Markham Street project gets green light from Planning Commission

A rendering of the proposed apartment building on Markham Street.

The Fairfax County Planning Commission approved Oct. 30 without objection – or even any comments – a recommendation to urge the Board of Supervisors to approve a rezoning application allowing the construction of a mixed-use project on Markham Street in Annandale.

The proposal calls for a 12-story, 310-unit building with space for a restaurant and/or retail on the ground floor. It would be built on a 3.4-acre site currently occupied by the AMF Annandale Lanes bowling alley. The building would have a mix of one and two-bedroom units and efficiencies. The project would include a linear park along Markham Street. 

The bowling alley would be town down.

The rezoning application was submitted by Markham Place LLC, a joint venture of Southern Management and the Webb Cos. It would be the first major building project in Annandale since the Annandale amendment to the Fairfax County Comprehensive Plan was approved in 2010.

While the Planning Commission had scheduled a public hearing on the proposal for Oct. 30, no one planned to speak against the project. So Janet Hall, the commissioner representing Mason District, said a hearing wasn’t necessary. She noted the Mason District Land Use Committee and Annandale Central Business District Planning Committee had both endorsed the project, as well as the Department of Planning and Zoning.

The staff report by the Zoning Evaluation Division says Fairfax County Public Schools expects the project to generate 32 new students. The applicant has agreed to commit a proffer of $346,400 (at the FCPS recommended rate of $10,825 per student) for school facility improvements. The building would be in the attendance areas for Mason Crest Elementary School, Poe Middle School, and Falls Church High School.

The new building would be next to the Seoul Plaza shopping center and would  lie between Markham Street, Little River Turnpike, and Annandale Road.

Other proffers would address such issues as parking, bicycle facilities, stormwater management, improvements on Markham street, construction of a new local street along the northern boundary of the property, workforce housing, an electric vehicle charging station, landscaping, and “bird-friendly design elements.”

The proposal includes two options for workforce dwelling units – providing all the units required by the county (20 percent of the total units) in the new building or distributing some of those units in the new building and some at The Parliaments, an apartment complex on the other side of Markham Street operated by Southern Management.

The Board of Supervisors has scheduled a public hearing on Markham Place for Nov. 18 at 3 p.m.