice cream” with mix-ins like fruit, cookies and candy. That confirms our earlier report that the former Knits Etc. space would be filled by an ice cream shop.

I-CE-NY offers a number of signature pre-set ice cream and mix-in combos, including “Mango Sticky RI-CE” and “Strawberry Cheese-CE Cake,” per its website.

The business is currently hiring “ice cream crafters” for the new Shirlington location. So far there’s no word on an exact opening date.

Dudley’s Inches Ever Closer to Opening, Begins Hiring

By Alex Koma
1/3

Dudley’s Sport and Ale in Shirlington is inching ever closer to opening, with plans to start hiring employees in the coming days.

Owner Reese Gardner told ARLnow that an “exact date” for opening of the long-awaited sports bar, located at 2766 S. Arlington Mills Drive, still remains unclear.

However, the restaurant did host a hiring fair this past Sunday (Sept. 23), and Gardner said the pub should be open soon. He’s been working since 2015 to bring the new bar to the space once occupied by The Bungalow Sports Grill, though he’s run into a series of delays over the years, some of which have been linked to the 3,000-square-foot rooftop space he’s building atop the 12,000-square-foot restaurant.

In a Facebook post earlier this month, the restaurant’s staff attributed some of the delays to more requirements from county planners, scuttling Gardner’s plans to open the bar in time for football season.

“Please understand we also want the venue to be open also but there have been continuous hurdles to overcome with this construction process,” staff wrote. “The latest is Arlington County would like us to add a dry sprinkler system to the outside rooftop area. The bottom floor is basically finished except for paint and small punch list stuff.”

Gardner added that the restaurant is now awaiting “final inspections” from the county, which will determine when exactly Dudley’s is able to open its doors.

Sinkhole Opens in Shirlington Condo Complex Parking Lot

By Alex Koma
1/3

A small sinkhole seems to have opened in the parking lot of a Shirlington condo complex, snarling traffic in the neighborhood.

The hole, now several feet wide, is centered in a parking space near the 2900 block of S. Woodstock Street, where the Courtbridge I condominiums are located.

Elizabeth Hallman, who lives nearby, told ARLnow she first saw the sinkhole appear yesterday (Thursday), while a car was still parked in the space.

“At first, one of its back wheels started to dip down a little,” she said. “But just a little while later, it was really low, to the point where the front wheels were noticeably higher.”

She added that a “very skillful” tow truck driver was able to remove the car from the space a short time later.

As of this morning (Friday), crews were hard at work to patch up the hole. They’ve closed a section of S. Woodstock Street while those repairs continue.

Lotus Grill and Noodles in Shirlington Closes

By Vernon Miles

(Updated at 7:30 p.m.) Lotus Grill and Noodles, a Vietnamese restaurant in Shirlington, has closed its doors for good.

The restaurant has been on 4041 Campbell Ave in the heart of Shirlington since 2013. From its Facebook page:

We’d like to thank all our local patrons, loyal customers and our friends & family [who supported] us over the past 5 years, and even thanks to our Facebook fan just hitting “like” us and never had a chance to visit us once. Yes, we surely missed being a part of a nice area [like] Village of Shirlington. Adieu, ciao, sayonara, bye bye and thank you again.

The interior of the restaurant is currently empty, but the owners said at the door that they are currently showing off the space to new clients.

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